From Course in General Linguistics

I thought that Saussure’s writing was much easier to understand that the past readings that we have read. I felt that it was much clearer, although I didn’t exactly understand everything. I was thrilled that it was easier reading just for the simple fact that I just handed in my English writing sample and my brain is quite fried, but we’ll see what jumbled thoughts come out.

There was a lot of interesting points in this piece. I really enjoyed reading the characteristics of language starting on page 960. I think my favorite one is number 3. Saussure states that “Whereas speech is heterogeneous, language, as defined, is homogeneous. It is a system of signs in which the only essential thing is the union of meaning and sound-images, and in which both parts of the sign are psychological”. I think I understood this one the best. Maybe this is because we did touch on some of this is Barry’s piece. I never really thought of signs. It just never really clicked to me and I’m not really sure why because it does make so much sense. I did not realize how crucial the meanings and sound-images are to each other until I really thought about it. If we did not have a union of meanings and sound-images, there would be no language, or at least not common ones that one group of people have.

I have to say, I did enjoy the pictures! It’s a nice break from all the reading. I thought they were also very helpful in understanding his points. Especially starting on page 963. I thought that the “Arbor” and “Equos” drawings helped me understand what exactly he was trying to say. Like many, I believe that I am a visual learner, so naturally the pictures helped. If you think about it, “ready-made ideas exist before words; it does not tell us whether a name is vocal or psychological in nature….” is true. For example, I thought of a baby that was just born (just go with me here). That baby does not officially have name until it’s actually alive, but the idea of the baby exists before it is born.

I liked how Saussure says “the important thing in the word is not the sound alone but the phonic differences that make it possible to distinguish this word from all others, for differences carry significance”. I just thought he hit the nail on the head here. I had taken a class once before that had a entire section on phonic differences in words and I didn’t realize how important they were until I learned about them. They are actually vital to understanding words and their meanings when they are spoken out loud. This is especially important when learning a new language. You have to be able to to pick out the differences between each word in order to understand their meanings and a lot of the words could look the same. It is their sounds that make them different from each other and what truly makes the meaning itself.

Williams and Rhizome, lets try to sum them up…..

Ok, so I did think that these two readings were much easier than Bakhtin, but I must agree with Keva on this one when I say I think I understood Bakhtin a bit more than the two of these. Although these two were easier reading, I feel like I was thinking to hard into them and trying to find the deeper meaning like I was with the other reading. I feel like this was not the case, that the meanings on these two were simple and this assignment had taken way longer than expected because I was thinking this way.

I think that Williams did make a lot of great points, once I actually understood some of them. It’s just very hard to put them down into words without confusing it all, but here goes. I thought it was interesting when Williams was talking about Literature as a concept. I feel like I do agree with him in a lot of his points here. On page 1568 he says ” The naivety of the concept, in this familiar form, can be shown in two ways: theoretically and historically. It is true that one popular version of the concept has been developed in ways that appear to protect it, and in practice do often protect it, against any such arguments.” I think what he means by this is that a popular theory, whether it is theoretically or historically formed, could develop ways to protect the theory through the practice of it. It is like it is untouchable and so believable if it is practiced by many people at a certain time. I think if you really think about it, this “theory” could be held true for out time because we do believe that certain theories tend to have more significance and more meaning if they are practiced more. Also, they may hold more truth and also may be safer or the “better” one to use if it is used more often.

I think that I may have understood Rhizome a bit more than Williams. He also had some very interesting points, right from the very first page. He says: “A book has neither object nor subject, it is made from various formed materials, and very different dates and speeds. To attribute the book to a subject is to overlook this working of matters, and the exteriority of their relations”. I think what he means here is that a book could have many different meanings. If we overlook or “miss” those meanings, or even think that the book only has one meaning, then we could quite possibly have a lack of understanding the text all together.At book is comprised of many different things, all made at different times. It is reasonable to think that a book would have more meaning behind it if you think about where it has come from and the relations it has to that person. Because sections of the book are written in many different times of a a persons life, each section could have different meanings according to what was happening in that person’s life at the time it was being written. I think what he basically trying to say here is that you have to look at a book as a whole, including it’s outside influences in order to understand it’s various points.

After reading these two readings, along with Baktin, I believe that I do have a better understanding of the “literature concept”. Although I did very much hate reading Baktin, I feel I have a better grasp on his materials, then I do with the other two. Either way, I feel like all of the reading had significance and they have made the subjects a bit more clear.

