Національна Академія Мистецтв України Інститут культурології

The ways of the periphrastic representation of problematic contents ensue from the very explorative destination of language. It is the task of rendering the unknown with the known that evokes the necessity to use periphrastic description. Idioms serve to designate such points of exploration where circumlocution describes the object of researches with the already known notions so that periphrastic description arises. Thus one can find in periphrastic transformation the mediation between the known and the unknown as the fundamental cognitive mission of language. It is already the widespread game of crossword where periphrastic descriptions serve to define the presupposed words as their idiomatic substitutes. Therefore one can regard periphrastic description (circumlocution) with its metonymic inferences or compressions as the basic element of idioms.

To sum up this reasoning one has to underline the necessity of the formation of idioms within the system of language. This necessity ensues from the nature of idioms as verbal heterogeneities as well as from the otherness as the object of reference for the idiomatically interpreted collocations. The reference for altered object is here of crucial importance. The difference of texts from tools as those belonging to artificial environment as well as of information from the transformation of reality is that distinguishes language in its mediating mission. Idioms with their permanent shift & drift of direct and literal meanings meet the demands of this property of language mapping the reality.

The place of intermediary link is here occupied with parable, its fold being a trope. They revealed the “inner form” () of the meant entity that found itself out through the act of miracle. Thus the comprehensive system of concepts has been developed where the images () were regarded as a “similarity” () to miracles as entities revealed through tropes. It is essential that such system has turned out to resound with folklore beliefs and preferences. For example, circumlocutions in the manner of the mapping of a world per speculum in aenigma «through the reflection in a riddle» have become the foundation of the folk books for mantic practice (in Eastern Europe known as the books of Rafla) where such enigmatic manner was widely represented with emblems uniting verbal and visual elements⁴⁰². Here the periphrastic description resembles the imaginative system of the so called impossibilia, that is the premeditated fables of incredible events widely represented in riddles and other enigmatic narratives.

The common source for such semiotic approach of Christian tradition is to be found in the First Epistle of St. Paul to Corinthians (13.12): “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known”. This statement has become the foundation for the semiotic doctrine of St. Augustine where the enigmatic images, the puzzles instead of ready notions play decisive role⁴⁰³. Consequently such problematic contents of an utterance constitute its inner form in contrast to outer form that supplies means of expression for contents. The advantage of such division may be seen in its aptness to represent the mutability of borderline between the direct literal meanings as the device for designation of the transferred derived meanings that reflect the entity as the object of an utterance. Inner form reveals the property of “hologram” providing the integration of lexical system as inseparable entity due to net of references inherently included in it⁴⁰⁴. Respectively each word acts both as a knot of the intersection of a lot of taxonomic classes due to the property of compatibility and as a representative of its own innate derivative potential concealed in the inner form.

Thus problematic core of concept’s contents presented with the inner form of word coincides perfectly with the meanings acquired with poetic idioms as the units of an idiolect. The idioms designate puzzles or questions; they pose problems to solve and by no means ready ideas as the “labels” for the bits of accumulated information. Moreover, poetic idioms allow to discover the still unknown facets of the map of world and to delineate them with the means of common language⁴⁰⁵. Within the borders of poetic idiolect knowledge becomes an intermediary link in comprehending the still unknown mystery and posing reasonable questions to it. It becomes obvious that the logical principle of identity can be used only with numerous restrictions and reservations for the poetic idiolect. This principle would violate the immanent poetic laws of poetic imagination.

At the same time the danger of arbitrariness emerges that has the outlook of “designation / assignment” dilemma. If one admits a sense (signification, concept) to designate the unknown only without any vestiges that would connect it to the already existing knowledge it would mean to return towards the approach of arbitrary and unmotivated verbal sign proper to dualistic theory. Here the meaning would be assigned to a sign quite voluntarily. A poet would then designate white with black or as one likes it. This approach would presuppose that sense meant just a mystery or a wonder and not a problem to be explored. In other words such a seemingly alternative approach would become plain mystics with respective arbitrary consequences. Meanwhile in reality the very purposefulness of poetic speech precludes the fortuitous semantic shifts so that the boundaries of the variability of the meanings become very solid indeed. It is to be stressed that the problem and not mystery or wonder determines the contents, and the problem implies the exploration instead of arbitrary acts of assignment.

