The Great Eskimo Vocabulary Hoax Summary

“The Great Eskimo Vocabulary Hoax” by Pullum discusses one of the most widespread fallacies related to linguistics; Eskimos have hundreds of words for snow, each fundamentally different, and used to describe a different type of snow. This incorrect information is taken as an interesting factoid of common knowledge, having spread from linguistics into general society, making it a widespread bit of ignorance that is difficult to combat. The Eskimo vocabulary hoax started when Whorf took Franz Boas’ information that Eskimo has at least four terms that refer to snow, and turned those four terms into seven, while stating that English only has one word for snow. From here the issue snowballed, with authors seemingly picking arbitrary large numbers and confidently asserting that Eskimo contains that many different terms for snow. Recent reports on Eskimo words for snow range

His main source is an Eskimologist at the University of Texas, Anthony Woodbury. This source states that Eskimo is not a proper language, that a single root in an Eskimo language can have hundreds of variations, and that some words can be commonly associated with snow, yet have a meaning that has nothing to do with snow. An example of the last point is igluksaq, which is usually taken to mean snow to build igloos, but literally translates to house-building materials. Another point made by Pullum is that snow serves as an ever-present background for an Eskimo life, just as sand is for beach bums, yet beach bums only have one word to refer to sand. One more argument made with common knowledge is that there is more than one English word for snow; blizzard, slush, sleet, and snow, to name a few. Pullum concludes his paper by citing Woodbury as his source that the Central Alaskan Yupik Eskimo language contains only about a dozen terms for