Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Writing

This is my first post, so I thought about my first topic for a while before I started writing. From intermittent brainstorms in my day, I thought that a discussion about writing itself could satisfy as a first post. It’s general, it can easily be philosophical, and it relates directly to the process that allows this blog to exist. I’ll try to keep my post tight, but that’s not a promise.

Derrida argued that speaking, as opposed to writing, is closer to our intent, will, or consciousness. He reasons that because speaking is an immediate action of communication--that our thoughts are expressed as they happen--they are therefore a more accurate presentation of our thought process. Writing, on the other hand, is merely a representation of speech. Moreover, it is a process that can be “fixed” and calculated over longer periods of time, thus escaping our immediate will the more we mull it over, the more we edit and doctor it. Speaking, then, is a more accurate portrayal of our mode of thinking whereas writing is a more detached process.

***edit: I just re-read some Derrida today, and found that what he says is quite different than this previous chapter. He claims that writing, in being a representation of speech, puts "death" to the language in making it a more detached sign. Speech is immediate, so it is alive. When something is uttered, it streams out of you in the moment as opposed to writing which is an engraved symbol of the spoken word...or something like that... to be honest, I find him extremely difficult to read. He uses so much terminology, like all lit. theorists, that I'm starting to believe that they are all talking absolute nonsense. So my discussion doesn't really have much to do with Derrida, but I'll leave it up anyway***

I have one issue with this claim. Namely, it doesn’t take into consideration what stream of consciousness writing is capable of. Who’s to say that I can’t type as fast as I think? Couldn’t I achieve the same immediacy in writing as I do in speaking, as long as I type fast enough and with no restraint from my thoughts?

Of course, you could say that in writing, there is a strong visual cue going on in your thought process. In speech, our expression and our perception of it is purely auditory. Any visual rendition of your thoughts has to be created abstractedly in the mind, whether it is a textual or imaginary visualization.

Even so, it would be absurd to claim that I have never taken a few seconds, or even minutes, before formulating a spoken comment or statement. I’m sure that anyone can agree with this. That moment right before we say something thoughtful in a discussion: we fix our eyes on an indeterminate spot in space, frown, open our mouth to say something, stop, repeat, and finally say whatever it is we choose to say. Are we not detaching ourselves from our immediate thoughts then? Could I not edit my own thoughts by hearing them in my mind before I speak them?

At times we are unconscious of our own line of thought. We simply speak and communicate without an editor present; no censorship, no “fixing”, and no outside tools, such as a dictionary, or some other text to help us. Surely though, this doesn’t encompass all speech, especially when an important discussion is taking place (a good example would be the Press Secretary taking questions from an army of reporters on one of the government’s most recent blunders). At times, especially when we know that what we say will have a significant impact on our surroundings, we take our time and “choose our words wisely”, or something to that “editing” effect. Does speech in this instance take on a similar process as writing? The same kind of question could be asked about sign language. Sign language is more akin to speech due to its immediate nature, except that it is purely visual, this time in hand gestures and shapes.

Writing is, after all, merely another form of communication (one of many). Like all forms of communication, it is bound by laws that both restrict its freedom and grant it sense. In English, there are only 26 letters in the alphabet. There are also many grammatical guidelines to consider, many of which are ingrained into us from early age. Our language is at once simple in its foundational building blocks, and complicated in its syntactical and contextual potentials. We are therefore able to master our language in a way that allows us to convey (seemingly) free and original meaning on paper or in speech. But in another sense, we are slaves to language--bound by the same laws that allow it to make sense. You can’t express yourself with absolute originality and accuracy to your own individual thoughts unless you make up your own language to do it, and then, what would be the point in saying it? No one would understand you, and to be fair, it would be impossible for you to understand yourself unless you grew in complete isolation of any culture or society. Further, you would be speaking gibberish, because language can't even develop or exist without a culture or society to house it.

But I am digressing too much into language itself. Writing is a visual adaptation of our language that allows us to see it from a different perspective, that allows us to store it away, play with it and modify it. It is a documentation that can be used personally for future use, or for it to be available to a wider audience over space and time.

One difference between the linear aspects of writing and the linear aspect of speech is in our ability to map out writing. Already, I have erased, gone back and added in, re-read, and put aside thoughts on my clip board in case I find use for them later. Writing wasn’t always so flexible as it is in today’s age of computers. I imagine that Descartes’ meditations took a lot of effort, energy, and resources to write even one essay. He must have sensed a sense of permanence for each word inscribed as he dipped his quill in ink and legibly scratched it into the limited paper in his possession. To erase or edit was an arduous and inconvenient process, and I suspect that his line of thought could easily be influenced by this reality. Today’s writing in comparison is lazy and extremely convenient. I can afford to be disorganized and sporadic in my writing and editing, therefore my thought process can afford to be disorganized and sporadic.

I find my post to be wandering. Fortunately no promises were made in this respect. My original question on Derrida’s claim that speech was a closer reflection on one’s thoughts still holds some water though. Merely because speech has immediate broadcasting doesn’t mean that the speaker can’t edit his linguistic thoughts before they are let loose. Although I must admit that by writing this very post I have fallen into the trap he pointed out. The more I wrote about what I thought, the more detached I became from that original bit of consciousness which started it all; the greater grew that gap between my consciousness and what eventually came about in this post.

2 comments:

  1. I really liked the language part and you came up with the same problem I saw, in that people sensor what they say constantly and if you have ever met the few people who are more of a stream of consciousness talker they are horrible to talk to, and often say dumb things that don't make a whole lot of sense.

    Even if you did come up with a completely made up and original language, your mind would still think in terms of the language you knew before. All my internal speech is in English, so even me creating a new language wouldn't let me escape the entrapping of my former language.

    Great first post anyway, look forward to seeing the next one.

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  2. The mills of God grind slowly; yet they grind exceedingly small. I will assume your second post may be a book.

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