For Ferdinand de Saussure, linguistics is the study of language (langue), which he discerns from speech (parole). Language is a code, allowing you to communicate intelligibly provided you prescribe to a socially bound meaning—a contract if you will. On the other hand, speech is the ability to create endless, original streams of language, organized such as to give coherence to the code (856-857). In the confines of the excerpt, Saussure deals only with the metaphysical origins of language, delineating linguistics, as well as his minted field of semiotics.

To begin, Saussure asserts that language is only comprehensible as a sign, in the abstract sense. Broken into its components, language is composed of a sound-image, and its correlated concept; however, in the spirit of semiotics, Saussure abstracts these to a signifier and a signified, respectively.  The two entities are intimately linked, analogous, in his words, to the two sides of a sheet of paper: they are inseparable yet distinct (858).

At this point, it should be noted that the tangible object is impertinent to Saussure’s argument of language. He assumes a Nietzschean perspective that is dismissive of the Ding an sich. Language deals not with the physical entity, but with the concepts we form surrounding our perception of that entity.

Thus, language is an indivisible whole, a coupling of signifier and signified that emerges from the primordial mass of shapeless thoughts extant in the conscious (856). For one part to exist without the other would infer an objective existence (860). In such a scenario, the concept of chair would be matched with its appropriate signifier, CHer, one having existed before the other. However, in his Nietzschean frame, Saussure does not accept the independent existence of either part. Rather, as the object is apprehended, it is identified by its proper signifier; if the conceived object lacks a signifier, the object is identified by its relation to another signifier. For example, Columbus, after sailing the ocean blue, could only speak of the birds and faunae in terms of his European knowledge. A new concept, having been identified via a tangential connection to another, familiar concept, will become distinct through cognition of it to the point that it incarnates its proper signifier (862). This new concept begins its existence concurrent to its signifier, prior to which it had existed as whichever familiar concept, prior to which it had not yet formulated an existence in our consciousness. Operating within the assumption that there can be no thought without language, Saussure contends that definition is achieved through negation (863-865). In other words, the concept of chair is not that of a rock, nor a sofa, nor a table, neither can it be anything else that you sit on. Similarly, the concept of a sofa is not that of a chair, and so on and so forth. Although it is through negation that concepts are defined, once signified, they become positive terms defined by what they are. In sum, language is a form rather than a substance (865). As such, it must be studied as a humanity, not as a taxonomy.

In Saussure’s essay he enlightens us by explaining that language only consists of differences.”In language there are only differences. Whether we take the signified or the signifier, language has neither ideas nor sounds that existed before the linguistic system, but only conceptual and phonic differences that have issued from the system”(862) In this quote Saussure is saying before we had a linguistic system there wasn’t any way to tell things apart because we had no meaning for it. We are unable to give a sign to the signified without already having a working linguistic system in place. After we come to an agreement with the contract we sign when we learn a language, and its rules, we are able to use this system to arbitrarily give concepts and phonics a meaning by giving it a sign. After having a linguistic system, we are able to differentiate the signified and signifier by knowing what they are not, and give them a sign. For example we know the sex of a human because of the genitalia of the human being. We know the sex of the person as a female because they do not possess male genitalia or vice versa. After making a linguistic system we figure out what the concept and phonic differences are by looking at other concepts and seeing that they don’t possess the same traits as them.After we come to this realization ,we are able to differentiate a male from a female and give it a sign. When looking at a cow or a dog we know what it is based upon what we know it isn’t. A cow is large and makes moo’s sounds. A dog is small and barks. This is how we know a dog isn’t a cow by the different traits these both possess. If we gave them both the same sign we wouldn’t have any way to tell the difference in our linguistic system.

Saussure goes on to explain that until we have a sign for a signified, and signifer they will always be negative. “But the statement that everything in language is negative is true only if the signified and the signifier are considered separately; when we consider the sign in it’s totality, we have something that is positive in it’s own class.”(862) When looking at language as only differences we see how negative it really is. In order to see the differences we have to think about what the concept isn’t to define what it is. Saussure is saying that when we bring the signified and the signified together we have a new meaning in the system. After finding the differences of traits from a male and a female, we are able to give it a sign. When we give the idea a sign it is no longer negative because it has a new meaning when the concept and sound are put together. When we say the word male we don’t immediately look for the negative differences between it and other words. Instead we identify each words meanings in a positive way in order to have a functional linguistic system.

I mentioned in class that Barthes once claimed, in an interview, that reading Jakobson was such fun that it belonged at his bedside, like all ecstatic and irresponsible activities in his life.  In that spirit, more or less, try this exercise taken from a longer article by Louis Hébert at the U of Quebec:

Which functions of language are activated in the following text?

This text you gave me to correct is a bunch of rubbish! Listen to this, you’ve got several verbs with no subject, you state the obvious (“a day lasts 24 hours”!), then – are you still following me? – you use obscure metaphors (“work is the drop hammer of life”) and stupid malapropisms (“You are the suntan of my life”).

So the Norton is definitely at Shakes & Co. now, so pick up a copy ASAP!