It is not the unknown only that a sign designates as well as it is not the ready knowledge that it would label. Be the object of designation absolutely unknown, then it would be absurd even to suggest any name for it. The very fact that it is designated attests at least the knowledge of its existence (imaginary existence as well). For instance the use of the name God presumes at least the belief (or its denial) in His existence and respectively the knowledge of it given, in particular, through the Revelation. In its turn the contents of the concept London can’t be reduced to a point on a geographical map. Beside this point there remains an infinitely large bulk of unknown information that belongs to the contents. Thus it goes about neither mystery nor label. Sign as the element of a code reflects the dialectics of the known and the unknown or, in other words, it renders the unknown through the known. It means that the signified always presumes a complicated object including the unknown part, the ignotum that precludes in advance any possibility of simplification. In the same way as the formation of poetic idiolect and idioms presents the exploration of common language and becomes part and parcel of its diachronic development, problems are presented as the messages of the exploration of world.

To select the adequate elementary unit that would correlate with the problematic essence of contents represented in idioms one has to cope with the controversies arising from some incorrect use of terms in methodology. It goes about the widespread term of concept conceived as that correlating with idiomatic ambiguity and the semantic syncretism of etymons (that’s as the condensation of the meanings that are conceived as reciprocally discerning from the viewpoint of nowadays)⁴⁰⁶. Therefore concept presupposes the abstract object (denotation) together with the intersection of different attributes (significations)⁴⁰⁷. Meanwhile as we have already seen, this abstraction of ultimate generalization entails indefiniteness (as is the case with pronouns), therefore such “zero” denotation refers to problem and not to constant contents. Ultimate generalization entails the shrinkage of contents together with the growth of volume so that it results in indefiniteness of the zero denotation. As to the bunch of indivisible significations it belongs to the abstract attributive space. One does often define concepts as those inseparable from images so that they are represented actually as a peculiar kind of images being endowed with the properties of invariance, stability, reproducibility and manifesting signs taken separately from text⁴⁰⁸. Such and approach actually blends concept with idiom because all the essential features of idiom are here reproduced. The confusion becomes especially evident when it comes to the comparison between concept and literature’s type as a personage’s image, the distinction being seen in the dominance of partitive designations and details proper just for the concepts⁴⁰⁹ - and, we can add here, to idioms as well. As the result the confusion of image and concept is acknowledged⁴¹⁰ although idioms are not mentioned. This tendency towards blending notions is still reinforced with the so called key-words (vocabulae) being regarded as concepts⁴¹¹. There remains still the question whether key-words are to be identified with concepts or rather with idioms inasmuch as they designate particulars and not abstract attributes. At any rate it would be here appropriate to remark that in world literature one overtly prefers to talk of inner form and not of concept when it goes about the images of idiomatic locutions: image component “jest quasi-equivalentem pojęcia inner form” (is almost an equivalent to the notion of inner form) [Szerzunowicz, 2010, 208]. This participation of inner form in the generation of idiomatic images is especially evident in such German composed substantives as <Bücherwurm> ‘bookworm’ or <Bärenhunger> ‘bearish hunger’. It is idiomatic images that are meant here and by no means concepts.

There are also to be mentioned difficulties impeding the return of the term image (and its cognates type and ideal) in spite of the efforts connected with the development of imagology as a special approach. In linguistics image is used for figurative meaning and almost coincides with the notion of trope. In philology image denotes usually a portrait of a person correlating thus with the notions of tupe and ideal. Besides, image is opposed to notion as something diffuse to precise ans exact. Meanwhile it does not go about diffuse or figurative meaning that is of importance for image as the term in humanity studies. It is the unknown and enigmatic, the problem and puzzle that are implied. Giving description of an object the image shows also the problem that stands behind it. Image always presumes problematic contents, and therefore it can’t be exhausted with the things it refers to. This problematic productivity of image can be demonstrated at the example of such special kind of image as the so called motifs of a narrative that are conceived as predicates in the wide sense i.e. the new particulars in opposite to the presupposed known subjects. Due to this quality motif intersects with the details that coincide with it⁴¹². The preferences for images instead of concepts are indebted to such their properties as the relation to presumed personal (or personified) characteristics of such details that induce puzzles to be solved. But of the primordial importance is to be evaluated the fact that images belong to language and are generated with language’s immanent means in opposite to concepts that grow and dwell upon the strange soil. These preferences become visible at such images as <forlorn village> or <bleak house> that by no means can be reduced to the hyponyms of the concepts of <emptiness> or <alienation> respectively.

