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.They are related to other concepts intheoretical systems, which systems of concepts and conceptual relations give eachconcept its meaning.If this is true, how can the word s meaning be given by itsfunction as a part in a sentence ? Clearly, it cannot, this is not enough you haveto know to which theoretical system the word/concept belongs before you canreasonably know what the word, the concept, means and what it in its relationalmeaning implies and is implied by.So, rather than a word s meaning being givenby its function as a part of a sentence (Palmer, 1981:37), it seems more justifiableto argue that its meaning is given by its function as a part of a theoretical system. 164 The reading of theoretical textsIt seems, then, as if general semantics stands to language in action as languagestands to parole or, better perhaps, adopting Benveniste s (1971f:101 1) distinction,as the linguistics of the sign and language stands to the linguistics of the sentenceand discourse, where the linguist of language sees the sentence as the ultimate level,while it is the minimal unit for the linguist of discourse (Benveniste, 1971f: 108).What Benveniste advocates is, then, a linguistics of levels (Benveniste, 1971f: 104).However, Benveniste s claim that the sentence is not only the minimal but alsothe highest unit, since it cannot integrate any higher unit (Benveniste, 1971f: 106),must be questioned.His argument rests on the assumption thatA statement can only precede or follow another statement in a consecutiverelationship.A group of propositions does not constitute a unit of an ordersuperior to the proposition.(Benveniste, 1971f:109, italics mine)However, if a sentence, or a statement, is an inter-sentence, or an inter-statement,i.e., related in one way or another: logical, for example to other sentences/statements, these other sentences/statements are among what give the sentence/statement its meaning.And if a statement is made in the name of a theory, themeaning of this statement is dependent upon other statements made in the nameof the same theory.Thus, it seems as if Benveniste s claim is somewhat unfounded there is at least one relation between statements/sentences other than the merely consecutive , there is, in short, (at least) a logical relation that has to be accountedfor.Thus, we may accept Benveniste s two linguistics with this proviso, claimingthat instead of the sentence/statement being both the minimal and the maximalunit, it is only the minimal, while the highest unit is a larger one, possibly theargument or inter-argument, as I have indicated above.The two linguistics thus deal with two distinct levels of language; we have todeal with in the movement from language to discourse emergent properties : new properties appear , as Ricoeur notes (Ricoeur, 1986:67).It is on the level ofdiscourse, the level of language in action (Benveniste, 1971f:110), where the meaningpotentialities discussed above reside, and general semantics, as an abstract objectivismin the words of Voloshinov (for example, 1986:58), cannot but ignore it, since itfalls outside its scope.In a slightly different terminology, Voloshinov has, then, reached much thesame conclusion:The most accurate way of formulating the interrelationship between themeand meaning is in the following terms.Theme is the upper, actual limit oflinguistic significance; in essence, only theme means something definite.Meaning,in essence, means nothing; it only possesses potentiality the possibility ofhaving a meaning within a concrete theme.(Voloshinov, 1986:101) Holes in wholes in wholes 165As all arguments, utterances, questions and answers, etc.are made from a pointof view, from within a specific language practice, this leaves little room for a generaltheory of semantics as long, that is, as it sticks to its predilection for autonomouswords and/or sentences.But general semantics as the Science of Meaning (cf.Ullman, 1962) is faced withyet another problem, which a theory of reading cannot ignore, and which truly oughtto belong to any theory pretending to deal with meaning or understanding languagein action.This problem is that of silence, of omission, of absence, the significance ofwhich was already identified by Althusser while reading Capital (for example, 1975:29).Certain omissions, absences, silences are telling, but how can they ever be detectedgiven that the word or the sentence are considered the ultimate meaning-carryingunit? Important in this respect are not only the absences identified by Ingardenas spots of indeterminacy and potentiality and the demands for concretizationthat are involved, and that were discussed towards the end of Chapter 5.Thereis at least one other absence or silence that also has to be reckoned with.A case in point is Vincent Descombes, whose Modern French Philosophy (1980)barely mentions Gaston Bachelard on the grounds that modern French philosophyis what is talked about at the time the book was written (Descombes, 1980:1 3),and Bachelard was supposedly not talked about, since he is absent in Descombes stext.However, as Mary McAllester Jones shows, his argument does not hold water.On the contrary, Bachelard was talked about in the mid-seventies by Canguilhem,by Lecourt, and by others (McAllester Jones, 1991:3f).As an absence in Descombes stext, it the absence is obviously there, but should we conclude that it is withoutsignificance, without meaning? It would go undetected by a general semantics,concentrated upon sentences as it is.Thus, for the science of meaning it wouldbe meaningless the meaninglessness of silence.But it is possible to read thisabsence turning Descombes upon himself, and give it a certain significance.It ispossible, in other words, to see this particular absence or silence as a manifestationof an inverted form of legitimistic thinking (mentioned in Chapter 2, above).Legitimistthought is, according to Descombes, the quest for sources, for identity: if myshameful origins leave me nameless and stateless, there is no place for me(Descombes, 1986:142).The process inverted, Descombes s silence may be seenas an instance of an anxiety of influence (Bloom, 1975), where legitimisticinheritance is both recognized and, in the act of silence, denied.This one instance, this one possibility of meaningful silence tells us that silencein general has to be taken into account, and that it is a problem of meaning thatsemantics as the science of meaning, as it is traditionally understood with its narrowconception of its object of knowledge, will hardly ever be able to theorize, howevermuch silence is conducive to the production of meaning [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.They are related to other concepts intheoretical systems, which systems of concepts and conceptual relations give eachconcept its meaning.If this is true, how can the word s meaning be given by itsfunction as a part in a sentence ? Clearly, it cannot, this is not enough you haveto know to which theoretical system the word/concept belongs before you canreasonably know what the word, the concept, means and what it in its relationalmeaning implies and is implied by.So, rather than a word s meaning being givenby its function as a part of a sentence (Palmer, 1981:37), it seems more justifiableto argue that its meaning is given by its function as a part of a theoretical system. 