From Discourse in the Novel- Bakhtin

Well, I think the whole “language barrier” thing is catching up to me. Is it just me or did everyone else have an extremely hard time understanding Bakhin’s essay? I think I must have read it at least three times all the way through and I’m still having trouble understanding parts of it. I feel like I had a much easier time understanding Barry and I feel like it took me hours to try to figure out Bakhin. I kept getting distracted and I feel like it did not keep my attention for more than minutes at a time. I had to keep going back and reading the same sentence a million times, along with looking up words in order to understand what they meant. It’s just very frustrating to not be able to understand something, especially something like this, which is vital to this posting. Anyway, I’m going to try to make some sense of it, so here goes!

On page 1190 Bakhtin states “The separation of style and language from the question of genre has been largely responsible for a situation in which only individual and period-bound overtones of a style are the privileged subjects of study, while it’s basic social tone is ignored”. When I first read this I was like “What? Is this even in English?”, but then I read a bit further and it did make a little more sense. He then says that “…..stylistics defines itself as a stylistics of “private craftsmanship” and ignores the social life of discourse outside the artist’s study, discourse in the open spaces of public squares, streets, cities, and villages, of social groups, generations and epochs”. What I think Bakhtin means by all of this is that it is hard to pick out the style of writing or prose because it is not associated with any other style. So, stylistics are like a “private craftsmanship” and basically work alone. Also it “ignores the social life of discourse outside the artist’s study” because it is misinterpreted and is not understood, hence why it stands alone.

Another quote that I had found interesting and a bit helpful in understanding this essay was on page 1192 when Bakhtin states the basic types of compositional-stylistic unities. He states them as: “Direct authorial literary-artistic narration (in all its diverse variants); stylization of the various forms of oral everyday narration; stylization of the various forms of semiliterary (written) everyday narration (the letter, the diary, etc); various forms of literary but extra-artistic authorial speech (moral, philosophical or scientific statements, oratory, ethnographic descriptions, memoranda and so forth); and the stylistically individualized speech of characters. I think he stated these in order to make a point about the “novelistic whole”. I think what he was trying to say was that all of these unities work together to form a whole, which is the novel and no one unity is higher than the the work as a whole. This goes back to the “private craftsmanship”. A private craftsmanship, whatever it may be, works alone, but also needs other elements to help it along, but those elements are not higher than the craftsmanship. It’s confusing, but it does make sense if you look at it through an example. A Plumber could be considered a private craft-man, but the man or woman alone could not get the job done. He or she needs work tools and knowledge of the subject in order to do the job correctly. It is just like the unities. The novel or piece of work needs all of the unities to complete it, but it does not subordinate to it.

At the end of Bakhtin’s  essay he states that “the problem of stylistics for the novel inevitably leads to the necessity of engaging a serious of fundamental questions concerning the philosophy of discourse, questions connected with those aspects in the life of discourse that have had no light cast on them by linguistic and stylistic thought-that is, we must deal with life and behavior of discourse in a contradictory and multi-languaged world”. I think that this can be applied to his essay itself.  When I read this essay, I did not understand it until I read it a few more time through. I had to read it more times perhaps because of the linguistic and stylistic thought that had no light cast upon them, which did make me question the whole point of this essay. I think that he sums it up with the very last sentence which is true that “we must deal with the life and behavior of discourse in a contradictory and muti-languaged world”. If you think about it, he is right. We really can’t do anything about it, but try to understand it through our questioning. 

First Posting

I guess my “English major” story starts pretty much where everyone else does, in high-school. I never really knew what I wanted as a career in life. English has always been my strong point. I’ve always received good grades and it seemed to always come easy to me. I figured that “you do what you know” and that’s when I decided to become an English teacher. My high school English experience is probably like everybody else’s. I can remember reading To Kill a Mocking Bird, Huckleberry Finn, Of Mice and Men, The Scarlet Letter, and Lord of the Flies. I also can remember reading a lot of Shakespeare, which is probably where my love for it had started.

Coming into college, I thought that I had the whole English thing down. My very first English class that I had took proved me very very wrong. I felt like I had hardly learned anything in high-school and that I was extremely unprepared for college English. But, since I always love a challenge, I stuck with it and grew to love it even more. After I had a “oh my god I don’t know what I want to do with my life” meltdown two semesters ago, I realized that teaching just wasn’t for me and I decided to minor in communications. I’m not exactly sure what I want to do with this just yet, but hopefully it will involve something with either writing for a news station or a news paper in the future.

I have to be completely honest here. Pardon my french, but this class quite frankly scares the hell out of me. I’ve heard from many others that it is extremely difficult and since I have never really thought of myself of having a “critical mind”, I’m quite terrified of it. I’m am not much for analyzing theories, but like I said I rarely give up and always am up for a challenge. Hopefully, since this is a requirement for my major, I will do well in this class and learn the information that I need to know to critically analyze literature, which is what I believe is needed for a deeper understanding of this subject.