{"id":6686,"date":"2016-02-02T14:18:36","date_gmt":"2016-02-02T14:18:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/02\/02\/what-is-language-tool-enabler-dominatrix\/"},"modified":"2016-02-02T14:18:36","modified_gmt":"2016-02-02T14:18:36","slug":"what-is-language-tool-enabler-dominatrix","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2016\/02\/02\/what-is-language-tool-enabler-dominatrix\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mystery of Language: Tool, Enabler, Dominatrix?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\"Karl_Kraus\"<\/a>I have spoken before, romantically no doubt, of the mother tongue as our alma mater<\/em>, our dear mother to whom we owe honor. Mater and matrix of our thoughts, she is yet deeper and higher than our thoughts, their sacred Enabler.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I was pleased to come across a similar, albeit more trenchant, observation in Karl Kraus' Beim Wort Genommen<\/strong>, Koesel Verlag, 1955, pp. 134-135:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Ich beherrsche die Sprache nicht; aber die Sprache beherrscht mich vollkommen. Sie ist mir nicht die Dienerin meiner Gedanken. Ich lebe in einer Verbindung mit ihr, aus der ich Gedanken empfange, und sie kann mit mir machen, was sie will. Ich pariere ihr aufs Wort. Denn aus dem Wort springt mir der junge Gedanke entgegen und formt rueckwirkend die Sprache, die ihn schuf. Solche Gnade der Gedankentraechtigkeit zwingt auf die Knie und macht allen Aufwand zitternder Sorgfalt zur Pflicht. Die Sprache ist eine Herrin der Gedanken, und wer das Verhaeltnis umzukehren vermag, dem macht sie sich im Hause nuetzlich, aber sie sperrt ihm der Schoss.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I do not dominate language; she dominates me completely. She is not the servant of my thoughts. I live in a relation with her from which I receive thoughts, and she can do with me what she will. I follow her orders. For from the word the fresh thought springs, forming retroactively the language that created it. The grace of language, pregnant with thought, forces me to my knees and makes a duty of my expenditure of trembling conscientiousness. Language is a mistress of thought. To anyone who would reverse the relationship, she makes herself useful but denies access to her womb.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I might have translated Herrin<\/em> as dominatrix if I wanted to accentuate the masochistic tone of the passage. 'Mistress' is obviously to be read as the female counterpart of 'master.' <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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I have spoken before, romantically no doubt, of the mother tongue as our alma mater, our dear mother to whom we owe honor. Mater and matrix of our thoughts, she is yet deeper and higher than our thoughts, their sacred Enabler. So I was pleased to come across a similar, albeit more trenchant, observation in … Continue reading “The Mystery of Language: Tool, Enabler, Dominatrix?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-language-matters","category-literary-matters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6686\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}