Reading Wittgenstein against «semantic alienation»: political aspects (2 texts: Dictation on philosophy against metalogical entities (1931) and a section of the Big Typescript (1933) about the grammatical confusions - texts will be available in advance).
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Summary
We will present two texts that illustrate the double face of Wittgenstein as a political thinker (in an indirect sense).
The first one is a Dictation to Waismann of the early 1930’s against the metalogical use of symbols in philosophy, for example the words « proposition », « truth », « sense », as well as « game » should be treated like « chaise », « table », etc. This critique also includes the use of the word « philosophy ». The reader is invited to understand a kind of democratic view on language that would cope with a democratic conception of politics. The contention towards a levelless description of the use of concepts, that is the job of « philosophical grammar » in these times for Wittgenstein, would then cast a light on a politics of language in view of establishing a grammatical grasp of expressions, at the basic level of ordinary language excluding the consideration of « distinguished » expressions of higher status or dignity.
The second text is extracted from the Big Typescript (1933) and deals with our « insatisfaction » with language because of too many confusions. In contrast with the former one, this latter text recommends a therapeutic cure to get rid of grammatical prejudices that are the sources of these confusions. It calls for cleaning the language in view of clarity. Such a view could on the contrary be seen as serving an elitist conception of the use of language in our linguistic community. I will also show that it could also be read as prolongating the anti-modernist critiques echoing Nietzsche’s and Heidegger’s critical approaches to the « modern ».
These two aspects of Wittgenstein’s politics of language make him a sort of « revolutionary conservatist » difficult to classify. The first text would be more in accordance with the politics of the Vienna Circle if it did not destroy the project of a « logical Syntax of language » (Carnap’s one in 1934). Note that Carnap was on the same political line as Otto Neurath (left wing of the Vienna Circle). The second one would be ambiguously more aristocratic if it did not appeal to the « liberation » of the use of our linguistic expressions (e-g. a« rebellion » against the mastery of language under the authority of a « president of language »).
So the question leaves us with a dilemma that leads us to scrutinize some contrasts between the Vienna Circle and Wittgenstein respective conceptions of language, in the Viennese context of controversies about the extensive capacity of language to gather a larger community, in other words build the conditions of agreement in forms of life that are not a mere agreement between opinions (Philosophical Investigations, § 241).
Информация о докладчике
Антония Сулез (Antonia Soulez) – почетный профессор (Professeur Emérite) философии языка университета Париж 8 (Paris 8 Vincennes - Saint-Denis). Специалист в области античной философии и в области современной философии языка, Антония Сулез также опубликовала в последние годы ряд работ в области взаимодействия философии и музыки в 20 веке. Она, в частности, является автором монографий Manifeste du Cercle de Vienne (textes réunis et présentés par Antonia Soulez et Jan Sebestik, Meridiens Klincksieck , 1986; 2 ed. Harmattan, 2010), Deux leçons sur la liberté de la volonté de Wittgenstein (PUF, 1998), Comment écrivent les philosophes ? (Kimè, 2003), Wittgenstein et le tournant grammatical (PUF, 2003), Wittgenstein et la philosophie aujourd’hui (dir. Antonia Soulez et Jan Sebestik, Meridiens Klincksieck, 1992 , 2 ed. Harmattan, 2001), Du son à la musique : Mach, Helmholtz, Dahlhaus (dir., Vrin, 2011), Au fil du motif : autour de Wittgenstein et la musique (Delatour-France, 2012), Dictées de Wittgenstein à Waismann et pour Schlick (dir., PUF, 1997-1998; 2 ed. Vrin, 2015), Détrôner l’Etre : Wittgenstein antiphilosophe ? (en réponse à Alain Badiou) (Lambert-Lucas, 2016). Она также является автором нескольких сборников поэзии Timbres (1999, Édition d’Ecarts), Sons-Couleurs (2010, Delatour-France), Qualia (2014, Delatour-France), Sons voisés (à paraitre, Delatour-France) и поэм, опубликованных в журнале PO&SIE (dir. par M. Deguy), Belin), а также лауреатом литературной премии ПЕН-клуба 2016 года.
Персональный сайт: http://www.antoniasoulez.fr/
Рабочий язык – английский; для вопросов и дискуссии - английский, французский, русский.
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