The Languages of Pao
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The Languages of Pao is a science fiction novel by Jack Vance, first published in 1958, in which the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis is strongly true.
[edit] Plot
The planet Pao is a quiet backwater with a large, homogeneous, stolid population ruled by an absolute monarch: the Panarch. The current Panarch attempts to hire an offworld scientist, Lord Palafox from the Breakness Institute on the planet Breakness as a consultant in order to reform Pao. Before the deal can be concluded, however, the Panarch is assassinated by his brother Bustamonte, using mind-control over the Panarch's own son, Beran Panasper, to do so. Lord Palafox saves Beran Panasper and takes him to Breakness as a possible bargaining chip in his dealings with Pao.
Somewhat later, Pao is conquered by the Brumbo Clan from the planet Batmarsh and the Panarch Bustamonte is forced to pay heavy tribute. To rid himself of the Brumbos, he seeks the aid of Palafox, who has a plan to create technical, mercantile and warrior castes on Pao using customized languages and other means to shape the mindsets of each caste and to isolate them from each other and the general populace of Pao. Mostly to amuse themselves, some of the young people create a language they call "Pastiche", taking words and grammar from the three newly created languages and from the original Paonese language and mixing them seemingly at random. This enrages Palafox, but he regards this development as no more than a minor annoyance, failing to realize the tremendous long-term significance.
Beran Panasper infiltrates a corps of interpreters being trained on Breakness and returns to Pao incognito. After several years, the plan proves successful. The Brumbo Clan is repulsed by the warrior caste. Once Beran Panasper reveals to the masses that he is still alive, his uncle Bustamonte's popular support melts virtually overnight and Panasper claims the title of Panarch that is rightfully his without bloodshed. For a few years, the castes of Pao are highly successful in their respective endeavours and the planet experiences a short golden age. However, Panasper is upset about the divisions in the populace of Pao caused by the Palafox programme; the three new clans speak of the rest of the Paonese as "they" rather than "we" and regard them with contempt.
Beran attempts to return the planet to its previous state by re-integrating the castes into the general populace. Palafox opposes this move and is killed by Panasper, but the warrior caste stages a coup and takes command of Pao. Panasper convinces them that they cannot rule the planet alone, since they share no common language with the rest of the population, and that interpreters are still needed.
One interpretation of the end of the novel is that Beran Panasper is only in nominal charge of the planet, on the sufferance of the warrior caste, and that it is uncertain what will become of him and his plans of re-uniting the populace of Pao. Another way of seeing the ending is that Beran has outfoxed the warriors by getting them to agree to his decree that "every child of Pao, of whatever caste, must learn Pastiche even in preference to the language of his father". In the end, Beran looks ahead twenty years, to a future when all inhabitants of Pao will be Pastiche-speakers - i.e., will speak a langugue which mixes some attributes and mindsets appropriate to peasant cultivators, proud warriors, skilled technicians and smart merchants - which will presumably shape a highly fluid and socially-mobile society, composed of versatile and multi-skilled individuals.
[edit] Commentary
The Languages of Pao is a rather generic adventure novel and certainly not one of Jack Vance's most successful works. It has won a great deal of attention and some critical acclaim through its portrayal of language as a tool of social engineering. Even this is somewhat overrated, however, as the eponymous languages are by no means the only tools used to shape the mindsets of the technical, commercial and warrior castes. Vance returns to the discussion of language and mind in other novels, perhaps most notably in the Planet of Adventure series, in which he describes the language of the alien Wankh at some length.
Unlike most generic adventure stories, much of the time is devoted to Beren's education, and the development of his character. His changing attitude to the character of Palofax is also vital to the novel.
[edit] Sapir-Whorf
It is often said that The Languages of Pao shows a reality in which the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis is strongly true. Certainly Palofax makes this claim in his sales pitch to Bustamonte. But it is not at all clear if Palofax is overstating his case, is mistaken himself, or may even be lying. In the event, the new castes or sub-societies are created with strong cultural biases that supplement and reinforce their linguistic biases, and it is not at all clear which factors are the most influential. For example, the warrior sub-society (which we see the most of) trains its members from childhood that personal honor and the reputation of the group is the major value, compared to which personal comfort or wealth, or even obedience to orders is of little moment. Such training has been effective in real history (consider the case of Sparta) with no particular manipulation of language involved. This might well be the case in the world of Pao, too.
The basic assumption of Vance's book is shared with George Orwell's famous dystopia, Nineteen Eighty-Four - where the ruling regime creates an artificial languague, "Newspeak", designed to shape a completely submissive society whose members would have no rebellious or subversive thoughts (and certainly would perform no rebellious or subversive acts). The above cricism of Vance's work applies to Orwell's as well: the totalitarian regime described does not rely on the engineered langugue alone to achieve this result, but also on a vast repressive apparatus which makes any rebellious thought or act punishable by torture and death.
