Words are vocal sounds and vocal sounds are meaningful. They are meaningful in the same way as are expressions of the face and postures of the whole body. When one among other “A” tuning forks vibrates, they all do. When one person vocalizes, all those who hear it experience the effects of those sounds. We all experience the feeling-condition of the vocalizer upon hearing their sounds. We experience the feeling of all vocal sounds, be they non-verbal exclamations or words. The sounds made for the formation of words affect us when they appear in words and when uttered simply as non-verbal sounds. The use of vocal sounds in words causes us to think of their meaning in terms of the things to which they, as words, refer. When the same sounds are uttered simply as vocal sounds, not as parts of words, they are meaningful in terms of the feelings they represent/generate. We are accustomed to assuming that words mean only the things which they name. The issue of their meaning not as referential tools, but only as sounds, does not often arrise. However it is this primary meaning that enables the use of the spoken word to supply us with a sense of the meaning of our world. That relative sense is human culture. Our spoken language supplies us with what instincts supply other creatures, a sense of what to do. Their sense of what to do is hardwired, ours is based upon the perceived meaning of things. Because our actions result from our culture, it is incumbent upon us to create a culture which fosters humane behavior. Our culture evolved into its present form before the advent of weapons of mass destruction. The roots of our culture are as ancient as are the roots of our language. Our culture may have been somewhat adequate for our species-survival long ago: is it adequate now?
Joseph Gilbert On Jun 7, 2011, at 8:55 AM, Tony Whitson wrote:
As a song by the Brazilian popular artist Rita Lee was playing in the background, it came to me that desire plays into how words do their meaning, through a kind of saudade do ainda nao~.I could offer "nostalgia for what has not yet been" as a translation for "a saudade do que ainda nao~"; but that does not seem to ring the same. Vocal sounds do participate in the being of words, _pace_ the death wishes of analytical philosopers who long for a mastery of meaning as mere content of the propositional residues, or shadows, of speaking / writing / etc.On Tue, 7 Jun 2011, Joseph Gilbert wrote:Words are vocal sounds. Vocal sounds are meaningful. Joseph Gilbert On Jun 6, 2011, at 9:15 PM, Tony Whitson wrote:Peirce explicitly contended that the meaning of any sign (including words, thoughts, arguments, feelings, or whatever), _qua_ signs, lies in the virtuality of potential future interpretations (just by virtue of the fundamental nature of what it is to be a sign, i.e., in the activity of sign-relations). Also, notice that I'm using "meaning" as something that we -- and our words, thoughts, etc. -- DO, not something they contain, convey, etc. I recently noticed similar usage in the title of Jay's MCA review of Sfard's book, which speaks of "Meaning Mathematically," not "mathematical meaning." The latter locution could mean the same as Jay's, but it also would allow the more familiar reading of "meaning" as a noun. If we need to begin meaning differently than how we might be heard to mean in positivist discourse, I think we need to begin choosing speaking that resists assimilation to that discourse.On Mon, 6 Jun 2011, mike cole wrote:The poem is neat and your explication brings to mind a recurrent thought when I encounter the core idea of "the thought is completed in the word." I (think I) know what LSV and Mandelshtam are saying, but I always have this thought that the thought is not yet completed, not in so far as it is taken up, perhaps transformed, and comes back again at a later time, in some new,albeit related, form, to begin that side of the cycle over again. mikeOn Sun, May 1, 2011 at 2:24 PM, Tony Whitson <twhitson@udel.edu> wrote:I clipped the wrong line from Martin's post in that last message. I meant the Dickinson verse in reponse to the line that now appears below fromMartin.In Dickinson's verse, what's not timeless is not merely the meaning that a word does as a lexical unit in a language (i.e., in the philological sense), but even in a specific utterance the word spoken continues meaning, as itcontinues living, non-timelessly. On Sun, 1 May 2011, Tony Whitson wrote: On Tue, 26 Apr 2011, Martin Packer wrote:For LSV word-meaning is not timeless. It changes over time; he didn'tstudy philology for nothing! A word is deadWhen it is said Some say. I say it just Begins to live That day. --Emily DickinsonI find it helpful to think of meaning as something that words do -- notsomething they contain, convey, etc.Tony Whitson UD School of Education NEWARK DE 19716 twhitson@udel.edu _______________________________ "those who fail to reread are obliged to read the same story everywhere" -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970) __________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca__________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmcaTony Whitson UD School of Education NEWARK DE 19716 twhitson@udel.edu _______________________________ "those who fail to reread are obliged to read the same story everywhere" -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970) __________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca__________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmcaTony Whitson UD School of Education NEWARK DE 19716 twhitson@udel.edu _______________________________ "those who fail to reread are obliged to read the same story everywhere" -- Roland Barthes, S/Z (1970) __________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca
__________________________________________ _____ xmca mailing list xmca@weber.ucsd.edu http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca