[lit-ideas] Homosexual Tearfully Admits To Being Governor Of New Jersey
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2004 20:14:45 EDT
In a message dated 8/20/2004 2:59:52 PM Eastern Standard Time,
Scribe1865@xxxxxxx writes:
The Onion can still peel away another layer:
Homosexual Tearfully Admits To Being Governor Of New Jersey
http://www.theonion.com/index.php?issue=4033
-----
Interstingly, this is a case of what linguists call 'equitives'.
Take the identity:
'governor of New Jersey' = 'homosexual'.
Out of the identity you can formulate two 'identity' predications -- one the
reverse of the other:
1. Governor of New Jersey is homosexual.
2. Homosexual is governor of New Jersey.
What the Onion is dealing with is the failure of replacing identity
statements in opaque contexts ("admit to...") _salva veritate_. That is: while
governor of New Jersey tearfully admits to being homosexual _is_ the case, the
'equitative' reverse in the opaque context does not (but the Onion suggests it
should) hold: homosexual tearfully admits to being governor of New Jersey." The
further implicature is of course that being governor of New Jersey is hard to
take...
Cheers,
JL
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