Still further contradictions ensue from the rejection of the signifying aspect of outer form in the very definition of concept⁴¹³. In this case concepts must be excluded from the field of linguistic approach because each element of language always is endowed with the vehicles of meaning, be it even literal meaning as the signifying device for figurative meaning. Such suggestion aims at justifying the separation of concepts from their verbal vehicles as such. In particular it presumes the creation of a work of literature as something void of verbal stuff that would be filled with lexical units⁴¹⁴ in the same way as children paint with colors the ready figures. Thus it is implied that poetic imagination in general would be possible beyond the power of language. The falsehood of such presumption is too obvious to be worth discussing. Its danger consists in entailing arbitrariness in the interpretation of poetic images as the concepts. For instance in the line by A.Tsvetkov «в календарном цеху штамповали второе число» ‘one stamped number two in the shop for calendars’ are detected concepts ‘production’ and ‘time’⁴¹⁵ that are only possible (and not obligatory) classes for the mentioned notions as hyponyms. Meanwhile it would be much more probable to say not of production but of standardized modes of existence that are implied with the poetic line, as well as of the idea of alteration implied with the mentioned number. To isolate concepts from their lexical (verbal) representation and simultaneously to acknowledge them to be verbalized notions would imply obvious contradiction. At the same time the verbalization of so comprehended concepts would mean tautology. Concepts are already present in a word’s contents as possibility and by no means appear as the result of the casualty of a single verbal use. It is the inherent property of inner form that becomes explored and disclosed in textual generation in its inseparable connections with the outer form where the contents become manifested.

The conceptualistic approach that has recently won a favorable place in humanities’ researches is now calling forth serious objections. V.V. Lewitzki, for instance, points out the arbitrariness of the very definition of concept so that “the researcher can give the name of concept to all he takes for granted”⁴¹⁶. The refutation of conceptualism was already undertaken by P. Coffey who had underlined the unfitness of colloquial language’s concepts to be correctly presented. This obstacle for scientific admissibility was known for ages and reflected in such paradoxes as “the Heap” (it is impossible to decide how many grains make a heap) [Coffey, 2, 1938, 305]. Another cause for concept’s vulnerability follows from the circumstance that “the thoughts that make up our knowledge … may be perfectly consistent with one another … and may nevertheless be all false” [Coffey, 1, 1938, 20]. In other words it is conceptualistic restriction of mental space and its seclusion that presupposes the generation of erroneous concepts of chimerical character (though the very conceptualism was borne just in the criticism of such chimeras). It is also to be mentioned here that these objections have been continued and developed by G. Spaeth who has shown also the contradictions inherent to “the sacred triangle of conceptualism” (wittily labelled by him) between immanent mental nature of concepts and their determination on the existential grounds that must include them [Шпет, 2005, 318].

The “triadic” representation of concept implies, as G.G. Spaeth has shown, the errors of confusing and redoubling the notions. In particular the confusion concerns the relations arising between a sign and attributes (with the respective representations) or objects that are designated⁴¹⁷. The relations between object and attributes become here conceived as those of subjective images generated with the reflexive activity. The name can be said to be disrupted between thing and concept or, respectively, between the objects that would correspond to different attributive representations so that the contradiction arises: instead of the single object there appear at least a pair of them characterized with different concepts (represented attributes)⁴¹⁸. As he result the risk also arises that concerns the arbitrariness in the relations between things and names that became redoubled and multiplied⁴¹⁹. Therefore the logical error of substituting proper terms takes place.

