The hypothesis of linguistic relativity, also known as the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis , the Whorf hypothesis, or Whorfianism, is a principle suggesting that the structure of a language affects its speakers' world view or cognition, and thus people's perceptions are relative to their spoken language. However, the idea did not originate with Edward Sapir or Benjamin Lee Whorf, but rather, was imported from German humanistic thinking by various American authors. Being related to the concept of the spirit or "Geist", it is a core tenet of Völkerpsychologie and other versions of post-Hegelian philosophy and German romanticism.