- Email: [email protected]
Les passions. Essai sur la mise en discours de la subjectivé
Book reviews
02
the semantic metalanguage is explicitly accorded predictive power, and, what is more, it is this which is used to claim justification for the preference of ‘the semantics of grammar’ to ‘autonomous syntax’. However, it goes without saying that a theory cannot be predictive unless it makes use of generalizations; therefore, the concepts included in the generalizations (irrespective of whether they are considered to be ‘universal primitives’ or not) exclude those phenomena which are outside their scope. This means that however impressive the amount of data co!lected and analysed by the author is, even if the book contained a hundred times more empirical information, it would not bring us nearer to the resolution of the paradox. Thus, in turn, it cannot claim to have proved that the ‘global’ tradition is more acceptable than the ‘modular’ way of thinking. Consequently, WC must acknowledge a kind of ‘incommensurability’ between the two approaches: coherent arguments for the one approach are not at the same time arguments against the other. In sum, The Semantics of Gramntar is a good book; but it is not better than any other account, whether representing ‘autonomous syntax’ or the ‘global’ approach, which equally could not resolve the paradox. It cannot prove the correctness of its claims, but it cannot be refuted, either. I think this is the most we can expect from a theoretical enterprise in linguistics today. eferences Haiman, John. ed. 1985. Iconicity in syntax. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins. Wiesc. Richard, 1082. Remarks on modularity in cognitive theories of language. Linguistische Berichte 80: 18-31.
Les passions. Essai sur 4a mise en discours de la subjectiviti. xelles: Pierre Mardaga, 1986. 200 pp. FF. 150.00. rman Parret, Le sublime du quotidien. Paris: Hades; Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1988. 283 pp. US $49.00 (paperb.). Reviewed by Isabella Pezzini* The books under review testify to the rising importance of the question of enunciation (in French, ‘inonciation’) in semiotics and pnilosophy of language. In more general terms, they address the question of subjectivity and its manifestations in discourse and in textual alid aesthetic practices. The first book is a response to the questions and the initial results that issued from the Greimas-inspired structuralist school gf semiotics :n the * Translated by Stef Heywaert and Nathalie Roelens. Correspondence address: I. Pczzini, Universiti di Bologna, Istituto di Discipline della Corrunicazione, Via Toffano 2. I-40125 Bologna. Italy.
02
the semantic metalanguage is explicitly accorded predictive power, and, what is more, it is this which is used to claim justification for the preference of ‘the semantics of grammar’ to ‘autonomous syntax’. However, it goes without saying that a theory cannot be predictive unless it makes use of generalizations; therefore, the concepts included in the generalizations (irrespective of whether they are considered to be ‘universal primitives’ or not) exclude those phenomena which are outside their scope. This means that however impressive the amount of data co!lected and analysed by the author is, even if the book contained a hundred times more empirical information, it would not bring us nearer to the resolution of the paradox. Thus, in turn, it cannot claim to have proved that the ‘global’ tradition is more acceptable than the ‘modular’ way of thinking. Consequently, WC must acknowledge a kind of ‘incommensurability’ between the two approaches: coherent arguments for the one approach are not at the same time arguments against the other. In sum, The Semantics of Gramntar is a good book; but it is not better than any other account, whether representing ‘autonomous syntax’ or the ‘global’ approach, which equally could not resolve the paradox. It cannot prove the correctness of its claims, but it cannot be refuted, either. I think this is the most we can expect from a theoretical enterprise in linguistics today. eferences Haiman, John. ed. 1985. Iconicity in syntax. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: Benjamins. Wiesc. Richard, 1082. Remarks on modularity in cognitive theories of language. Linguistische Berichte 80: 18-31.
Les passions. Essai sur 4a mise en discours de la subjectiviti. xelles: Pierre Mardaga, 1986. 200 pp. FF. 150.00. rman Parret, Le sublime du quotidien. Paris: Hades; Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1988. 283 pp. US $49.00 (paperb.). Reviewed by Isabella Pezzini* The books under review testify to the rising importance of the question of enunciation (in French, ‘inonciation’) in semiotics and pnilosophy of language. In more general terms, they address the question of subjectivity and its manifestations in discourse and in textual alid aesthetic practices. The first book is a response to the questions and the initial results that issued from the Greimas-inspired structuralist school gf semiotics :n the * Translated by Stef Heywaert and Nathalie Roelens. Correspondence address: I. Pczzini, Universiti di Bologna, Istituto di Discipline della Corrunicazione, Via Toffano 2. I-40125 Bologna. Italy.