A very vulnerable deficiency of “concept” consists in the lack of cognitive task that it would tackle. This absence of problems can be exemplified with the errors arising with the difference between object and objective (in German terminology Object vs. Gegenstand, in Russian объект – предмет). As G.G. Spaeth has put it, it is not enough for cognition that a thing is selected and made the object of cognitive attitude. The chosen object must still become the incarnation of the respective cognitive task⁴²⁰. Therefore the necessity of disclosing the destination of object becomes evident. In its turn task as such is also insufficient for an object’s definition. The task entails explorative aims & goals attached to the object. It is with putting and solving the problems (and not separate isolated questions) that the objects come into play within the field of cognition⁴²¹. As the conclusion the “teleological” approach to objects becomes indispensable as the prerequisite of delineating objects as the objects of practical human activity⁴²². Meanwhile the term “concept” doesn’t presuppose any explorative purpose with ensuing tasks.

Similar objections remain relevant also as far as the recently appeared book by Yu.S. Stepanov is concerned where the author considers separately the concepts of artificial scientific humanitarian language as a kind of linguistic superstructure so that they resemble “parts of an imaginary bilingual dictionary where the contrasted terms belong each to different branches of humanities” [Степанов, 2008, 27]. In its turn concepts in artistic language are to be seen almost only as “the hues of national use” [Степанов, 2008, 96] but in this sense they are merely mingled with idioms. Another suggestion consists of intrusion of visionary interpretation in purely verbal stuff in the manner of hieroglyphics or baroque emblems where visual row served to elucidate words [Степанов, 2008, 64]. Meanwhile one should here to bear in mind that idioms are of much a wider scope of use than the concepts (as treated above), their semantic shifts including both lexical (potential) meaning and actual sense as singularity’s points of contents.

Conceptualistic triangle ignores first of all the problem of mediation between its ingredients. It lacks there intermediary means that provide the possibility of transition and correspondence in each its apex “sound-thing-idea”. It remains unclear how one can find out the connection between these extremely heterogeneous ingredients⁴²³. Such refusal from the problem of the origin and motivation of designation in language remains the possibility for purely nominal solution. The question how language becomes medium that unfolds in textual tissue between man and world is replaced with the purely passive observation of the correspondence of disparate signs towards similarly separated things. The reticent presupposition within this approach is the assumption as to the lack of entirety and continuity of language where such disparity of isolated signs would ever be possible. Words are likened to labels that have been stuck to things, lexical contents becoming something similar to glue. Thus also not only the dependence of such “labels” upon the entirety permanently generating them is denied but also the existence of something unknown and of respective questions standing behind them is ignored. The very existence of conceptual triangle presupposes the problematic background of questions it replies. The just mentioned lack of medial points in “the triangle” ensues from the fact that the meaning of a sign is not indication towards a thing only; it is first of all the reply to a question posed in the background, and it is due to this question that the meaning becomes derived and motivated. The existence of names entails the existence of problems. In its turn each separate name presupposes the existence of all other possible names so that its isolation is relative, and the existence of a generating system of language as entirety ensues from here: such are the principal objections against the isolationism concerning “triangles”⁴²⁴.

In particular each name is always a hyponym of some more general universal and /or the designation of general class including such hyponyms so that the name always takes certain place in the whole hierarchy of ideas. In the same way each image is the derivative and the origin for the generations of others. Each notion or image is to be conceived as a representative of a taxonomic class (semantic field, etymological nest etc.) and never as an autonomous unit. One deals with the permanent net of ideas where notions or images are only knots of the tissue inseparable from the whole. That’s why neither “name” nor “idea” can be isolated as an apex of a conceptual “triangle” – and the same concerns “triangle” itself. The inherent inner dependence between notions and images prevents any possibility of isolating them within a separate “triangle”. As to the “things” that occupy the third apex, it is well known that the very ability of their separation from the thorough world would become an enormous achievement of human spirit. Thus the whole tissue of ideas becomes contrasted with the thorough reality in their permanent interaction and never separate “names” with isolated “things”. To sum up there is the problem of derivation & generation that stands behind each “triangle”. It is why there are no reasons to say about internal references between the three ingredients of a “triangle”: they all depend upon the external references as far as each “triangle” is only a particle of the totality and entirety of language. The ratio existendi of each “triangle” is situated beyond its limits, its being only a part of a total, and this dependence proves the fallacy of conceptualistic approach. One can’t make any judgment about the mediations and connections dealing with isolated three ingredients as one can’t judge about the behavior of a part taken separately from the entirety that includes it.

