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07/2001--09/2001 35.
Hegel as a forerunner of structuralism? (1) 07/01/2001
I described Hegel as a forerunner of today's structural linguistics in my
post dated Usually
three items come onstage in such a discussion:
And people search the meaning of "dog" (or "There is a
dog."), which must be something pointed out, denoted, designated, referred
to, stood for, represented, symbolized, expressed, or connoted , etc. by a speaker
among those three items.
But structural linguists after Saussure have showed us that language is a
system of difference: its elements have distinctive oppositions to
each other; and
that an element is given a meaning through its difference by the totality
of language, which is the ensemble of differences (or a negative unity a
la Hegel).
How did the young Hegel treat this intriguing theme? He first supposes, so
to speak, a private sign the meaning of which depends on those who use it;
its meaning does not have a autonomous semantic system.
He then insists on: ----------------------------------------- (*1) " . . . die Bedeutung des Zeichens
ist nur in Beziehung auf das Subjekt; es hängt von seiner Willkür
ab und ist nur durch das Subjekt selbst begreiflich, was dieses sich dabei
denkt. Es hat nicht seine absolute Bedeutung in ihm selbst, d. h. das
Subjekt ist in ihm nicht aufgehoben. (Jenaer
Systementwürfe I, Felix Meiner Verlag, S. 200) (*2) "Diese stumme
Bezeichnung muß die Indifferenz des Bestehens . . . absolut
aufheben. Die Bedeutung muß
für sich sein, entgegengesetzt dem, das bedeutet, und dem, für
welches es die Bedeutung hat; " (ebenda, S. 200) 36.
Hegel as a forerunner of structuralism? (2) 07/04/2001
The young Hegel argues--preposterously a bit on first sight:
In his assertion of the autonomy of a
"name" his unique viewpoint of the relation between a name and a
thing attracts our attention.
We, moderns, are apt to reduce everything that has intersubjectively and
socially been formed to an agreement or a contract among us, who are supposed
to be individual or atomistic. Our common understanding of the meaning of
language is its good example.
Hegel, on the contrary, sees continuity between a "name" and an
"empirical being" as cited above; consequently, "a name . . .
[i.e.,] the ideality of an existing thing, or its direct non-existence."
(*3) We
may be able to grasp that 'continuity' in today's philosophical terminology
after W. Hiromatsu:
(By the way, we should not identify Hegel's ideality with Hiromatsu's
straightforwardly. To put it simply, the latter is the product of
intersubjective and con-jugate work of mankind, while the former is the result
and, as the movement is circular, the cause of the meta-movement of the
world.) ----------------------------------------- (*1) "Im Namen
ist sein empirisches Sein, daß es ein Konkretes, in sich Mannigfaltiges,
Lebendes und Seiendes ist, aufgehoben, es zu einem schlechthin in sich
einfachen Ideellen gemacht. Der
erste Akt, wodurch Adam seine Herrschaft über die Tiere konstituiert hat,
ist, daß er ihnen Namen gab, d. h. sie als Seiende vernichtete und sie
zu für sich Ideellen machte. . . . Der Namen aber ist an sich, bleibend,
ohne das Ding und das Subjekt." (Jenaer
Systementwürfe I, Felix Meiner Verlag, S. 201) (*2) " . . . das Bezeichnete hatte sein
Zeichen außer ihm; es war nicht gesetzt als ein Aufgehobenes, ebenso hat
das Zeichen nicht an ihm selbst eine Bedeutung, sondern nur in dem Subjekte, .
. . " (ebenda, S. 201) (*3) " . . . ein Namen . . . die Idealität
eines existierenden Dings, das unmittelbare Nichtexistieren desselben."
(ebenda, S. 202) The
change from a mark to a name is mediated by memory, which "makes what we
called sensory intuition into something recollected or something
thought." (ebenda, S. 200 f.) (*4)
S. my post dated 37. Hegel as a forerunner of structuralism? (3) 07/10/2001
"A name," now, "exists as language, which is the existing
concept of consciousness." (*1) But language is not an aggregation of
names; the young Hegel, of course, held holism in all respects. He first
thought of an animal's voice:
"An empty voice of an animal has a meaning that is determined in it
infinitely. A purely sounding voice, a vocal [of a human being, however,--Taki] distinguishes itself by means of vocal organs indicating the division of
a vocal in its difference. [That is,] This pure sound is discontinued by
muteness, . . . by which every sound gets a meaning, because a difference of a
mere sound . . . is just determined by the preceding and following ones. The
sounding, divided language is the voice of consciousness, in which every sound
has a meaning; that is, in a sound exists a name, the ideality of a thing, or
its direct non-existence." (*2)
His explanation above of the emergence of language from the articulated
sounding voice is rather superficial, or pointless at least philosophically
for us – then the difference between an animal's voice and human
language would merely be whether there is clear articulation in a physically
sounding voice or not. And in the first place, is it right philosophically or
semantically to trace the descent of language back to an animal's or
animalistic voice?
