As I write I'm eating breakfast. I'm eating granola. I'm eating vanilla almond granola. I'm eating vanilla almond granola with whole organic milk. I'm eating vanilla almond granola with whole organic milk. I bought the granola in bulk from Bloomingfoods along with the milk.
Do you know what I'm doing while I write this?
One can't really eat and write at the same time. Nor could a fellow student-blogger conjure up the image of the bowl my high school ceramics teacher made. I know a lot more than the reader of this post because I have the references either in front of me or already pretty well developed in my head.
I can only give you, the reader, signs. I can only send you signals. You can't imagine how good it tastes (I think there's a lot of sugar in the granola). I can, however.
According to the diagram provided by Richards and Ogden, the words (symbols) I have employed to tell you about my breakfast, which is my purpose this morning, are not directly connected to the idea, or referent, of me eating breakfast in from of my computer in all of its situational complexities. I provided certain symbols because of causal relations that in many ways determine whether or not the ideas will be transferred to you.
Causal relations are always present with language, and according to Richards and Ogden, the meaning associated with words as symbols is present in the speakers, not language: there is no true connection between words and what they signify.
Also, I may or may not be listening to this music this morning because this class isn't really real. So if you read my post, here's your prize (they are local): http://www.slavetothesaddle.com/
6 comments:
I like your take on this idea of symbols, Peter. Now that I've read your post, I think I maybe get what Richards and Ogden may have meant about symbols...I like the notion that they're a more simplistic way to convey something literal, and but then is the underlying left to be determined? But I guess if you're going with the most simplistic means, underlying meaning is basically unable to be conveyed, only inferred.
Peter I would like to clarify your argument that Ogden and Richards present a disconnect between symbols and the ideas the represent. You stated, "According to the diagram provided by Richards and Ogden the words (symbols) I have employed to tell you about my breakfast...are not directly connected to the idea, or referent." I think that they are arguing that there is a connection between symbols and ideas, while i would agree that they are arguing that there is no connection symbols and referents.
"Between a thought and a symbol causal relations hold. When we speak, the symbolism we employ is caused partly be the reference we are making and partly by social and psychological factors" (Richards 1274). So according to Ogden you spoke of you breakfast perhaps for the social purpose of humor or because you breakfast is providing psychological comfort, but the symbols you provided were enough to evoke your reader to understand your initial thought this morning was to eat a well-rounded and nutritious breakfast.
Your intro made me wonder what one can actually call the referent. In your example "breakfast" is a symbol for "vanilla almond granola with whole organic milk. I bought the granola in bulk from Bloomingfoods along with the milk." But isn't each individual thing their another symbol for more referents? I May be arguing semantics but isn't milk made up of a complex soup of nutrients? And aren't each of those nutrients made up chemicals and those chemicals made up of molecules and so on until we reach some final set of subatomic particles? Basically what I'm wondering is how do we decide when saying "vanilla almond granola with whole organic milk" is enough to mean breakfast? Or is the idea that there is never a real meaning behind symbols?
I think that the way you've demonstrated symbols is very interesting. As I read your blog post, I got a picture of what your morning looks like. I could see you there eating your granola, because I know what granola is. And I understand what the words you used symbolize. But what happens when the words we use to communicate get more complex? I guess with google being the lifeline that it is these days, it wouldn't be hard to look up the complex words. But what if they were culturally complex? What if the "standard" google definition fails to convey what the word represents for, say, my family. In this I find more word failure. How far can our inferring take us?
I agree with Kavawrig. I think that Locke would argue that it depends on our own idea of what constitutes "breakfast". For someone that wakes up eating leftover pizza or other dinner foods in the morning, then "vanilla almond granola with whole organic milk" becomes an introduction to a new idea: other food can be ingested this early in the morning that was not on last nights' table. R&O would use this to describe the non-direct connection between symbol and referent. What is one person's referent may not be another persons. I could even argue that this ties back into the very first piece we read, where Burke argues for a sociological criticism of literature. I think we can apply this same criticism to referents--as they are defined and the connection between those and symbols established on the basis of the individual/group. Also, anyone else have the problem that blogspot keeps deleting posts?! This is the fourth time I'm trying to upload it so fingers crossed!
Your post reminded me of a discussion I was having with my boyfriend, in which he was complaining about how when he talks about things people nod and say "I know what you mean". They say this even though he can tell they aren't interpreting his words the way he means them and are really imposing their own meaning onto his words.
I nodded and said, "I know what you mean... No! I really know what you mean!"
But he doesn't know that. All he knows is what he meant and all I know is the complex meaning of the symbols he gave me in my own mind.
And speaking of giving words, everyone should read my favorite picture book, Phileas's Fortune:
http://www.apa.org/pubs/magination/441B053.aspx
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