Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • Silverstein 1976

    Uploaded by

    camille
    15 views23 pages
    Silverstein 1976

    Copyright

    © © All Rights Reserved

    Available Formats

    PDF or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    Report this Document
    Silverstein 1976

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    15 views23 pages

    Silverstein 1976

    Uploaded by

    camille
    Silverstein 1976

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    of 23
    Keuttt. Becoo # Hinuy G. Selly et Meaning in Gr Tnepatopy . Ahbagueegue : Unite of Mos Meyer Pevs 2 Shifters, Linguistic Categories, and Cultural Description’ MICHAEL SILVERSTEIN Unie of Chee For Romar aobson INTRODUCTION "Ths chapter witty tn dep cones ofthe statment tt specs anngl cal char, nel hi stent eo Toe ot pews of pag acco tat ce ed to or neal tre cts te Gna soma of nat ad soa nt olgit.e ges woo stale or deertine power What I waht Gh here demon tat dy tsa have al se “ngage” ith wich to dcr the eae mening sacs of spect ba, gg hat peso the “nto os Co rs of gnc, tegctng nom seg epee Sgn ncn hfs ndver Te meaning ots font Hn ide aay rte me spect ofthe eet in Which the Scr Tn making theme of tha oem ary, 1 Rope Senos at th “pag” anal o seh hee tradition extending fom Peirce to Jakobson—allows us to describe the ‘eal linkage of language to culture, and perhaps the most important spect of the “meaning” of speech [At one level, language has long served anthropologists at kind of ‘xemplar for the nature of things cultural. It seems to display thee “altura” propertics with clarity in the tangible medium of arcuate Phonetic speech. Thus, and at snother level, could the analytic lesions of linguistics be transfered analgiallyto other socal behavior, giving dof stuctunlized anthropology, of, mote remarkably, could the actual linguistic (especially lexicographic) stractures of language be salle cultore. 1 wil be developing the argument that this reecved Point of view is exentilly wrong. That aspect of language which hat teaitionally been analyzed by linguists, and has served as moda), just the part that is functionally unique among the phenomena of culture. Hence the structural characterise of language inthis trad tional view cannot relly see at model for other aspects of ealtre, nor can the method of analss. Further, lingustic (or lxicographical) structres that emerge frm the tational grammatical anala® must of necesity bear a problematic, rather than isomorphic, elationhip to the stracture of culture LINGUISTIC AND OTHER COMMUNICATION To say of social Bchavor that itis meaningfol implies necessarily {hat it is communicative, that that the behavior sa complex of signs {sign vehicles) that signal, or stand for, something in some respect, Such behavioral signs are significant to some pesons, participants n a communicative event, and such behavior i purposive, that i, geal ‘oriented in the sense of accomplishing (or in falling to accomplish) ‘tain ends of commonicaton, for example, indicating one social rank reporting an occurence, effecting a care for a dca, and so forth. In general, then, we can say that people are constituted a8 ¢ Society with cetan culture to the extent that they share the same ‘means of social comniniation, Language as a system of communication has the same character: fists a8 the rest of culture, So in eedr to distinguish aalyie subparts of cute, such as language, we have traditionally distinguished among ‘Shifters, Linguist Categories, and Cultural Description {ypes of communicative rents on the Bais of the signaling mein, In the case of langage, the signaling medi i articulate speech, and ‘events canbe lated on this basis Speech Events By such analysis, «speech event, endowed with an overt goal in a socially shared system of such purposive functions, consis of some Sequence of speech behaviors in which some speaker or speakers signal to some hearer or hearers by means of a system of phonetic sign vehicles called specch messages or utterances, The utterances ate organized iat 4 sstem forthe participants by virtue of ther knowledge of linguistic ode, or grammar. The speech event takes place with the patcpants {in given positions, oli, and over a certain span of tine, "The oes of speaker and hearer may be taken by diferent individuals ding the curse of such an event. Many other characterises of such speech vents most alo be taken into consideration, among them the other sociological aspets ofthe individuals inthe roles of speaker and heater which ae fequently salient in defining the event, the prior speech ‘vents (if any), the gestural of inesic commonication that invari ‘accompanies spoken language, the distinction between roles of hearer 1nd audience, and so forth. A description ofthe speech event must min ‘mally take into account these fundamental defining variables, Speech events so defined, moreover, are conecrrent with events Based on distinct sgoating media, and these together make up lrgeseale caltaral routines. Desrptvely, the simplest speech events would be those which themselves constituted the entire goaldeetd socal be havior. I is doubtful that such evens ext In ont own culture, reading 4 scholaly paper can come dose to being a speech event pure and simple, the purpose of which is expressible in terms of informative Ascourse among socal categories of scholars. The possibility of diatnet forms of symbolism that canbe iavolved in these ents is nota nue ‘Tam dealing here only withthe purposive nature ofthe spech event in 4 system of social action. The more embedded speech events ate those which ae art of such lrgescale cultural enterprises as complex eitals including speech, song, dance, dest, ete, where the meaning of the speech behavior in the speech erents is wally integelly linked tothe B presence of these other signaling moda, Analytical, the problem of trying to give the meanings of signals in such a station is very complex, Referentil Speech Events But the ultimate jusifeation for the segmentation of speech from other signaling media les in one ofthe parposve ses that scms to

    You might also like