Let be even put apart the question of the existence of the designated object of this triangle so that the concept wouldn’t represent chimerical essences, the problem still leaves as to the arbitrary nature of mental representations. The roots of such arbitrariness lie in the artificial isolation of concepts from their linguistic contents with the scheme “concept + verbalization”. Meanwhile such isolated and abstracted concepts don’t remain within the reach of linguistic comprehension. What will be the contents of the concept [life] or [death] taken as something ready, separated from the associated words and predestined for verbalization? The answer would be the whole biological science. What would be the contents of the concept of God? This question seems to be a rhetoric one. Thus it goes about the determination of this imaginary arbitrariness of mental representations and the removal of its relativity. Concepts are to be evaluated as the eclectic compromise between notion and image without any genuine attempt of removing their contradiction. One has to discern categories and images, and concept blends these two notions. Such blending effect causes the fact that concept conceals under its “skin” very different essences, in particular etymons and idioms together with the mentioned images and notions, not to say of personal characteristics. Concept can be said to throw into one heap absolutely different things that are to be strictly discerned.

Conceptualism does fully accord with the viewpoint of Plato’s followers as far as concepts can be represented in the form of distorted notions as the result of the “pollution” of “primary ideas” that coincide with their interpretation as “labels” on occasional observations of disparate “things”. Whether the “ideas” are viewed as primordially ready in the mode of mediaeval “realism” or as the result of the detection of common traits among occasional observations (nominalistic viewpoint) they remain void of their chief shaping element, that’s of no importance. Nominalistic approach to concepts as a collection of common features of observations that are generalized doesn’t differ actually from the realistic approach to them as those of a priori established ideas: it is textual casualties that are accumulated to delineate the contents whereas it is the inner form’s potentiality that becomes disclosed in contextually preconditioned meanings. The both of them ignore the principal role of problems. An object designated with a concept must necessarily be a reply to the question posed by an observer. Meanwhile it is the very problem that is taken reticently for absent and lacks for a concept’s definition. The primary aim of conceptualism was the detection and refutation of “chimerical” ideas, of “idols”. Meanwhile together with the “ghosts” of “chimeras” the real problematic contents were purged out. The so called “Ockam’s razor” has become the tool for removing all enigmatic and questionable. Thus in nominalism the paranoiac suspicion about problems (further labeled as ‘superstitions’) combines with hebephrenic attitude towards signs as pure toys or labels.

It is necessary to take into consideration that the making of both category and concept is always the aspect of interpretative procedure. Designation of partial attributes in concepts especially needs interpretative efforts. Being the products of interpretation the concepts do not as a rule correspond to lexical units and their denotations (meanings) so that they need at least word combination to be presented. These denotations always designate abstractions that need the ascent to the concrete. The opportunities of language determine only the horizon of consciousness, and it must be still intermediary degrees for the transition from one to another. The transition from categories to concepts would presuppose the differentiation of language map that were not within the reach of a linguist’s competence. At the same time it is not purely cognitive reasons that prevent concepts from becoming an effective tool for language’s exploration. It is existential problem of indefiniteness and diffusion, of perfection and transcendence that are ignored in conceptualism. Rejecting problems together with wonders and superstitions this approach becomes incapable of mapping the essence of existence (and merely to discern it while reticently denying essence that stands behind outer revelations). Concept means literally ‘fruit’ [Legowicz, 588] as the result of brain’s generalizing as well as generating activity. The nominalistic approach coincides with the realistic one in that they both take concepts for something imperfect as a kind of partitive knowledge generated with imperfect human brain without paying attention for the asks and obligations of further cognition that such partitive knowledge would imply.

One can detect the deficiency of the term concept in the confusion of perfectly different notions blended together. From one side concept (vs. denotation) is another name for sense (vs. meaning) that in its turn is the generalization of the inner form of word⁴²⁹. Denotation as the counterpart to concept represents meaning taken primarily as literal one or as the termination of the derivative continuum of a word, as its limitation point (according to Potebnya’s paradox of the priority of trope). The sense vs. meaning designates the derivative potential as the generalization of inner form (cryptotype, latent or deep contents etc.). The literality and terminality of denotation presumes also its abstractedness that evokes the necessity of the ascent to the concrete. In its turn in contrast to sense vs. meaning the opposition of concept vs. denotation arises from the intention of extending the laws of general categories over