LANGUAGE: An Inquiry Into Its Meaning and Function

Volume VIII of the Science of Culture Series deals with the implications of language as the unique and distinguishing attribute of man. The assumption of this series is that knowledge in one area pooled from apparently discrete domains will have a tremendous synthetic value and will suggest the possibility of discovering more all-embracing definitions about the ""meaning of life"". Thus men from distant disciplines- philosophy, politics, religion, psychiatry, anthropology, poetry, theatre- attempt ""to define a philosophy of language, to point to the native meaning and function of language, and finally to articulate the unitive principle..."" By and large the approach is non-pragmatic, emphasizing the power and validity of the symbolic form, inherent meanings and concepts in contradistinction to the idea that language is simply a vehicle for the transmission of laboratory-discovered-and-tested facts. The authors (Erich Fromm, George Boas, Auden, Kurt Goldstein, Barold Lasswell --to mention a few) discuss facets of language as it applies in their respective fields -- speech in a mentally disabled person, dreams, cultural variances, legal language as an instrument of decision. For the serious of the serious.