by way of comment
see the video
interesting: helm’s questions n
by age forty
death is advisable or preferable
one would wonder
after the onslaught of parkinson
On Sun, 29 Oct 2017 at 06:36, Redacted sender jlsperanza for DMARC <
dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Helm notes, elsewhere that “Essays in Idleness” is a collection by Kenko.”--
(Whose real name was Urabe Kaneyoshi – Grice complained that J. L. Austin
was being artlessly sexist when he coined the phrase ‘trouser word’ for
adjectives like ‘real’ in “real name” – but perhaps here ‘real’ is not THAT
otiose – ‘a trouser word,’ Austin said, ‘is the word that, metaphorically,
wears the trousers’ – “Sense and Sensibilia” (a pun on Austen’s
masterpiece). Quoting from the afore-mentioned “Essays,” Helm notes, “we
could almost find in Kenko an ancestor of Speranza [….]” Or Grice? I would
not be surprised! Grice knew little of Japanese to try and find a
proto-Griceian Japanese ancestor to him (i.e. Grice), but a Griceian
didn’t: J. Frits Staal, who collaborated at length with Grice, used to see
that, against Kipling, East and West _might_ meet! Anyway, this is Kenko as
quoted by Helm. Kenko – the proto- or palæo-Griceian -- notes:
“Everyday speech, too, is growing regrettably bad. Whereas they used to
say ‘Lift up the carriage’ and ‘Turn up the lamps’, now they have changed
the way they pronounce it. Old people say that it is a great pity that for
the assembly of servants of the Household Department they now say ‘Get up
and light the lamps’, and at the recital of the Golden Light Sutra, instead
of saying ‘Hall of the Imperial Lecture’ they say ‘Lecture Hall.’” Yes,
there is something Griceian about these reflections. Or perhaps
anti-Griceian? Grice might say that “Hall of the Imperial Lecture” is
overinformative if (and only if) “Lecture Hall” does the trick (Similarly,
he would say he is a fellow of St. John’s, and not “of St. John’s College”
– Similarly Christopher Robin complains when Shepard suggests he names the
bear, “Winnie the Bear” – “Otiose,” Christopher Robin replies: “And
over-informative: anyone can see he is a bear already”). It might be argued
that “Lecture Hall” (unlike “Hall of the Imperial Lecture”) makes no
imperial implicature, and Grice might grant that! The implicatures Kenko
seem to be complaining (or says some are complaining) about “Get up and
light the lamps” seem more difficult to track in that he does not provide
an alternative. It seems that the complaint rests on the idea that if you
are going to light the lamps you must by necessity ‘get up,’ making ‘get
up’ “otiose”, or “idle,” i.e. over-informative.
Helm continues to quote from Kenko: “But despite the degeneracy of these
latter days, happily the nine-times-encircled imperial palace still remains
aloof from the world, serene and venerable as of yore. Fine-sounding names
are used, such as the Platform of the Dews, the Dry Rice of the Morning and
the diverse styles of gates and halls. Even the names of such things as
are in the houses of the common people, blinds, verandas and doors, are
pleasing to the ear. I like to hear the command ‘Make ready for the night’
in the nobles’ quarters, and the cry ‘Hasten to light the lamps in his
Majesty’s Bedchamber’. . . It is amusing to watch the important air of the
high officials’ underlings, or to see them on a coldish night dozing as
they sit here and there the whole night through. The Prime Minister
Tokudaiji said, ‘I love to hear the beautiful sound of the bell in the
Shrine of the Sacred Mirror.’”
Well, the figure of speech Kenko seems to be emphasizing we may call
‘archaism.’ It is possible a figure of speech. Grice quotes, “Methinks the
lady doth protest too much.” (a violation of his terse maxim to the effect
that one should provide adequate evidence for one’s conversational
contribution. “Protesting too much” is going over the top in that respect,
and may invite an implicature to that effect. Now, there is no easy way to
formulate this briefly other than by quoting Shakespeare (Grice’s scenario
is worth quoting in full: “A wants to know whether p, and B volunteers not
only the information that p, but information to the effect that it is
certain that p, and that the evidence for its being the case that p is
so-and-so and such-and-such. B’s volubility may be undesigned, and if it is
so regarded by A it may raise in A’s mind a doubt as to whether B is as
certain as he says he is (“Methinks the lady doth protest too much”). But
if it is thought of as designed, it woud be an oblique way of conveying
that it is to some degree controversial whether or not p.” And I guess
Popper would agree with that, seeing that Popper LOVED ‘controversial’).
But is Kenko referring to archaisms? And what conversational maxim is
flouted when an archaism is used? Grice’s “avoid obscurity of expression,”
I would assume – a submaxim of the supermaxim, “Be perspicuous [sic].” The
deliberate use of archaisms can be subdivided into literary
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literature> archaisms, which seeks to
evoke the style <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Style_(fiction)> of older
speech and writing; and lexical <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexicon>
archaisms,
the use of words no longer in common use. A distinction
between archaic and obsolete expressions can be made. An archaic expression
is one that still has some current use but whose use has dwindled to a few
specialized contexts, outside which it implicates old-fashioned language.
