Re: [xmca] Word Meaning and Concept

[mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com>]

Huw & Andy:

How different are your interpretations?
Andy  points out that "Vygotsky says in several places that the word is the
sign for or carrier of the concept" and goes on to say that meaning is
action.

Is this what you are saying, Huw, or that meanings are instruments of
action?

mike

On Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 8:21 AM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>wrote:

>
>
> On 13 June 2011 04:42, mike cole <lchcmike@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> That is to compacted and complicated for me to be able to gloss to myself,
>> David.
>> I am struggling with the polysemy of both "meaning" and "concept" in this
>> discussion to make sense of their relationship very well. Ditto sign and
>> symbol, although Huw's
>> note about signs and shadows nudged me along. I noted that Anton referred
>> in
>> a recent note to "tool and sign/symbol" and wondered what he meant, but
>> was
>> too preoccupied to ruminate.
>>
>> Here is a thought I had while ruminating. Might it be appropriate to say
>> that meaning is a tool of human processes of concept formation ?
>>
>>
> Yes, I think so.
>
> Re nudges, you might like to consider that analog phenomena occurs in
> parallel (all at once), whilst the non-analogical aspects of speech and text
> are sequential.  In other words, speech is a serialized description of a
> plan.
>
> Words, word meanings, predicates and propositions serve the function of
> (sequential, serialized) description.  Describing is a particular kind of
> action, or activity.  Concepts are used to regulate (coordinate) action.
>
> In this context, I think it would be useful to distinguish word meanings
> from sentence meanings, such as the child's utterance of "Dog!", i.e.
> "There's a dog!"
>
> Huw
>
>
>> mike
>>
>> PS- There was a fascinating segment on the American Evening TV Program, 60
>> minutes, this evening.. A controversy about "The N word" , the banning of
>> Huck Finn, and the success of a book which substitutes the word "slave"
>> for
>> the word "nigger." One proponent of the argument for using slave was
>> teacher
>> who is shown in class discussing "the n word", asking her class, "why do
>> we
>> say the N word instead of 'n-i-g-g-e-r' spelling it out?"
>>
>> Now THERE is an example of the power of the book!! At least I am not alone
>> in my
>> confusions about such matters.  :-))
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Jun 11, 2011 at 8:17 PM, David Kellogg <vaughndogblack@yahoo.com
>> >wrote:
>>
>> >  This is Evald Ilyenkov, "The Concept of the Ideal', in "The Ideal in
>> Human
>> > Activity", Pacifica, CA: MIA, p. 268:
>> >
>> > "The meaning of the term 'ideal' in Marx and Hegel is the same, but the
>> > concepts, i.e. the ways of understanding the 'same' meaning are
>> profoundly
>> > different. After all the word 'concept' in dialectically interpreted
>> logic
>> > is a synonym for understanding the essence of the' matter, the essence
>> of
>> > phenomena which are only outlined by a given term; it is by no means a
>> > synonym for 'the meaning of the term' which may be formally interpreted
>> as
>> > the sum total of 'attributes' of the phenomena to which the term is
>> > applied."
>> >
>> > Ilyenkov then goes on to discuss Marx's cuckoo-like propensity "not to
>> > change the historically formed 'meanings of terms'" but to propose very
>> > different understandings thereof, and thus to change the very concept.
>> >
>> > Three questions:
>> >
>> > a)  In addition to the ONTOGENETIC argument against the equation of
>> meaning
>> > and concept (viz. that if meaning were already equivalent to concept
>> then
>> > meaning could not develop into a concept), can't we make a SOCIOGENETIC
>> one?
>> > Doesn’t this sociogenetic argument explain both the cultural adaptation
>> of
>> > concepts over time (e.g. “quantity” into “operator” in math, “grammar”
>> into
>> > “discourse” in linguistics) and the cuckoo like exaptation of other
>> people’s
>> > terms to express quite different concepts by Marx and by Vygotsky (e.g.
>> > "egocentric", "pseudoconcept", etc.)?
>> >
>> > b) Viewed sociogenetically, isn't this distinction between conceptual
>> > essence and word meaning the same as the distinction between
>> signification
>> > value and sense value? That is, from the point of view of Johnson's
>> > dictionary (or the Kangxi dictionary, or the Port Royal grammar, or any
>> > other state codification of meaning) the state-ratified meaning of words
>> is
>> > their essence and the other, vernacular uses are simply senses, folk
>> values,
>> > the range of phenomena to which hoi polloi apply the words?
>> >
>> > b) Isn't the OPPOSITE true when we look at the matter microgenetically?
>> > That is, from the point of view of interpersonal meaning making, the
>> essence
>> > of the phenomenon to which I apply the term in the given instance is the
>> > self-legitimated, auto-ratified, individually-approved sense value and
>> the
>> > signification value is simply the range of conventional meanings, the
>> range
>> > of conventional phenomena to which the word is applied and misapplied by
>> > others?
>> >
>> > David Kellogg
>> > Seoul National University of Education
>> >
>> >
>> > __________________________________________
>> > _____
>> > 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
>>
>
>
__________________________________________
_____
xmca mailing list
xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca