Short Wave - 'Arrival': How To Talk To Aliens

Episode Date: July 2, 2021

(Encore episode) The 2016 movie Arrival, an adaptation of Ted Chiang's novella Story of Your Life, captured the imaginations of science fiction fans worldwide. Field linguist Jessica Coon, who consulted on the film, breaks down what the movie gets right — and wrong — about linguistics. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Shortwave from NPR. Jessica Coon was a teenager when she first learned that linguistics is a thing. She'd stumbled upon Story of Your Life, a science fiction novella by Ted Chang. It's all about a linguist trying to figure out how to communicate with, well, aliens. I think it was actually probably the first time I heard about the field of linguistics. And yeah, then I started college the next year. I saw an introduction to linguistics course and signed up for it. These days, Jessica's a field linguist at McGill University.

In particular, I work on syntax. Basically, the way words combine to make sentences. And a few years ago, she got an email to be a consultant on a movie. A movie that was coincidentally based on the exact novella she read as a teenager. I'm not trying to draw any connections that aren't there, but you read about linguistics for the first time in a book that became a movie that you became the person they consulted with. It's amazing, right? It's pretty wild. I mean, when I first got the email that asked me to work on this film, I was really ready to push spam because it sounded very strange.

And then at some point I saw the story of your life and I said, wait a minute, I haven't thought about that in years. and then I responded. That film, 2016 sci-fi hit Arrival. So real quick, in case you haven't seen it, here's the gist. This is the day they arrived. All of a sudden, 12 spaceships land all over Earth. And we don't know why. They're not doing anything. Eight hours after landing, there's still no signs of first contact.

They're just sitting there. And so governments around the world are panicking, trying to figure out why are these alien spaceships sitting here. And different teams are going in to try to understand why they're here what they want. And we are following one of these spaceships that I think is somewhere in Wyoming. And they bring in Amy Adams, who is a linguist. And her job is to decipher the alien language and figure out what they want. Human. So today on the show, another installment of the Shortwave Science Movie Club,

what the movie Arrival got wrong about linguistics, what it got right, and whether or not field linguist Jessica Coon has actually communicated with aliens. Honestly, it's a toss-up. I'm Maddie Safaya. You're listening to Shortwave, NPR's Daily Science Podcast. So, Jessica, you were the linguist who consulted on the movie Arrival. So give me a big picture sense of what that means. Like what did they actually have you do?

Yeah, so the first thing I did was I got to read drafts of the screenplay, which was really fun because it's a very common thing to do in academia. We read things and we give feedback on them, but usually not at this fun of a scale. The best committee meeting ever. Exactly, yeah, it was very fun. So I got to read the screenplay, and they especially wanted feedback on how linguistics and linguists were, represented in the film. So there were lots of places where I gave feedback and, you know, they incorporated it into the film. There were other places where they would say, okay, Jessica, yes, yes, like, thanks for your help. But really, in the end, linguists are not Hollywood's primary

audience and we're not going to get everything right here. And now you linguists just get to join, like, all of the other fields of people who get really annoyed when their science is misrepresented on screen. So welcome to the club. Sorry, we're not going to change that. The movie makers also put Jessica through some exercises, basically giving her a whiteboard and asking her, what would you do if aliens showed up? And those exercises actually informed one of the most famous scenes in the movie. When the main character, Luis Banks, played by Amy Adams,

schools the guy in charge of the mission about the fundamentals of linguistics. He asks her for a list of vocab words, essentially the key words she was planning on teaching the aliens that day. You have a vocabulary list for me? I do. These are all grade school words. Eat, lock. Help me understand.

So Amy Adams walks over to the whiteboard and scribbles, what is your purpose on Earth? Okay, this is where you want to get to, right? That is the question. Okay. So, first we need to make sure that they understand what a question is. the nature of a request for information along with the response. Then we need to clarify the difference between a specific you and a collective view

because we don't want to know why Joe Alien is here. We want to know why they all landed. And purpose requires an understanding of intent. We need to find out do they make conscious choices or is their motivation so instinctive that they don't understand a why question at all. And biggest of all, we need to have enough vocabulary with them that we understand their answer. I get it. Stick to your list.

I love that scene. Yes, that is one of the great triumphs of linguistics in the film. Yeah. I mean, this was one of the most interesting parts of the movie for me because I'm, you know, this idea of building a base for understanding of a new language is like really, interesting and like the first steps in trying to communicate, which is, you know, like your thing, right? So, but it's something that I think we just don't think about. And to see it in kind of in practice was so fascinating. And I'm glad to hear it was like pretty well done in your eyes, question mark. Yeah, I think it, I think it was really well done. I mean, I think one thing that is

really neat about this movie and what makes it such, you know, interesting and intellectual sci-fi is They're not just typical humanoid creatures. We don't already have some kind of magical universal translator in place. And so we have to figure out how do they even communicate and will we be able to communicate with them? Given how advanced they are that they've made these spaceships and have arrived on Earth, I think it's safe to assume that they have some advanced form of communication and that that form of communication should have patterns in it that we could eventually decipher. But thinking about, you know, is it audible or is it written or could creatures communicate with smells or, you know, like we just have no idea what could be out there.

If it's audible, is it in a sound frequency that human ears can pick up? Yeah, for sure. Okay. All right, Jessica. So I'm sure a rival doesn't get everything right in its portrayal of linguists. Are there particularly, like, cringe-worthy moments for you, Jessica? There are a few of them. So actually one of the scenes that I think is in the trailer for the movie

is when Forrest Whitaker's character, Colonel Weber, shows up at Amy Adams' office. I'm Colonel G.T. Weber? The reason he's there is because she is on the top of everybody's list of translators. You are on the top. Everyone's list when it comes to translations. And linguistics, as I mentioned, It's the scientific study of human language.

Linguists are really not translators. This is a separate skill set. I could not translate anything for anybody. Many linguists do speak multiple languages. So, you know, sometimes this is how people get interested in linguistics, but it is not a prerequisite for being a linguist. So if there are listeners out there thinking, oh, that sounds so cool, but I'm bad at learning languages,

I could never be a linguist. Rest assured, you definitely can. There are lots of excellent linguists who claim to be terrible at learning language. Okay, so Jessica, at the end of the movie, it is revealed to us that the aliens have come to Earth to kind of give us the gift of their language when, you know, used correctly can help you see through time, like see your future, essentially. So my first question is, as a professional field linguist, Jessica, can you see through time? Yes, definitely. Good. I wanted to establish that. But no, really, I mean, one of the cool things about the movie is that they explore this idea that the language that you use changes the way that you perceive the world. And this is actually an idea that's, you know, that's at least been debated in linguistics. And so talk to me a little bit about that idea.

Sure. Yeah. So this idea is called linguistic relativity or the Superior Wharf hypothesis. And it's the idea that the language you speak constrained. or determines your thoughts or how you see the world. And when it comes to sort of larger world vision, you know, this has been pretty clearly shown to not be correct. So, you know, humans have basically the same cognitive abilities regardless of the language they speak. And it's even, you know, a worry with this is if taken too far, it can be a very easy way to exoticize

or other people who speak differently from us, right? You know, like, this culture just speaks a different language, and so they're basically, you know, they don't have the same thought processes as we do, and that's not true. But of course, we don't know anything about alien languages. So that's sort of the fun science fiction part of the movie is, you know, alien languages likely are very, very different from human languages. Yeah, yeah. And of course, then there's sort of the larger plot element of what she is seeing in the future. And really, I think it's a story about humanity. and families and, you know, what kind of choices you would or wouldn't make if you saw that a crisis was coming but knew that there was happiness along the way. I think it's good. I completely liked it. The headline is, movie good, Jessica Coon. Well, I say this in part because, you know, some linguists have said, why did you let them have all that Superior Wharf stuff in there? We all know that's not right. But if you take that out, it's really, you know, it's not the same movie anymore. Yeah, you know, and also, I'll say,

They don't know. You know what I mean about alien language? You don't know. These are a different set of rules. We don't know anything. Yep. All bets are off. So, you know, very important question, Jessica, scientifically, is, did you meet Amy Adams for this? I did get to have lunch with Amy Adams. Probably the most glamorous thing I'll ever get to do in my academic life. And she was awesome. She was very cool. She had excellent questions. She was super smart. super interesting to talk to. We had a really good conversation. Oh, awesome. And I think, you know, one thing that's really special about this movie that she pointed out is that, you know, this is a science fiction film with a female lead, right? She's not just the love interest. If anything,

the man, Jeremy Renner, he's the love interest. Like, she is the lead and she is a scientist. And apparently, um, it's unusual in films to first cast the woman. Usually the man is cast first. And then they pick the woman sort of based on chemistry of the man they've already selected. And this is not how this movie works. So I think, you know, it's wonderful for the field of linguistics for us to get this kind of publicity. And now people know a little bit more about what linguists do. And it's also, I think it's really neat from the point of view of having women scientists represented on the big screen. Okay, Jessica Kuhn. This was so much fun.

Thank you for your time. Thank you for your brain. I appreciate it. Sure. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. This was fun. Today's episode was produced and fact-checked by Britt Hansen and edited by Viet Le. I'm Maddie Safaya. Thanks for listening to Shortwave from NPR.