Re: [PEIRCE-L] by way of answering your questions

[Michael Shapiro]

Tom, List,

No, I don't have a reference for my assertion. It's my own discovery after working for over fifty years on establishing a Peircean linguistics. If you want to see examples, I can refer you to my blog, www.languagelore.net.

Michael

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Gollier
Sent: Nov 30, 2015 3:28 PM
To: Peirce List
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] by way of answering your questions

Michael,

I've been following your recent comments with interest precisely because Peirce does explicate iconicity in terms of the triad of images, diagrams, and metaphors; but I'm more curious about your basis for saying there's the "overall drift in language development is toward greater diagrammaticity (iconicity) between sound and meaning."  Do you have a reference(s) for that assertion?

Thanks,

Tom

On Sun, Nov 29, 2015 at 11:18 AM, Michael Shapiro <poo...@earthlink.net> wrote:

Jerry, List,

All languages change by making the relationship between sets of sounds (signs) and sets of meanings (immediate objects) more and more diagrammatic (iconic). This is the processwhereby the fundamental arbitrariness between sounds and meanings is attenuated.

A diagram is an icon of relation, and that's why I prefer to use "diagram" and "diagrammatize" rather than "icon" and "iconic" because in language we're always dealing between sets of relations (with the possible exception of onomatopoeia).

No, I wouldn't restrict this to utterances, but remember that to a significant extent all human communication is parasitic on the linguistic kind.

Sorry, but I can't relate any of the above to Peirce's use of the terms involved. As far as I know, he never used the words "diagrammatize" or "diagrammaticity." Nor was he particularly acute when it came to language structure, since he didn't really deal with in the contemporary sense.

Hope this makes things less "dense.".

Michael

-----------------------------
PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON PEIRCE-L 
to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . To 
UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message not to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu with the 
line "UNSubscribe PEIRCE-L" in the BODY of the message. More at 
http://www.cspeirce.com/peirce-l/peirce-l.htm .