10 april 2000
from peter jones, sheffield hallam university, UK
dear xmca-ers
some further thoughts on the meaning/sense thing. references to vygotsky are,
i'm afraid, to the 1962 version. i'm taking up a issues which have already been
referred to in previous communications by harry, dot, and jay (to mention only
three!), mainly to do with the relationship between this sense/meaning thing
and activity (on the one hand) and thinking (on the other).
1) The relationship between meaning and sense is not that of the relationship
between external, ie social, genuinely communicative speech addressed to others
(henceforth external speech) and inner speech (for oneself). Insofar as both
external and inner speech are forms of verbal thinking then both meaning and
sense remain dimensions of both forms. Therefore, both meaning and sense are
part of the semantic make up of all words, external or inner. As Vygotsky
says: A word acquires its sense from the context in which it appears; in
different contexts, it changes its sense [146]. A word in a context means both
more and less than the same word in isolation..; This enrichment of words by
the sense they gain from the context is the fundamental law of the dynamic of
word meanings. Of course, Vygotsky is not speaking here of inner speech (or
only inner speech) but is talking about the fundamental dynamic of word
meaning, ie of word meaning as a unit of verbal thought (whether expressed
in external or inner speech). It is therefore as true of written forms as of
spoken forms: A word derives its sense from the sentence, which in turn gets
its sense from the paragraph, the paragraph from the book, the book from all
the works of the author.
2) If sense is not restricted to inner speech, then by the same token it is not
identical with the private and personal as opposed to the collective or
social. As can be seen from the quoted passages from Vygotsky, sense is a quite
objective (socially constituted) phenomenon expressing the fundamental law of
the dynamic of word meaning. Speech (whether external or inner) can be neither
produced nor understood without sense; it is an irreducible dimension of the
social facts of semiotic communication and mediation (including semiotically
mediated cognition - ie verbal thought). To illustrate, Vygotsky refers to the
fable the Dragonfly and the Ant by Krylov. The words Go and dance! have a
definite and constant meaning, but in the context of the fable they acquire a
much broader intellectual and affective sense. They mean both Enjoy yourself
and Perish. This means that by virtue of the specific relations between
words in this fable, or to put it another way, by virtue of the contribution of
these words to the sense of this particular fable, they acquire a new sense.
But we should remember that when we are talking about the sense of the fable,
we are also talking about people understanding that fable. Understanding the
fable (understanding the narrative and its sense and moral) is a verbal
thinking process, so that the generation of new sense within the fable is a
necessary and irreducible dimension of understanding it (making sense of it,
sorry for the pun). The generation of sense, either by the speaker/writer or
the hearer/reader (in attempting to recreate/respond to the speaker/writers
thought) is therefore part of the verbal thinking process. This brings us,
then, to the connection between the meaning/sense distinction and the
language/thought distinction.
3) Vygotsky calls meaning (as opposed to sense): only one of the zones of
sense, the most stable and precise zone...The dictionary meaning of a word is
no more than a stone in the edifice of sense, no more than a potentiality that
finds diversified realization in speech. Sense, then, is the actual; meaning a
potential to be realized. Meaning is a moment in the realizing and
instantiation of sense (whether in external or inner speech). Vygotskys Go
and dance! - the meaning (ie what it means outside of or, perhaps better,
before its use in the fable) is transformed, transmuted, sublated or negated
(to use the dialectical terminology) into sense. Another example: You are in a
building and a fire breaks out. There is no obvious means of escape from the
room where you find yourself. The room has brick walls, a door (open, with
smoke coming through) and a window (glass). There are tables and chairs. You
have to get out: this is a problem-solving task that requires thought. The
dictionary meanings of the words fire, smoke, wall, table, chair, window etc
do not (cannot) suggest a solution to this problem. A correct solution to this
problem (on the ideal plane) is a concept: a thought form which synthesizes,
as a plan of action, those properties and relations of things in the situation
which are essential to the realization of the goal (to escape). The dictionary
definition of table and window will not tell us whether this particular table
can be used to smash this particular window, and whether this window (when
smashed) can be used as an escape route (what floor are we on?). This
synthesizing movement of thought involves analysing the specific conditions of
the task, the relations between the given objects and circumstances; it
involves calculating objective possibilities (causal and temporal connections
etc). This connecting up of the concrete ingredients of the task in thought
generates the movement of sense - from the potential meanings of table, window
etc to the task specific senses of these words as they are caught up in the
thinking process of creating a solution to the problem. It is irrelevant
whether or not this thinking process is realized in external speech (eg if I am
part of a group of people trying to get out) or in my head (if I am alone). (I
have a paper on this looking at the role of language in joint practical
activity).
