Guido Fernandez Parmo: June’s classes, 2017

Language and politics

June 3rd

Guido opens up the class by sharing with us his deep interest in movies; he recalls his 2016’s
lessons on Language and Politics , which gets him to ‘add’ to the concepts being discussed
then, the role the cinema also plays in this realm.
The domineering language imposes onto us a definition of the world; this domineering
language defines our representation of the world by the way it gets us to conceptualise reality.
Thus, it is not a matter of imposing contents onto , let’s say, the cinema audience , but it is a
matter on how the elements of both the language and image system are set up to make us
perceive a given image of the world. Lecturing on language and politics , then, is not just to
debate over the control of our thoughts , but to debate over the way in which we are led to
think.
Our context of perception ( condición de percepción) is what provides us with the range of
possibilities we resort to for assigning meaning to our perception of the world. i.e. , what
we can think about ;and how we can think about it . Judith Butler has written a book , Frames
of War : When is life grievable? ,2009, ( Las vidas que merecen ser lloradas) whose main query
is to analyse the different effects war images have on viewers. When the western world
comes to learn , for example, about the terrorist attack in Manchester during Ariadna
Grande’s concert , with a toll of a few casualties , they get into panic. However, they seem to
be quite indifferent to the hundreds of people being manslaughtered by US and British forces
in the eastern world.

After this introduction, Guido sets the main points of his class:
 Problem.
 Language and what is regarded as natural.
 Political dimension of language: Edward Said & Delueze and Guattari.
 Language with a small ‘l’. (lengua menor)
 Foucault: discourse

The teaching of English may be closely related to the idea of Imperialism: is it that we still
deny this fact? It is true, though , that we teach English not only for pragmatic and
instrumental reasons but also for political ones. To clarify this concept, we can mention
Caliban by Shakespeare whose main character, Caliban , says to his master : “You taught me
language, and my profit on 't Is, I know how to curse. The red plague rid you .For learning me
your language!” It is through these words that we can see how the dominated gets to be
empowered by the master’s language. Caliban has not altered the system of the English
language; he has used English to curse the colonizer. Reality has been altered. Probably, no
one has ever thought about the possibility of insulting the master till Caliban did.

The world has been organised almost in the same way since the XIX century. In the XIX century
, Great Britain did so through her colonising power. Then , in the XX century, The U.S was in
charge of reorganizing the world . It is clear , then, the world has always been colonised by the
English Language. When Caliban makes it clear he has resorted to his master’s language to
curse him, he has truly made the language become his own. He has been able to transform the
language for his own benefits ; the language has become his own language.
Oswald de Andrade , a Brazilian poet , in his ‘ Manifesto Antropófago” (1928) has written : “
tupi or not tupi” for the sake of making fun of English. Making fun of the other – The Master -
leads to his powerlessness and to his denaturalisation. Why is it that the poet has used ‘tupi’?
Tupi is an Amazon cannibal culture of warriors. The warriors eat the foreigner up to possess his
power and use it for other means.

The previous accounts may sound striking because we tend to have a natural conception of
language. Where does this idea come from ? It is grounded on “The Adamic Theory “ (Teoría
adánica); Adam has given all things a name. This natural idea of language is apolitical since it
strips language off any human action. This natural representation of reality clashes against
Structuralism in the XX century. Structuralism has come to claim that a language is a system of
signs. Each sign claims some relational value ,i.e. the value of each sign is assigned in relation
to the values assigned to the other elements of the system. This is generally set in terms of
differences and it is this relative system that shapes the structure of the language. Thus, the
meaning of words emerges from this system of relations. To make this more comprehensible,
we can draw a parallelism with any game of cards where the value of a card varies according
to the rules of the game – “ El ancho de espada” will mean one thing when playing ‘ Truco ‘
and will mean something totally different when playing ‘ La Escoba de Quince’. Therefore, the
value of the card is not in the essence of the card; the card in itself is void of content for its
visual content is meaningless. The relations set among the cards is what makes up the
structure: a structure is the result of the interplay set among the relations of the system.
This is an invariable condition of any system , which is not set by nature but by culture. The
sign does not refer to the thing ‘out there’ straightforwardly; its reference is not
extralinguistic but rather intralinguistic. The meaning of a word is closely related to the
meaning of another word within the language system. To know what “ pegar” means , we
should know the meaning of ‘ despegar’. ( In English , we can think of “ to stick” vs “to
remove”). In sum, language is a structured system.

