Re: The Myth of Arbitrariness

Dr. Jamshid Ibrahim wrote:
>
> benlizro@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> > Do you really think that, by some form of research, we might some day
> > arrive at an explanation for _why_ the word for dog is "dog", "chien",
> > "perro", "hund", "inu", "kurii", "sobaka", etc. in various languages?
> > (I mean, of course, something _other_ than the etymological/historical
> > particulars of each language.) I can't even imagine what such an
> > explanation might look like.
> >
> > Everyone will admit that arbitrariness is not total, that there are
> > some non-arbitrary elements in language. John Lawler is probably right
> > in emphasizing that these are more extensive than many people think.
> > But arbitrariness is still the typical situation.
> >
> > Even within the familiar domains of non-arbitrary, sound-symbolizing
> > words, arbitrariness exists. According to my little dictionary, the
> > crow is called /qa:q/ in Egyptian Arabic. We can see the similarity to
> > the crow's voice, and thus a sound-meaning connection. In English there
> > is no such connection -- even though the bird may say "caw caw", its
> > name is /kro:/, and that's an arbitrary fact about English. But even in
> > Arabic, while the imitative origins of the name may be obvious, it is
> > an arbitrary fact that must be learned that the bird _is_ named in this
> > particular way, and not another -- not */ka:k/ or */qa:qa:/ or anything
> > else. And that's an arbitrary fact about Arabic.
>
> The Myth or the Dilemma of Arbitrariness was developed because human
> language was (has been) seen as a purely linguistic phenomenon. But The
> Language phenomenon which is unique to human beings cannot only be seen
> as a linguistic skill. All of those linguistic definitions provided so
> far cover some features of language but are far from complete. We
> cannot speak of human language without taking into consideration the
> human being ie molecular biology, psychology, cognition,
> anthropology.... or those human created disciplines like information
> technology. What is needed now is an interdisciplinary view based on
> the latest advances in these disciplines.
>
> Uttering utterances means a duality of signs must first be generated so
> that others can add on it or change it. The first utterance triggers a
> phenomenon not void of some sort of tie which later becomes weaker or
> even completely distanced.

I assume by "first utterance" you mean (2), the giving of a name to
something that has not previously had a name. And by "completely
distanced", you would mean what most people would call "arbitrary" (1)
in Saussure's sense.

>But the link is still there.

In what sense is it "still there"? It may have been there in the past,
but (another thing Saussure emphasized) most speakers of a language know
nothing about its history, so the fact is irrelevant to them. And for
the bulk of words in our ordinary vocabulary, even linguists are not
able to trace them back to a primal naming event. So arbitrariness
remains a fact.

>Thus generation
> means transcending the limits of convention and arbitrariness.

What does this mean?


>
> Human experience is chaotic but schema, although analogue, gives the
> necessary structure to it. It is not arbitrary. Everybody is equipped
> with such a schema. For example schema of OUT is moving things in
> physical space then it is extended to a metaphor. Schematic
> understanding at various levels of linguistic expression is important.

What is arbitrary is that the phoneme sequence /aut/ is associated with
this particular type of movement.

Ross Clark
.

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