Taking Language at its Word?
Here is a quick question that befuddles me: Why do we invest so much into our preferred terminology? In other words, why don’t we stop to wonder if our “different” words really mean different things and, if so, then, set to figure out what those differences are? Until then I see arguing as a bit fruitless.
I feel that many of the issues I come across regarding the polemics that we are used to here at VN and elsewhere are because we are too quick to take language (e.g. liberal, conservative, socialist, Catholic) at its word, when the fact may be that we don’t really know what we are talking about.
My criterion is this: I try and understand words at the level of belief. I ask myself, “What does the person who says that believe it to mean?” Most beliefs are self-identified as for the good, even when they are wrong, so, starting at that point can transform what we mean and understand others to mean by this or that flimsy term and other linguistic affections, I think.
It makes for hard work, but I think it is worth it. How about we give it a try?
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I’m game, Sam.
Yes.
Although this is true, it must be understood that language has a social context as well, and that it is incumbent upon language-users to learn the conventions of speech and writing–else why go to so much trouble to teach grammar, writing conventions and idiomatic usages of the “target language” in schools? Language-learners must understand that, if they use the language they’re learning or using in an unconventional way the burden is on THEM–not the “audience”–to provide “signals” to facilitate better understanding.
A lot of folks here at Vox Nova have complained about my use of “all caps” for emphasis, rather than just reliance on the subtleties of tone and word-choice to get my meanings across–as I would if I were composing a piece of literature. However, I am not composing “pieces of literature” here and I am often worried, as I write here profusely–but in great haste–that my emphases be missed, the thought of which can be quite frustrating.
Recently, on another thread whereon I will never again be commenting, because of a “scolding” that I thought was gratuitous and strongly suspected was motivated by something other than the subject at hand, another commenter objected to the use of the term “Holy Fathers,” and was himself snarked at by the same individual, who apparently doesn’t understand that it really DOES make a difference if you pluralize a form that is conventionally understood to mean something entirely different when it actually appears in theological texts in the plural, as opposed to the singular form. Now I know perfectly well that language changes with usage, but when the popular language changes with usage so that a conventional and very ancient and important MEANING is actually being lost (such as, for example, the very different meaning of the subjunctive form of verbs, as opposed to the simple declarative, interrogative or imperative forms–something that is regularly happening in American English–sorry, but, as an instructor of English literature, I care DEEPLY about such things), then such disfigurements really ARE undermining and subverting the public discourse we depend upon for our political and social existences.
“Holy Fathers” has always meant, throughout the centuries of the Christian civilisation that I know of, the early Doctors of the Church–including the Doctors of the Eastern Church–and NEVER the Supreme Pontiffs of the Latin Rite of Christendom, and it is incumbent upon me and anybody else who wishes to be a part of the milleniums-old discussions of theology in the Christian tradition to learn the conventions of that discourse, if we wish to be a part of it.
The degradation of language, the vitiation of its range of full meanings, IS the true beginning of any civilisation’s decline. Just look at what happened to Latin at the end of the Roman Empire–and at what were the political consequences of that decline.
dingby: I think the sense of language you are advocating for is a bit different than my own. That does not preclude that I disagree with you, but my point here is to shake down what we mean when we launch into polemic language…
Here is my proposal then: We should ask people who use words we want to think we understand what they mean by this or that, in goodwill, of course…
Yes, Sam, your last comment clarifies, and I definitely agree with you there.
My criterion is this: I try and understand words at the level of belief. I ask myself, “What does the person who says that believe it to mean?”
That’s a good criterion. You aim to discover, not decide, what the other means. We’re too quick in our debates to skip over the process of interpreting what the others means. As you say, it’s hard work.