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Re: Using METONYMS; was: O Duty (Was: "If")

From:Ed Heil <edheil@...>
Date:Tuesday, May 25, 1999, 0:40
Sally Caves wrote:

> Hi Ed. > > Ed Heil wrote: > > > > I think that Geroge Lakoff would say it only ought to be a "surprise" > > to followers of the cult of "objectivism" as he calls it. :) > > > > I've read a bit of Owen Barfield lately, and I highly recommend him. > > One of the things that he insists on is that it is only fairly > > recently, in historical terms, that we even had to start calling it > > "metaphor." Before that it was just that concepts were deeper; they > > had inner and outer meanings that were part and parcel of each other; > > distinguishable only with some effort. ... > > Hmmm. Interesting, but I tend to doubt that. The classical writers > and certainly the medievalists were highly aware of what they were doing > rhetorically... check out Geoffrey of Vinsauf and all the books on > Rhetoric. If the term wasn't "metaphor," then it certainly was "imago." > But "metaphor" came in a while ago from the late Greek. The Renaissance > poets were also completely aware of metaphors, _anargia_, _exemplum_ and > "conceits." So what is this "it" that Barfield says we started calling > "metaphor," and so recently?
Oh, I'm afraid that most of my response to your post will be "I've dreadfully oversimplified and misstated Barfield and beg you to read him yourself; he's both a much better writer and much better arguer than I am." I think Barfield would say that the move from "original participation" to "non-participation" (which he would want to push forward from into "final participation," a future participatory universe which is not innocent of the insights that have been gained by our move into a non-participated world)... Um, that the move from "participation" to "non-participation" began as early as Aristotle, and that it was a gradual process. I think we might have to work out more precisely what we mean by "metaphor" before I address your question further.
> > > Barfield insists that many people find the personifications (Love, > > Virtue, Peace, etc) of the middle ages and renaissance uninteresting > > because we have thrown off a 'participatory' style of thinking, in > > which abstractions were very real and living and interpenetrated with > > everyday reality in ways that seemed as obvious to them as the > > interpenetration of the theories of physics (electricity, and so on) > > with reality seem to us. > > And that's precisely what I want to restore in Teonaht. Interesting.
I hereby adjure you to read some Barfield then. :)
> > > He says that artificially stripping reality of its "participation" in > > higher realms, the divine, the ideal, the mana-filled, has made > > possible modern science and the major religions... but that it is > > founded on a lie, because in fact the world we experience *is* > > participatory -- but it participates not in a divinity that is beyond > > it and wholly separate from us, but in our humanity (and perhaps also > > in divinity communicated through humanity). > > Hmmm. I'm not clear about this here. How has this stripping made > possible the "major religions"? I would think quite the opposite. It > may have made modern science possible, but the major religions I see > on the other side of the fence in this argument.
Well, I oversimplified there. Perhaps rather than 'major religions' I should have said something like 'religions of the book'; it is Barfield's contention that an essential feature of Judaism was *refusing* to see most of the universe as the direct face of divinity as a pagan would, and confining, concentrating the participation to the Divine Name and, as an extension, the Torah. In Judaism and in Christianity and (as best I know it, which is not well) Islam, there is a tension between seeing the world as the sacramental face of God, and the Areopagite's _Via Negativa_, where God is known only from what He is Not. Or to put it another way, between God-In-The-World and God-Against-The-World. The former shades away into paganism; the latter into abstruse philosophy. In any case, it all involves some interesting spins on Original Participation, if not an abnegation of it.
> > That the world around us is not merely 'objective' but crucially > > arises from the interface between an inaccessible 'objective' reality > > and our consciousness is *also* what George Lakoff was trying to prove > > in _Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things_! > > A book I've often seen on the shelves and resisted buying for some > reason. > Partly because Lakoff was getting some bad press. Should I reconsider?
Most decidedly. I'm curious what bad press Lakoff got? he's one of my favorite linguists/philosophers.
> > I doubt he's read Barfield, and I think the convergence of their > > conclusions is really interesting. > > > > Anyway, I think you'd find Barfield's work (if you haven't already > > read it) very interesting; a lot of what you've said about > > personifications resonates with what he's written (and I'm sure I > > haven't adequately expressed it in this message). > > > > I only know two of his books well enough to recommend them: _Saving > > the Appearances: A Study in Idolatry_ and _Speaker's Meaning_. The > > latter is a bit more linguistically oriented and a lot shorter. > > > > I'll give it a try. But I hoped, actually, that my initial post would > inspire other conlangers to fess up: how much do any of you consciously > use personifications and metaphors in the everyday parlance of your > languages?
I'm afraid I've not got far enough on a conlang to say.... I've just got a few interesting beginnings.
> > "QuchwIj Dayachqang'a' bang?" > > (KHOOCH-widge da-YATCH-kang-a BANG?) > > I'm glad to know somebody else does this for pronunciation
guidance! :) Ed Heil -------------------------------- edheil@postmark.net "QuchwIj Dayachqang'a' bang?" (KHOOCH-widge da-YATCH-kang-a BANG?) Klingon for "Want to stroke my forehead, babe?" ------------------------------------------------------------