4) From this perspective (ie the role of meaning/sense in verbal thinking and,
hence, of activity), we could reconceptualize the meaning/sense relation in the
following way. Rather than thinking of meaning as dictionary meaning (where
dictionary meaning is in fact itself a particular, task-determined sense),
we could think of meaning as that which has already been meant using these
words, ie as a complex system of already established (more or less
conventional) senses: the semantic sediment of already established activities
and significant connections. Meaning tends to provide us with the typical,
canonical, tried and tested properties and relations of things. Meaning in this
sense (!) can only ever therefore be an ingredient of verbal thinking, which
involves creating something new - connecting things up, breaking things down,
etc in novel ways. Verbal thinking requires us to transcend these existing
semantic resources provided by meaning. So that the creation of sense by the
actual use of language in context as a tool of thinking (whether in external or
inner speech), the development of concretely adequate senses and sense
relations and systems mediates the movement of thought from the identification
of a problem through the analytical and synthetic processes of deepening our
understanding of things in order to find a solution. Thinking is not the use of
decontextualized word meanings as such, but involves transforming this semantic
resource into the system of concrete senses necessary to sustain the conceptual
connections necessary for the task solution.
5) The process Vygotsky described as the influx of sense (147) - the way in
which the senses of different words flow into one another - is also evident
in both external and inner speech (and therefore in egocentric speech as well).
But in inner speech, he argues, the phenomenon reaches its peak, with a
single word ... so saturated with sense that many words would be required to
explain it in external speech. Actually we may agree that the phenomenon
reaches its peak in inner speech, but not exactly for the reason given since
the concretized sense of words in external speech has the same quality.
Vygotsky also argues for the preponderance of the sense of a word over its
meaning (which he takes from Paulhan).
6) The condensation, abbreviation, etc of the form of verbal thinking (in
transition from external speech to inner speech and thought) which Vygotsky
argues for should not be interpreted as involving a loss (or movement away
from) the systematicity, and cognitive power of concepts (abstractions) as
realized in eg systems of scientific terms (meaning and sense) in external
speech or writing. The scientist who thinks through a problem and arrives at a
solution in his/her head (wordlessly, via relatively unconscious processes,
insight etc) is thinking in concepts. That system of scientific concepts which
we learn via external speech as the meaning (better, sense) of a system of
words (terms) is transferred (internalized) through our actual use of such
terms in intellectual activity into a capacity to use these concepts
wordlessly. This is the plane of thought itself as Vygotsky puts it [149] -
that plane of verbal thought which is still more inward than inner speech,
where every thought creates a connection, fulfills a function, solves a
problem. At this level ideas are not inchoate (as implied in Richard
Prawats paper in the new MCA), amorphous or unformed; thought, as Vygotsky
argued, has its own structure, maximally - most instensively - focussed on
solving the task to hand. A speaker often takes several minutes to disclose
one thought, he argues, not because it is unformed but because in his mind
the whole thought is present at once [150].
7. Finally, Eugene's reference to Ilyenkov on this puzzled me a bit. i know the
reference to 'ideal bread' (in Dialectical Logic) but as far as i know there is
no discussion of the sense/meaning thing in this connection - eugene, could you
please give us more info about this one?
With apologies for the long ramble.
best wishes to all
P
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