164 The reading of theoretical textsIt seems, then, as if general semantics stands to language in action as languagestands to parole or, better perhaps, adopting Benveniste s (1971f:101 1) distinction,as the linguistics of the sign and language stands to the linguistics of the sentenceand discourse, where the linguist of language sees the sentence as the ultimate level,while it is the minimal unit for the linguist of discourse (Benveniste, 1971f: 108).What Benveniste advocates is, then, a linguistics of levels (Benveniste, 1971f: 104).However, Benveniste s claim that the sentence is not only the minimal but alsothe highest unit, since it cannot integrate any higher unit (Benveniste, 1971f: 106),must be questioned.His argument rests on the assumption thatA statement can only precede or follow another statement in a consecutiverelationship.A group of propositions does not constitute a unit of an ordersuperior to the proposition.(Benveniste, 1971f:109, italics mine)However, if a sentence, or a statement, is an inter-sentence, or an inter-statement,i.e., related in one way or another: logical, for example to other sentences/statements, these other sentences/statements are among what give the sentence/statement its meaning.And if a statement is made in the name of a theory, themeaning of this statement is dependent upon other statements made in the nameof the same theory.Thus, it seems as if Benveniste s claim is somewhat unfounded there is at least one relation between statements/sentences other than the merely consecutive , there is, in short, (at least) a logical relation that has to be accountedfor.Thus, we may accept Benveniste s two linguistics with this proviso, claimingthat instead of the sentence/statement being both the minimal and the maximalunit, it is only the minimal, while the highest unit is a larger one, possibly theargument or inter-argument, as I have indicated above.The two linguistics thus deal with two distinct levels of language; we have todeal with in the movement from language to discourse emergent properties : new properties appear , as Ricoeur notes (Ricoeur, 1986:67).It is on the level ofdiscourse, the level of language in action (Benveniste, 1971f:110), where the meaningpotentialities discussed above reside, and general semantics, as an abstract objectivismin the words of Voloshinov (for example, 1986:58), cannot but ignore it, since itfalls outside its scope.In a slightly different terminology, Voloshinov has, then, reached much thesame conclusion:The most accurate way of formulating the interrelationship between themeand meaning is in the following terms.Theme is the upper, actual limit oflinguistic significance; in essence, only theme means something definite.Meaning,in essence, means nothing; it only possesses potentiality the possibility ofhaving a meaning within a concrete theme.(Voloshinov, 1986:101) Holes in wholes in wholes 165As all arguments, utterances, questions and answers, etc.are made from a pointof view, from within a specific language practice, this leaves little room for a generaltheory of semantics as long, that is, as it sticks to its predilection for autonomouswords and/or sentences.But general semantics as the Science of Meaning (cf.Ullman, 1962) is faced withyet another problem, which a theory of reading cannot ignore, and which truly oughtto belong to any theory pretending to deal with meaning or understanding languagein action.This problem is that of silence, of omission, of absence, the significance ofwhich was already identified by Althusser while reading Capital (for example, 1975:29).Certain omissions, absences, silences are telling, but how can they ever be detectedgiven that the word or the sentence are considered the ultimate meaning-carryingunit? Important in this respect are not only the absences identified by Ingardenas spots of indeterminacy and potentiality and the demands for concretizationthat are involved, and that were discussed towards the end of Chapter 5.Thereis at least one other absence or silence that also has to be reckoned with.A case in point is Vincent Descombes, whose Modern French Philosophy (1980)barely mentions Gaston Bachelard on the grounds that modern French philosophyis what is talked about at the time the book was written (Descombes, 1980:1 3),and Bachelard was supposedly not talked about, since he is absent in Descombes stext.However, as Mary McAllester Jones shows, his argument does not hold water.On the contrary, Bachelard was talked about in the mid-seventies by Canguilhem,by Lecourt, and by others (McAllester Jones, 1991:3f).As an absence in Descombes stext, it the absence is obviously there, but should we conclude that it is withoutsignificance, without meaning? It would go undetected by a general semantics,concentrated upon sentences as it is.Thus, for the science of meaning it wouldbe meaningless the meaninglessness of silence.But it is possible to read thisabsence turning Descombes upon himself, and give it a certain significance.It ispossible, in other words, to see this particular absence or silence as a manifestationof an inverted form of legitimistic thinking (mentioned in Chapter 2, above).Legitimistthought is, according to Descombes, the quest for sources, for identity: if myshameful origins leave me nameless and stateless, there is no place for me(Descombes, 1986:142).The process inverted, Descombes s silence may be seenas an instance of an anxiety of influence (Bloom, 1975), where legitimisticinheritance is both recognized and, in the act of silence, denied.This one instance, this one possibility of meaningful silence tells us that silencein general has to be taken into account, and that it is a problem of meaning thatsemantics as the science of meaning, as it is traditionally understood with its narrowconception of its object of knowledge, will hardly ever be able to theorize, howevermuch silence is conducive to the production of meaning [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]