I did catch that in Harris' book, the one I mentioned. (I generally don't check out Wickepedia) At first I thought as you do, that some communication is not linguistic but then as you summarize Harris and from his own comments in the book, he does say that there is a verbal context or name or description underlying a supposedly non-verbal communication. This puts him into conflict with my current hero, Harry Collins, who separates tacit from explicit knowledge on just that divide, the verbal and the non-verbal. However, he does say that while all tacit knowledge (non-verbal) can be made explicit to some degree, it does not all do the job well and what it does may be irrelevant to too clumsy. So what if the problem is to keep the usual boundaries of linguistics intact is made pointless by the integrative approach? in fact, couldn't one argue that all linguistics rests on earlier non-verbal gestures, grimacing, other somatic subtleties? One way or another, directly or reflectively, language is privileged as the necessary component of knowledge transfer. You say no. I think I say no, too. But then if I go to yes, what have I lost, and didn't I gain something, like improved access to knowledge that can be shared? If I say no, I'm stuck with total subjectivity or need to rely on institutional opinion, which is only a random gathering of subjective opinion.
On another note, right now I'm reading something altogether different, about the puritans and separatists of the 17C and their metal inhabiting the ancient Jerwish Biblical texts, minus contemporary translations which they didn't trust.. It's astonishing how they saw their world completely thru the lens of exposed Biblical passages, prophesies, etc. to the point where a simple description of an event would only include information that reiterated a Biblical passage. Apparently their choices rested on the recognition that ancient Hebrew was a very complex language having multiple nuanced interpretive meanings for words that had only one or two in English. So, whatever was related in the Bible could have its present day relevance to the extent that something happening now (to puritans) was already foretold by the Biblical passage because the original words have synonyms in today's language. I'm trying to put myself into the head of a puritan or separatist in England of the 17C. So weird to attempt, but it leads me to imagine others four hundred years from now trying to put themselves into our heads. What gaps and distortions are we projecting that will astonish our descendants? It causes me to be cautious in dismissing out of hand any novel but learned ideas. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: cheerskep <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Tue, June 1, 2010 7:14:27 PM Subject: Re: book William -- No, I don't know Roy Harris, but I know of him, and I've read some of his writing.B I understand and sympathize with your impatience at my unsupported dismissal of Harris. It was prompted by my age-related greed for time. But I'll now try to remedy it a bit I recommend this: Go to the Wikipedia entry on "Roy Harris (Linguist)". Then down at the bottom of the entire entry click on the link " Roy Harris and Integrational Linguistics". And at the bottom of THAT entry click on "Integrationism - a very brief introduction". It's by Harris, and it's not very long. The following are some excerpts. To distinguish Harris's text from my comments, I'll all-cap my comments.B "Another approach [to the study of languages] emerged in the late 20th century. It was designed to avoid conflating the study of language with that of logic, or of languages, or of social differentiation, or of hypothetical psychological mechanisms. "It must be clearly understood that for the integrationist a sign is not a form which carries its own meaning permanently around with it. A sign acquires a meaning only when occurring in a specific context.b(B "The integrated character of linguistic and non-linguistic practices is so fundamental for human beings as to make it difficult to separate out any purely linguistic component. "To take a trivial example, raising a hand and pointing to a certain building supplies an answer to the question bWhich is the Town Hall?b. In that respect it is as much a linguistic ability as being able say, without pointing, bThat building opposite is the Town Hallb. Again, when you ask someone to shut the window, what you expect (or hope for) is a non-verbal response in the form of actions taken by the person you are addressing. In order to make sense, your question has to relate to an existing non-verbal situation where there is a window open and your addressee is in a position to shut it." "In order to understand your question, the person you are speaking to has to understand not only the words you uttered but also what a window is and how to shut it. By shutting the window, your addressee gives a contextually integrated response to your question. Thus there is a sense in which that response is no less a linguistic act than your utterance, since what makes it the right response is determined by the language of your question. "Traditionally, only spoken and written signs are counted as blinguisticb signs. But that assumption is challenged in integrational studies (see 3c above), which focus on the communicational function of the sign in its context." B IN SUM, HARRIS'S FUNDAMENTAL POSITION IS THAT GESTURES AND OTHER NON-SPOKEN PHYSICAL ACTS SHOULD BE CALLED "LINGUISTIC SIGNS" BECAUSE SUCH PHYSICAL ACTIONS ARE OFTEN ESSENTIAL TO COMMUNICATION.B I CLAIM THAT HARRIS'S CAMPAIGN TO HAVE EVERYTHING THAT IS COMMUNICATIVE LABELED "LINGUISTIC" IS UNWISE, UNPRODUCTIVE, AND INDEED, COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE. MOREOVER, I WOULD EXPECT OTHER LINGUISTS WOULD PROTEST THE ATTEMPT BECAUSE THEN WHAT DO WE CALL THE COMMUNICATIVE ELEMENTS THAT ARE SOLELY TO DO WITH SPOKEN/WRITTEN LANGUAGE b WORDS, SENTENCES, GRAMMAR, SYNTAX, VARIETY BETWEEN SPOKEN/WRITTEN LANGUAGES, ETC b I.E THE SPECIAL STUDY THAT OTHER "LINGUISTS" ALWAYS THOUGHT OF AS THEIR DISCIPLINE? NOT TO MENTION OTHER SCHOLARS WHO HAVE MADE THEIR SPECIALTY WHAT THEY WOULD CALL THE STUDY OF NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION. HARRIS'S INTEGRATIONAL THEORY TEACHES US NOTHING WE DIDN'T ALREADY KNOW, WHILE ALLOWING HIM TO CORONATE HIS TRIVIAL VIEW WITH A GRANDILOQUENT LABEL LIKE 'INTEGRATIONAL LINGUISTS'. (PERSONALLY, I RECOIL FROM ANY SUCH THEORIST WHO USES A TERM SO CENTRAL TO HIS TOPIC AS 'MEANING' WHILE MAKING NO ATTEMPT WHATEVER TO CONVEY HOW HE WOULD DEFINE IT, I.E. DESCRIBE HIS NOTION OF 'MEANING'. AND I STAND BY MY EARLIER ASSERTION THAT HARRIS REPEATEDLY ERRS IN REIFYING AS NON-MENTAL ENTITIES ENTITIES THAT ARE SOLELY NOTIONAL. I HONESTLY BELIEVE THAT TO STUDY HARRIS IS, FOR THIS FORUM'S PURPOSES, A WASTE OF TIME.) B B B B