Hegel, however, had an original way of looking at language a hundred years
before F. Saussure: "A difference of a mere sound . . . is just
determined by the preceding and following ones." And this idea led to his
later insistence of relationism: ----------------------------------------- (*1)
"Der Namen
existiert
als
Sprache. Sie ist der existierende Begriff des Bewußtseins, . . . "
(Jenaer Systementwürfe I, Felix Meiner Verlag, S. 201) (*2) "Die leere Stimme des Tiers erhält
eine unendlich in sich bestimmte Bedeutung. Das rein Tönende der Stimme,
das Vokale, unterscheidet selbst sich, indem das Organ der Stimme seine
Gegliederung als eine solche in ihrem Unterschiede zeigt. Dieses rein Tönende
wird durch die Stummen unterbrochen, . . . wodurch vorzüglich jeder Ton für
sich eine Bedeutung hat, da die Unterschiede des bloßen Tönens . .
. sich erst durch den vorherigen und folgenden Ton bestimmen. Die als tönend
gegliederte Sprache ist Stimme des Bewußtseins, darin daß jeder
Ton Bedeutung hat, d. h. daß in ihm ein Namen existiert, die Idealität
eines existierenden Dings, das unmittelbare Nichtexistieren desselben."
(ebenda, S. 201 f.) (*3) "So hat z. B. 'Jetzt' nur Sein in
Beziehung auf ein Vorher und ein Nachher. Ebenso ist das Rot nur vorhanden,
insofern demselben Gelb und Blau entgegensteht." (Enzyklopädie,
Abschn. 42, Zusatz 1) 38.
Hegel as a forerunner of structuralism? (4) 07/18/2001
Hegel further goes on with his comment on language in the so called
first
"Being infinite in its simplicity, [language—in the text] as
the infinity of consciousness in itself divides and articulates itself
and becomes the diversity of names. Language also recovers from absolute
diversity; . . . language is the relation
[italics--Taki] of names or the ideality of their multifariousness again
. . . [that is,--Taki] the generated universality . . . " (*1)
We stated before what he did above: language (e.g., English) itself
exists ideally as a "ground," while its elements (words, rules
of their usage) come into real existence as "figures"; and
language is indeed the sum of its elements, but it is, as the totality,
the ensemble of the relations among them. (*2)
Even so, some people would say, "One necessary moment of language,
that is, its referential function or the correspondence between things
and language should not be ignored, for we do talk of something in
language."
Although "in the universal element [or foundation--Taki] of
language names [are—in the text] ideal in themselves as regards
their form, they express the concrete, the determinate; but the
elemental [or foundational] unity, in which they are, posits them also
as that determinate, that is, the different from each other; it posits
their relations and themselves as the absolutely particular, that is, as
something that sublates itself in its determination." (*3)
Though the quotations above are intricate a good bit to interpret, we
can guess at their gist: as seen from a Hegelian view, the language's
function of referring to an individual is, to be sure, necessary, but
should be sublated at the same time, at least in philosophy. "In
essence language exists for itself and is an ideally posited
nature." Accordingly, "language is universal, acknowledged in
itself, resounding in the same way in everyone's consciousness."
(*4)
Here we recall a process in "Sense-Certainty, or This and
Meaning," the first chapter of "The Phenomenology of
Spirit." In that process the seemingly most concrete and individual
"this" or "here" turns universal through being
written down (i.e., use of a "name"). The turning is not
strange for us, since Hegelian consciousness itself—language is
its "existing concept" (*5)—is universal from the first.
We admit that everything, every fact is charged with meaning: nothing is
naked, nor appears as it is; and that this meaning is ideal and
universal; so our world is in fact put under a universal and
intersubjective spell. We feel interest in Hegelian idealism because his
inquiry into consciousness and language suggests the semantic or
semiological structure of the spelled world in its own way. ----------------------------------------- (*1)
"So unendlich
die Sprache
in ihrer
Einfachheit, unterbricht [sie – im Text] sich als Unendlichkeit
des Bewußtseins in sich selbst, gliedert, artikuliert sich und
wird eine Mannigfaltigkeit von Namen. Ebenso nimmt sie sich aus der
absoluten Mannigfaltigkeit zurück; . . . sie [die Sprache--Taki]
ist die Beziehung der Namen
oder wieder die Idealität
ihrer Vielheit selbst, . . . das gewordene Allgemeine, . . . " (Jenaer
Systementwürfe I, Felix Meiner Verlag, S. 202) (*2)
S.
my posts dated (*3) " . . . im allgemeinen Elemente der
Sprache an sich ideell [sind – im Text] die Namen nur der Form
nach, sie drücken das Konkrete, Bestimmte aus; aber die Einheit des
Elementes, in welchem sie sind, setzt sie zugleich als diese Bestimmte,
d. h. Differente gegeneinander, ihre Beziehung oder sie selbst als
absolut Besondere, das heißt ebenso in ihrer Bestimmtheit sich
Aufhebende. (Jenaer Systementwürfe I, Felix Meiner Verlag, S. 202) (*4) "die Sprache ist ihrem Wesen nach für
sich selbst vorhanden, ideell gesetzte Natur, . . . " (ebenda,
S. 226) (*5) "Sie [Language--Taki]
ist der existierende Begriff des Bewußtseins, . . . "
(ebenda, S. 201) Comments and suggestions are always welcomed. e-mail : takin@be.to
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