Language, communication, interpretation (upd.)

Class last night was a provocative jumble of linguistics & literary theory, story, worldview and meta-narrative.

It must have been a bit overwhelming for a lot of the students. Of the 25 or so in the class, only about 5 of us had taken any seminary courses before. The rest were all new students.

I think the prof is going to be every bit as enjoyable as people have suggested he will be. But he also seems tough and intense. As usual, I asked questions, talked a bit, but I think I conducted myself decently. I'm guessing the first impression was okay in both directions. :)

But as I read the first few chapters of one of the two main texts earlier in the week, I got hot under the collar about it, and my first question in class was about having to buy into the perspective of the text. The interpretive model that the author (a fellow Bethel prof. and a colleague of his) put forward really rankled me in spots. Fortunately, my prof said we will not be required to agree with the model proposed in that book in order to get a decent grade.

Some of the things she (the author) put forth made good sense. Others didn't. For example, she borrowed from current linguistic theory to help describe what happens in communication. She referred to "speech-act" theory and "relevance" theory. Speech-act theory says that words accomplish something, they don't just have content, they have momentum and weight - they DO things.

There's the locution (what is written), the illocution (what the words accomplish), and a perlocution (what the reader does in response.) The writer intends that the reader have a certain response; this is the perlocutionary intention. But the reader may not react that way at all, they may have an unintended perlocution. The words written are thus "on a mission", but the mission may or may not not result in the desired response. The Epistles of St. Paul are great examples of this.

Relevance theory says that an utterance (a speech act with a context), requires readers to infer some things, and they will select, among several options, that context which is most relevant for understanding. So, an utterance consists of both linguistic expression and assumed context.

Put another way, lingusitic expression + background context assumptions = meaning. Meaning elicits a response. The response may vary, however, with the context assumptions. If the author and reader have different context assumptions, the response (perlocution) may not be what the author intended.

Okay, so far so good. Are you with me?

I didn't think so. I don't get this either.

:)

Well, really, I suppose I do. Because this is why I got upset. I was tracking, up to this point. But the author of this textbook then went on to say that we, as contemporary readers of the Scripture, by understanding the shared background context assumptions of the original author and reader(s), can be brought into the world of the text and participate in the conversation.

Hogwash. I don't buy it. The best we can do is eavesdrop on someone else's conversation. It's like finding someone's diary, or a stack of old love letters. You may be affected by what you read, but not like the original reader and author were!

Here's an example. Let me illustrate with a dramatic scene.

Picture a boy and a girl on a couch, some time in the past. They are intimately in love, and have been so for oh, say... a few years. Let's further say that one of this pair has a degree in lingusitics - an expert in the field of language form and usage. For argument's sake, let's make the girl that expert (...it just fits the story better.)

Now in this particular scene, the boy is saying goodbye to the girl. She has told him, for lots of very sensible reasons, all of which he understands, that it's finally time they stop seeing each other.

She's right, of course (girls are always right, aren't they?), but he is heartbroken nonetheless.

Knowing she's not only right, but she's convinced... and not wanting to be a problem for her, not wanting to stand in the way of her happiness but preferring to end it well... he muscles up his manhood, bites his trembling lip, and does the right thing: he agrees with her, he gracefully lets her go.

But, he wants to be sure that she knows clearly how he feels about her, leaving no doubt that he would stay if she changed her mind someday. So he does one more time what he's done many times before this - he verbally "takes inventory" of her, and tells her how beautiful she is to him, and what he'll miss.

He starts with her hair: how silky soft it is. Then her eyes: how mesmerizing. Her cheek: how velvety smooth. Her lips: how tender and thrilling. Her neck: perfumed and inviting. And (preserving the couple's privacy a little bit here...), he proceeds downward, remembering out loud how marvelous he has found her to be and how lucky he has been to know it first hand...

Somewhere below the neck, she breaks. Though not the crying type, she can't help it this time. The tears flow, and she weeps and weeps at the beauty, the poignancy, and the heartbreak of it - knowing that she may never hear him say those things again, never see (and feel) him enjoying her again, the way no other boy ever has, and knowing how truly he means every word he said.

She cries. The linguistics expert cries her heart out.



(teardrops fall on couch. fade to black, cue music, roll credits.)



So let me ask you... is she thinking about his perlocutionary intention? Is she laying out the background context assumptions they share?

No.

It all just happens. She understands, without thinking. She knows.

Is her tearful response intended by the broken-hearted boy, who's simply trying to reach her heart one last time?

No.

It just happens. He sees her heart through her tears. He knows.



THAT is conversation. THAT is communication.

Not this silly model of picking apart someone ELSE's conversation, so that if we get all the assumptions right we somehow vicariously participate in it. Nonsense.

Ridiculous.

My point is that you can have all the linguistics and literary training in the world, but if you are not actually personally involved in a communication, your view of it can be nothing more than an academic exercise. And if you ARE personally involved in the communication... all academic training and analysis goes out the window - completely.

When you are personally involved, interpretation happens on the fly, in the now. You instinctively bring all your shared context and emotions to bear in the moment, without analysis.

Analyzing something implies emotional *distance* from it, not engagement in it...



Now, suppose there's an epilogue to our little drama on the couch, not in a movie scene now, but in real life:

Suppose that the boy, after this, had taken the further step of writing to the girl everything that he had just told her in person, so that she would have it to hold on to and read again and again...

and if that girl turned out to be your grandmother...

and you found in the attic her bundle of love letters from the boy, sewn into the lining of an old couch...

and from the words in those letters, while you sat on your grandma's old couch, you reconstructed the scene...

and you looked at the date, put two and two together, and realized that when your grandma sat on this very couch and tearfully said goodbye to this boy who loved her so...

that by this time she already was seeing your grandpa, who she then married a while later.

And not only did you discover that there was more to your grandma than you ever knew...

but all of a sudden you also realized that your existence on this earth depended squarely on the conversation that occurred on this couch, and the exchange of love-words and tears that happened right here.

Because if your grandma hadn't held her ground that night, if she had instead melted into the boy's arms and relented, she may not have ever married your grandpa, and your mother (...and you) never would have been born.

And NOW you can participate in the conversation. :) Because your very existence depended on it. You are the result of how that talk went.

THAT makes sense to me. And that's how to interpret Scripture. Not academically, not with analysis... but with emotional engagement. Because who you are today depends on those ancient conversations.