On Mon, 10 Jul 2000 07:09:09 +1000 Rob Schaap <rws at comedu.canberra.edu.au> wrote:
> I just don't think linguistic philosophy gets it! We were using symbols long
before we got to sentences, after all. We've effectively always been a
symbol-using species. And *all* symbols were expressed, related and
interpreted in a social context. Always.
Of course! Signifiers don't just fall from the sky. That's not what I'm saying.
> You keep insisting on some kind of state of nature that just ain't natural,
Ken! There ain't, and never was, a 'being' outside symbolic/social interaction
(ie history).
Sure there is. Most of our experiences aren't put into words. When you woke up this morning... how much of that "experience" did you articulate in language? Sure, you could explain it in language, but when you think about it you'll get a mixture of language and images. These images appear *as* images for a reason (understanding is, in part, scenic). You can translate these images, but something is always lost / in excess of the translation. Language builds on someting - that something is best understood as the imaginary. When you stubbed your toe in the afternoon, why did you think about grapefruit? (sting of associations... toe, round toe, swelled up toe, swelled up like something round, filled with blood, round like a orange, swelled up like a grapefruit. There is a link between the signifiers that is "filled in" by the imaginary, which sustains them. For a Marxist angle on this, you might check out Cornelius Castoriadis...
ken