In contrast, an obsolete expression is one that is no longer used at all. A
reader encounters them when reading texts that are centuries old. The
citations by Shakespeare <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakespeare> (such
as Grice’s “Methinks the lady doth protest too much”) are old enough that
some obsolete expressions are encountered therein, for which glosses
(annotations) <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloss_(annotation)> are
often provided in the margins. (Not on THAT one!). Archaisms can either be
used deliberately (to invite a specific implicature) or as part of a
specific jargon <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jargon> (for example in law
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law>, as Hart notes) or formula (for
example in religious <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion> contexts,
as the Archbishop of Canterbury is well aware). Many nursery rhymes
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursery_rhyme> contain archaisms. Some
archaisms called, metaphorically, “fossil”
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossil_word> expressions remain in use
within certain fixed phrases despite having faded away in all other
contexts (e.g. “vim <https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vim>” is not used in
Oxford outside the set phrase <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_phrase> “vim
and vigour,” that Grice was not ashamed to display!). An outdated form of
language is called archaic. In contrast, a language or dialect that
contains many archaic traits (archaisms) relative to closely related
languages or dialects spoken at the same time is called “conservative
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_(language)>,” – “but not in
its political usage,” Hart adds for clarification. Peter Trudgill is well
aware of this. In his “The Dialects of England” (Blackwell) he narrows his
corpus to that produced by what he calls the group of N. O. R. M. S., i.e.
non-mobile, older, rural, males, since he finds they will be more
‘conservative’ than other groups. Archaisms are most frequently
encountered in poetry <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poetry>, law
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law>, philosophy
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy>, science
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science>, technology
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology>, geography
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography> and ritual
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritual> writing and speech. Archaisms are
kept “alive,” metaphorically, by these ritual and literary uses and by the
study of older literature. Should they remain recognised, they can
potentially be “revived” (as when Grice revived Sidonius ‘inplicatura’
[sic] as ‘implicature’). Because they are things of continual discovery and
re-invention, science and technology have historically generated forms of
speech and writing which have dated and fallen into disuse relatively
quickly. However the emotional associations of certain words (for example:
'wireless' rather than 'radio' for a generation of Brits who lived through
the Second World War) have kept them alive even though the older word is
clearly an archaism, even to Grice! (if not his father). A similar desire
to evoke a former age means that archaic place names are frequently used in
circumstances where doing so conveys a political or emotional subtext, or
when the official new name is not recognised by all (for example: 'Persia'
rather than 'Iran', 'Bombay' rather than 'Mumbai', 'Madras' rather than
'Chennai' – or shall I add “Harborne” rather than “Birmingham” – Some bios
of Grice have them born in Birmingham when he was born in Harborne!). So, a
restaurant seeking to conjure up historic associations might prefer to call
itself Old Bombay or refer to Persian cuisine in preference to using the
newer place name. A notable contemporary example is the name of the airline
Cathay
Pacific <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathay_Pacific>, which uses the
archaic Cathay <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathay> ("China
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China>").
Archaisms are frequently misunderstood (especially by Wittgensteinians)
leading to changes in usage. One example is “another think coming”. Another
is found in the phrase <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrase> "the odd
man out", which originally came from the phrase "to find the odd man out",
where the verb "to find out" has been split (cfr. ‘split implicature’ – as
in “she retired to herself read” --) by its object "the odd man", meaning
the item which does not fit. The compound adverbs and prepositions found in
the writing of lawyers <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawyer> – such as
Hart (he was also a philosopher) (e.g. heretofore, hereunto, thereof) are
examples of archaisms as a form of jargon. Some phraseologies
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phraseology>, especially in religious
contexts, retain archaic elements that are not used in ordinary speech in
any other context, even at Oxford: "With this ring I thee wed." “you” shoud
not be used because it etymologically means ‘second person plural’ and
would implicate its utterer in at least bigamy). Archaisms are also used in
the dialogue <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue> of historical novels
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_novel> or films in order to
evoke the flavour of the period (As in “Blade Runner”). Some may count as
inherently
funny words <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inherently_funny_word> and are
used for humorous <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humour> implicature. But
some are just otiose, as Kenko might agree. A type of archaism is using the
pronoun “thou <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thou>,” as in an example
recently used by McEvoy (“Thou shalt not kill”): this “thou” used to be how
an individual was addressed, while “you,” formerly only used to address
groups, and then also to respectfully address individuals, is now used to
address both individuals and groups (but since this can result in
ambiguity, “y'all <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y%27all>” – that Kenko
does not use, even idly -- can be used to re-introduce the cancelled
implicature). “Thou” is the nominative
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominative_case> form; the oblique
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oblique_case>/objective
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective_(grammar)> form is “thee”
(functioning as both accusative
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accusative_case> and dative
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dative_case> – except if you’re from the
West Country where ‘thee’ is the nominative – vide “The Quaker Girl: A
Musical Comedy”), and the possessive
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitive> is “thy” or “thine.”
"Though thou hast ever so many counsellors, yet ["yet" is generally NOT
even a Griceian archaism, but it is in this context] do not forsake the
counsel of thy own soul." Proverb. "Today me, tomorrow thee." Proverb. The
meaning of this proverb is that something that happens to a person, is
likely to eventually happen to another who observes it, especially if the
two people are similar. (Grice used to say this to his brother, Derek).
"To thine own self be true." Shakespeare (cfr. Grice, “Methinks the lady
doth protest too much.”) The meaning of this saying is simply that it is
unwise to lie to yourself. In its contemporary context it meant to be true
(loyal, faithful, supportive) to one's own interests (the 'self' of person,
property, and goals). In other words, put yourself before others.
Archaisms in proverbs are often retained, far longer than in other parts
of the lingo. This is because they make the proverbs "fall easier on the
tongue,” as Yeats used to say. And also because of the rhetorical
implicature they invite by the use of two of the four fundamental
operations <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetorical_operations> in
rhetoric; to wit: permutation (immutatio) and addition (adiectio).
In anthropological <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropological> studies
of culture, that Kenko bypasses, archaism is defined as the absence of
writing and subsistence economy
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_economy>. But Kenko disgresses.
Cheers,
Speranza
