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Conference Paper

Olfaction in a hunter-gatherer society: Insights from language and culture

MPS-Authors
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Wnuk,  Ewelina
Language and Cognition Department, MPI for Psycholinguistics, Max Planck Society;
International Max Planck Research School for Language Sciences, MPI for Psycholinguistics, Max Planck Society;
Categories across Language and Cognition, MPI for Psycholinguistics, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons119

Majid,  Asifa
Language and Cognition Department, MPI for Psycholinguistics, Max Planck Society;
Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, External Organizations;
Categories across Language and Cognition, MPI for Psycholinguistics, Max Planck Society;

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http://mindmodeling.org/cogsci2012/papers/0207/index.html
(Abstract)

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Fulltext (public)

paper0207.pdf
(Publisher version), 129KB

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Citation

Wnuk, E., & Majid, A. (2012). Olfaction in a hunter-gatherer society: Insights from language and culture. In N. Miyake, D. Peebles, & R. P. Cooper (Eds.), Proceedings of the 34th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2012) (pp. 1155-1160). Austin, TX: Cognitive Science Society.


Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/11858/00-001M-0000-000F-3BD5-F
Abstract
According to a widely-held view among various scholars, olfaction is inferior to other human senses. It is also believed by many that languages do not have words for describing smells. Data collected among the Maniq, a small population of nomadic foragers in southern Thailand, challenge the above claims and point to a great linguistic and cultural elaboration of odor. This article presents evidence of the importance of olfaction in indigenous rituals and beliefs, as well as in the lexicon. The results demonstrate the richness and complexity of the domain of smell in Maniq society and thereby challenge the universal paucity of olfactory terms and insignificance of olfaction for humans.