Chomsky adheres to the fact that language structure is a ‘natural’ invariable; this is endowed
within human nature. Conversely, Foucault claims that language is power. Structuralism can
be real , imaginary or structural. Chomsky claims it is structural since it is inherent to the
human condition ; being Structuralism , then, independent of human action. Foucault holds
that there is no nature in language ; the use of language is political. Language use comes to
disclose what has not been mentioned out there. To become empowered through language
is beyond the individual structure . As a matter of fact , today we have learnt that English has
been changed collectively by Harlem, India or any other group of people, making it evident that
possessing a language is not an individual issue but a collective one.

Literature sets language in motion. Coetze, Dickens, Becket use language in such a way that a
new reality emerges from their unique use of language. If language is regarded as something
natural, no change will ever be possible. Language used to express a natural order will never
change whatsoever. Dickens, Hardy , Kafka can unveil another reality when they make us
feel, think and perceive reality differently. The language is the same but reality takes up new
forms.
The idea that Structuralism is natural has been imposed since this very same ideas is essential
to keep the natural order of thing. The idea is copied and reproduced for the sake of avoiding
the thought of the existence of any possible difference.

June 10th

Guido recaps the idea of reality: reality is represented through language. A metaphysical
conception of both reality and language encompasses that both concepts are beyond human
subjectivity. Then, reality is what has been done and language is part of that given reality; it
has its own nature / essence . Yet, a political view of language comes to tell that whatever
reality is , it has already become an effect of discourse.
Guido sets his main items:
 Language with capital ‘L’ and language with small ‘L’. ( Lengua mayor & Lengua menor)
 Discourse: Foucault
 “ Agenciamiento colectivo” : Deleuze & Guattari )

Guido sets the focus on the first point and makes it clear that the differences between
language with a capital ‘L’ and language with a small ‘L’ are not a matter of quantity but a
matter of politics. The category refers to the subject’s position; to the position the subject
takes over in the language within the language. A subject position that sets fixed invariables
of a language to both impose and keep an order ,which at the same time constructs the idea
that reality is ‘natural’. In Foucault ‘s view, the production of fixed invariables is materialised
through institutions. This is what is called language with a capital ‘L’.
Language with a small ‘L’ refers to the variable potential enacted to make langue with a capital
‘L’ run away. It is related to the power of modifying and transforming that language for the
sake of mapping onto the fixed invariables a variable. This is a new creation ; it is politics.

Henry James in his book, What Maisie knew or Jack Kerouac , to mention just a few writers,
belong to a group of writers who have been able to define a new way of life, where reality is
to become; it is not a thing. Language is an institution that has come to define reality and this
is what leads us to discourse –locus de enunciación-. The Real Académia Española sets the
fixed invariables of Spanish from a powerful subject position. An order and a hierarchy are
imposed denying the existence of any variables. English is the result of an institutionalised use;
yet , a pure origin of the language does not exist since there has always been some mixing in
any language.

Edward Said ( post colonial scholar ) claims that the West has invented both categories : the
West and The East in the XX century .Once The West had taken over the stance from that
hemisphere , it constructed a discourse to define power positions. In Foucault’s words what is
authorised is what produces reality and this is realised by social mechanisms. Discourse , then,
is what defines the way in which both we perceive and define reality. Each period in History
weaves the threads of discourse , which sets the conditions to allow us to see or not to see
parts of reality and to name what can be seen - condiciones de visibilidad y de decibilidad - .
We can see from reality what the social mechanism in power wants us to see. Today, we say
‘sky’ when referring to the ‘blue’ atmosphere out there , whereas for a Greek it was ‘Uranus’
or ‘ Cosmos’.

In his book El orden del discurso – , Foucault explains what factors guarantees the
reproduction of a fixed reality. This is materialised by: external factors, internal factors and
use. The external factors embody power positions and the power discourse has. The internal
factors seek to conjure up chance by defining these concepts: author, comment and discipline.
The comment is what warrants production of the same and the idea of an author presupposes
certain unity- this can be compared to the unknown writer of a street graffiti-. Finally, there
are discourse societies: education is one and the way in which discourse is used there ,also,
may guarantee reproduction of the same.

Translated by: Estela Medela

Early June, 2017