Title: The Linguistic Unconscious: Saussure and the Post-Saussureans
Abstract: Language is huge, extraordinary, ungraspable; mysterious in its instances, stupendous in its range. It is easy to see why thinkers over the millenia have so often defined humanity in term of it, describing Man as the Speaking Animal. As I have argued elsewhere,1 this is mistaken: language is the most striking thing about us, yes, but it is in turn symptomatic of something else that is also expressed non-linguistically; namely, the propensity to make things explicit. Although it is almost absurd to put it thus, we may see language, at the very lowest estimate, as a kind of tool, an infinitely pliable instrument for ensuring, among other things, maximum cooperation between members of a species engaged in common purposes. Language enables individuals to draw on a powerful communal consciousness to serve their needs better than their own unassisted minds. The extension of oral communication by means of writing and other systems of enduring signs enables information to be stored, not only outside the moment of its production, but also outside the human body.2 This has permitted humankind to develop at an extraordinary rate, quite independently of changes in genetic structure, bodily composition or the physiological parameters within which the body operates. As George Steiner put it 'Man has talked himself free of organic constraint.'3 Language has driven a widening wedge between human history and animal evolution, between culture and nature.KeywordsHuman ConsciousnessLinguistic SystemLinguistic SignConscious SubjectGrammatical SubjectThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Publication Year: 1997
Publication Date: 1997-01-01
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 2
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