You might have noticed that Blog Post #2 is due on Tuesday, when we’re not meeting due to Rosh Hashana.  Let’s bump the deadline back to 9/18 prior to class time.  Remember:

• this post counts and will be evaluated via the extensive guidelines I provided, so re-read the description/rubric/example as you work on it
• I will give some individualized feedback this time, with a provisional grade, so you know how you’re doing
• your post can be on any of the readings (or combination of readings) thus far; if you’re stuck, answer one of the meatier questions from the prompts for Saussure and Jakobson

Nietzsche’s observations about the “effect” of the intellect on its owner rattles the pillars of Western solipsism. He attacks the philosopher who believes, per this effect, that the center of the world is in his own head.”The arrogance inherent in cognition and feeling casts a blinding over the eyes and senses of human beings,” he writes. He goes on to malign the metaphorical projections made by philosophers to create self-serving “truths.” Through these lenses, the philosopher (for Nietzsche, the most rapacious seeker of approval) might see the imposition of humanity on “things” as of a piece with cosmic laws; i.e. unshakable, unchangeable. “True.”

Nietzsche is unsparing and thorough in his efforts to dismantle human intellectual self-importance. But perhaps Truth and Lying‘s most striking quality is the feral intensity of the author’s voice; his tone is downright zealous, and he darkly illustrates precisely what the didactic, moralistic, or self-centered philosopher he targets is afraid to hear.

An intrinsic beauty has just arisen within the human spirit.  It is particularly specialized and primarily human in nature: that is, if you consider yourself a human being.

The human intellect has made the discovery of understanding that it can distinguish the difference, between itself and from everything else within its environment—or consciousness.  Considering this form of logic, Nietzsche speculates in his essay On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense, that the human intellect is capable of accommodating only the interests of humans themselves.

“The arrogance inherent in cognition and feeling casts a blinding fog over the eyes and senses of human beings, and because it contains within itself the most flattering evaluation of cognition, it deceives them about the value of existence.”(pp.765)

To many, cognition can be described as a feeling of self-awareness within the world.  The human ability to wake up, hop in the shower, rush off to the office and then back home (to the ones they love most), all rely on the capacity to be aware of one’s self within one’s immediate environment.  To many, this brings meaning to life.  N. has compared this aspect of human life to that of a common housefly, with a view which shines light towards the perspective of the housefly.

The cognition of a single human being, is more than likely similar to that of the housefly’s, in the respect that the housefly believes that it’s existence hosts greater importance—not only amongst other houseflies, but other beings within it’s environment.  The difference of the two, lie in their methods of communication: in which the human being has chosen modes of language to describe things around him/her.

While being human myself, I can attempt to describe these particular concepts by using words and classifying things (of relevance) in arrangements.  My statements are not necessarily true, in the same respect that they are not false—due to the metaphorical nature of language.  This attempt to understand has helped humans develop schemes in order to progress in nature, to an extent that we consider other things in reference to our likeness.

“Everything which distinguishes human beings from animals depends on this ability to sublimate sensuous metaphors into a schema, in other words, to dissolve an image into a concept.”(pp.768)

Anthromorphic statements are usually limited in value, due to its inability to be true within itself.  This is simply a perception that: Everything in existence must, logically, possess a form of human likeness.  With these considerations, it is not difficult to infer that human beings will begin assimilating everything else in existence, with belief, that everything else in existence, exists for the sole purpose of entertaining humanity.  While humanity is pleased with its creative ability—to bring ideas into tangible form—it unavailingly, begins to believe that these creations are absolute in value.  Absolution drives human beings to believe that the products of their creations are valued with truth.  Simultaneously, the fundamental laws (which produced these creations) are derived from principles, whose truths are valued simply for their metaphorical substance.

“…The legislation of language also produces the first laws of truth, for the contrast between truth and lying comes into existence here for the first time: the liar uses the valid tokens of designation—words—to make the unreal appear to be real…”(pp.766)

N. infers that truth must have derived from a universal civil agreement over time, amongst human beings.  When the world has begun the cessation of war, human beings will potentially, be unified.  This accompanies a belief that certain members of society have always been in pursuit of truth.  Maintenance of this unified society also requires a standard form of communication, which all members of the specie must use to relay information, or some sort of system of designation.

In order for one thing to exist, it must have another thing to compare and contrast itself to: with purpose and expression or “…the full and adequate expression of an object within a subject…”(770).  However, this still does not determine the association and disassociation of the two, this is only an aesthetic value.  A thing cannot become an object, unless it is conceptualized as a subject and expressed through a medium, otherwise there is no connection in nature between the two.

N.’s writing style is highly complex, yet very poetic, as if the reader is sitting down comfortably and being read to.

Nietzsche asserts that truth is a construction with which humanity deludes itself in order to comprehend a universe that disregards it’s pathetic, ephemeral existence. As beings that have evolved a cognitive sense, humans are prisoners of their own phenomenological awareness. Our inability to grasp the physical plane objectively results in the creation of concepts through a process of sublimation. In so doing, humanity exists within a conceptual territory that it has reified through social conditioning. Language, as such, can only convey the distorted renderings which a twitching nerve perceived. Still another degree separates the objective from the understanding; humanity’s “architectural genius” results in a cyclical perception of existence whereby the self can be identified in the object. Yet, as Nietzsche argues, the object as spoken is merely a grotesque estimation of the object as perceived, which is itself an illusionary reflection of the object as it is. Human intelligence cannot escape the degrees of error as it attempts to understand existence via its own constructed modality. Ergo, the study of existence is reduced to the study of conscious existence. Truth undergirds the structural frame of humanity’s conceptual pyramid, but, just as the pyramid, it is a constructed entity that has been conceived in order to reason the whole. Meaning, for this short, cognitive branch of evolution, is entirely subjective, and therefore meaningless beyond the ego of existence.