History Main / CurseOfBabel

* ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery'', "[[Recap/StarTrekDiscoveryS2E04AnObolForCharon An Obol for Charon]]": a strange planetoid-sized living sphere infects the ''Discovery'' with a computer virus that, among other things, messes with the universal translator. As a result, crewmembers have trouble understanding one another or the instruments since everything gets translated to a random human or alien language (e.g. Burnham starts speaking to Pike in Klingon, while he responds in French). In a nod to the TropeNamer, Pike eventually greets Saru entering the bridge by saying "Welcome to the Tower of Babel" in Hebrew. Fortunately, Burnham knows that Saru has [[{{Omniglot}} taught himself 94 languages]] early in his Starfleet career, which has no doubt come in handy.

* In ''VideoGame/FortNite'' [[spoiler:the loop]] does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are.

* Aphasia (especially Wernicke's aphasia) is the RealLife version of this. It can be caused by strokes, brain damage, migraine headaches, and so on.

* Aphasia is the RealLife version of this. It can be caused by strokes, brain damage, migraine headaches, and so on.

'''Jasper:''' Portugeuse?\\

* One episode of ''Series/AgentsofSHIELD'' has Fitz, who's recently suffered from brain damage, develop aphasia. This leads to trouble when the agents need his help to stop the MonsterOfTheWeek, and all Fitz can say is "I didn't solve this today." They eventually figure out that ExactWords are in play, and "today" is the key word in the sentence: Fitz is trying to tell them that something he built ''previously'' can help them, but he can't accurately state "I solved this already."

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'', a pack of squirrels raise a ruckus after the Mayor builds a statue over the spot where they'd been burying their acorns. Bubbles, who can talk to animals, is unable to sort things out because she had been rendered mute after a bee she nearly swallowed stung her in the throat.

* ''Series/MorningGlories'' Issue #22 sees Hunter, Hisao and The Truants enter The Tower, causing each character to begin speaking in different languages. Interestingly, all the characters are able to understand one another, despite speaking seven different languages. A translation of the scene can be found in the [[http://www.multiversitycomics.com/annotations/mga-study-hall-issue-22/ Study Hall]] page.

* The original Tower Of Babel in ''Literature/TheBible''.
** The fate of the N.I.C.E. in C. S. Lewis' ''Literature/ThatHideousStrength'' is a ShoutOut to the Biblical Tower of Babel.
** The curse is then reversed at Pentecost, where the Spirit gave the apostles the ability to speak every language that existed in the known world. This was eventually considered a "sign gift" and became a matter of controversy that Paul dealt with in his epistles.

* In ''Series/Warehouse13'', stones from the tower make anyone touching them unintelligible to anyone who is also not in contact with a stone, effectively encrypting speech.

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1985'': In "Wordplay", Bill Lowery develops aphasia and gradually loses the ability to communicate with other people. The first indication of his condition is his wife Kathy telling him about a doctor named Bumper. He comments on his unusual name but thinks nothing more about it. When his neighbor Mr. Miller refers to his dog as an encyclopedia, Bill thinks that it is a practical joke. However, he becomes agitated when the mailroom attendant Robbie asks his advice on where to take Barbie for "dinosaur." Bill assumes that it is some sort of New Wave slang until he goes home and Kathy uses the same word. By the time that he goes to work the next morning, he cannot understand anyone and he is equally incomprehensible to everyone else. This presents problems when his young son Donnie has to be rushed to the emergency room. After Donnie is successfully treated, Bill has to learn the new language. He picks up one of his son's ABC books and sees that the new word for dog is "Wednesday." Other new words include "mayonnaise" for "experience," "trumpets" for "tricks," "throwrug" for "anniversary," "stepdad" for "seatbelt" and "elephant" for "emergency." Bill's own name is Hinge Thunder.

* In ''Anime/SenkiZesshouSymphogear'', [[{{Precursors}} The Custodians]] inflicted this on mankind over 5000 years ago, and caused humanity to lose its original language that they shared with each other and the Custodians. The goal of the first season's BigBad, Fine, is to try and destroy the Curse, which she states is anchored on the moon, believing they did so to intentionally screw over humanity and believed one of them, Enki, her lover, did it specifically to abandon her. [[spoiler: Turns out her attempts at doing so actually screwed over humanity by ''XV'', the fifth and final season. The Curse of Babel is not a mystical curse, but actually a computer program from the supercomputer, Marduk, that was inflicted on mankind from the moon, like she said. However, there was a really good reason for this. This is because the Custodians had a traitor, Shem-ha the Great Surgeon, who attempted to turn humanity into monstrous slaves for herself to try and raise an army to destroy the others. After she failed, she converted herself into words and etched herself into humanity's DNA via the original language. To counter this, the Curse of Babel was created to suppress the original language so that she would never rise again. Unfortunately, due to Fine's attempt to blow up the moon, uncovering the Lunar Ruins of Marduk, and then in Season 2, when Maria sung Apple, a Piece of the original language to give humanity a chance to connect for a brief moment to save the world from the rampaging Nepilim, jumpstarted her resurrection into the mortal plain. [[NiceJobBreakingItHero Oopsy poopsy]].]]

* ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'' features this plot once during part 5: ''[[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureVentoAureo Vento Aureo]]''. Narancia is briefly attacked by an enemy stand which rips off his tongue. After Giorno repairs it, Narancia finds himself unable to properly communicate urgent information about the enemy stand. [[spoiler: It turns out the attack was just a way for a second stand to attach itself to Narancia's tongue, forcing him to say the opposite of what he wanted, and even point in the wrong direction.]]

[[quoteright:350:[[ComicBook/JusticeLeagueOfAmericaTowerOfBabel https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jla_vol_1_45_textless.png]]]]

** The Tower of Babel story is OlderThanTheyThink -- an older Sumerian version of the story exists, [[https://web.archive.org/web/20160606142622/http://www.ancient-hebrew.org/36_babel.html as told here]].

** The Tower of Babel story is OlderThanTheyThink -- an older Sumerian version of the story exists, [[http://www.ancient-hebrew.org/36_babel.html as told here]].

* In ''VideoGame/Fortnite'': [[spoiler:the loop]] does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are.

* In ''VideoGame/Fortnite'', [[spoiler:the loop]] does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are.

* In ''VideoGame/Fortnite'', [[Spoiler:the loop]] does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are

* in ''VideoGame/Fortnite'', the loop does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are

* in ''VideoGame/Fortnite'' the loop does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are

* in "VideoGame/Fortnite" the loop does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are

* in "Videogame/Fortnite" the loop does this to people who enter it and also makes them forget who they are

The name of this trope comes from a [[TowerOfBabel structure in the Bible]] that mankind built to reach the heavens [[AGodAmI and become gods themselves]]. ''The'' {{God}} didn't like that, so He made all of them speak different languages to create mass confusion and halt the construction.