Frances; For the integrationist a word does not have a pre-fixed meaning. The meaning is constructed in context. Thus a word is not a sign until it is used in a specific context. He offers three general categories of context: biomechanical (what is possible in human biological terms, what we are able to do with voice, gesture, etc.; macrosocial what is habituated language in a social context, small or large; and circumstantial, what is the case at a particular moment.
I agree that it's very hard to follow some of his terms when by his own theory, they must remain slippery. We are all used to having anchor terms to tether our thoughts as we read difficult material. I think Harris is criticized for being vague at times, especially when his theory is put to the test beyond the safer waters of everyday communication. His blanket critique of non-integrationist language is "surrogational", meaning, I think, that it relies on a pseudo a-priori meaning, outside of any communicational context. Nevertheless, it's probably a mistake to read Harris from the position of "surrogational" linguistics. You can't really defeat his theory on the grounds that it doesn't employ and rest on the very logic and presumptions of the theories he's attacking. The only way to deal with him is to enter his thesis and try it out, and then look for internal flaws. The one crucial test of entry, for him, is to give up the notion that words have permanent, fixed meanings. The silent partner in his argument is old man Time. Since time never rests, change is the one constant albeit at differently perceived rates, and thus any meaning is forever slipping and morphing into another, even when they're "technical". Remember, Harris is the fellow who hates dictionaries! How can you expect him to accept anchor words and terms, even his own? Of course, that's what makes Harris' theory such a problem for linguists and scientists and humanists who insist on predetermined meanings and that's what makes Integrationist linguistics appealing to poets and other artists. Like pigs in the barnyard, artists wallow and roll in ambiguities, paradoxes, contradictions, and all manner of dialectical knots. WC ----- Original Message ---- From: Frances Kelly <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Wed, March 30, 2011 6:15:40 AM Subject: RE: Signs of Signs of Signs: Terms Frances to William and others... In the integrationist book by Harris on signs and language and communication there are several terms that seem to be used ambiguously. One group of related words in particular is not clear as to their meaning. They include the terms "exist" and "fact" and "object" and "real" and "token" and a few others. They are sometimes used as synonyms having the same definition, but are also often used to mean different things. The terms "type" and "truth" also pose some confusion in the book. My search for terminal clarity has taken to me other sources online, but with little success so far. This vagueness may be a deliberate attempt on the part of the integrationist framers to not be scientific or global, but this tack to make every user in each context a linguist may go to the failure of the thesis to be exact, and to thus not be useful in any serious research on signage and language. This tendency to be vague reminds me of the terms used loosely in the Morris book on signs and language and behavior, which vagueness has been justly criticized by experts in the field of sign study. In any event, my slow deep read continues to find correction for what it may be worth.
