Religious Language after J. L. Austin

1972 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-63
Author(s):  
James M. Smith ◽  
James WM. Mcclendon
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Religious Language ◽  
Recent Philosophy ◽  
Linguistic Action ◽  
The Way

John L. Austin believed that in the illocution he had discovered a fundamental element of our speech, the understanding of which would disclose the significance of all kinds of linguistic action: not only proposing marriage and finding guilt, but also stating, reporting, conjecturing, and all the rest of the things men can do linguistically.2 We claim that the illocution, the full-fledged speech-act, is central to religious utterances as well, and that it provides a perspicuity in understanding them not elsewhere provided in the work of recent philosophy of religion. In particular we hold that understanding religious talk through the illocution shows the way in which the representative and affective elements are connected to one another and to the utterance as a whole. There may, further, be features in such an analysis which can be extended to other forms of discourse than religious.

Many Waters Cannot Quench Love

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Larsen
Keyword(s):  
Religious Language ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Auguste Comte ◽  
John Taylor ◽  
The Way

At this point, Mill meets the great, passionate partner of his life, Harriet Taylor. This chapter endeavours to explain the complex relationship and way of life that they created for themselves during the lifetime of her first husband, John Taylor. The choice of celibacy is investigated. Even for freethinkers, chaste affairs were often pursued in this time period and milieu, including by people close to Mill such as W. J. Fox (with Eliza Flower) and Auguste Comte (with Clotilde de Vaux). This chapter also reveals the way that Harriet became a kind of substitute deity and religion for Mill. He frequently applied religious language to her, including deeming her judgement to be ‘perfect’ and ‘infallible’. With Harriet, Mill’s devotional sense finally found an outlet.

God and his imaginary friends: a Hassidic metaphysics

2014 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
SAMUEL LEBENS
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Religious Language ◽  
The World ◽  
The Mind

AbstractWhat happens when you assume that the world is a dream in the mind of God, or that the world's history is a story that God is spinning? Focusing on the role that this assumption plays in the thought of Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Leiner (1801–1854), at least as it is understood by Rabbi Herzl Hefter, I argue that this assumption generates interesting solutions to old riddles in the philosophy of religion and interesting insights into the nature of religious language.

How rational is rational theology? A reply to Mikael Stenmark

1999 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-97
Author(s):  
VINCENT BRÜMMER
Keyword(s):  
Religious Belief ◽  
Essential Role ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Language Game ◽  
Religious Language ◽  
Rational Theology ◽  
Truth Claims

In this response to Stenmark's critique of my views on rational theology, I concentrate on his distinction between the epistemic and the practical goals of religion and between descriptive and normative rational theology. With regard to the first distinction, I grant that truth claims play an essential role in religious belief and that it is indeed the task of philosophy of religion to decide on the meaning and rationality of such claims. I argue, however, that since such claims are internally related to the practical context of religious belief, their meaning and rationality cannot be determined apart from this context as is done in the kind of rational theology which Stenmark calls ‘scientific’. With regard to the second distinction, I reject Stenmark's view that philosophy of religion has a descriptive task with reference to religion, and hence also his claim that I have put forward a false description of ‘the religious language game’.

Emergent creationism: another option in the origin of the soul debate

2014 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 321-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOSHUA R. FARRIS
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Causal Role ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Viable Option ◽  
Substance Dualism ◽  
Material Part ◽  
Recent Philosophy ◽  
Discrete Effect ◽  
The Brain

AbstractIn the debate over the theology of the soul's origin, there have traditionally been three broad views on origins. These include creationism, traducianism, and Origen's pre-existence view. In the recent philosophy of religion and mind literature, William Hasker posits an alternative view of origins called emergent substance dualism. As a contribution to this discussion, I put forward one novel option as a via media between simple creationism and Hasker's emergent substance dualism, wherein it has relevant overlapping features found in the two contrary positions. I suggest that this view is a variation of creationism like emergentism where the material part (i.e. the brain) has some positive causal role in the soul's coming to be as a discrete effect of one divine cause. I argue that emergent creationism (as I call it) is a viable option deserving the attention of philosophers and theologians.

Uses and functions of the Romanian marker dar and its English equivalent but in professional spoken interaction. A contrastive corpus analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (62) (Special Issue) ◽  
pp. 153-168
Author(s):  
Cristina STAN
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Corpus Analysis ◽  
Comparable Corpora ◽  
The Past ◽  
Cultural Requirements ◽  
Spoken Interaction ◽  
English Equivalent ◽  
The Way

"Based on two comparable corpora of professional spoken interaction CIVMP2 and ITICMC3 and on the idea that in the past hundred years, the way in which researchers conceived communication has changed, this paper analyzes the ability of speakers to control their behavior, actions and attitudes in the process of communication in the workplace, in an attempt to demonstrate that language is an instrument of doing things. Moreover, based on Fraser's classification (1996), this paper also analyzes two contrastive markers, but and dar, trying to show that they may be seen as equivalent. Following Schiffrin (1987), I began my inquiry by paying attention to their distribution in discourse. Thus, in the corpora I have analyzed, but and its Romanian equivalent dar have the following functions: to express a contrastive value, to continue an idea, to signal the personal correction of the speaker, to insert an objection or a reaction to the previous speech act, to emphasize a discursive idea, an obligation etc. In addition, according to the analysis on the corpora, it could be said that speakers seem to constantly adapt to the conditions imposed by the interactional, social, ideological and cultural requirements of the context, as shown by Măda (2009)."

“World without End”

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-89
Author(s):  
Erik Meganck
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Death Of God ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Absolute ◽  
First World ◽  
Late Modern ◽  
Inside Out ◽  
The Way ◽  
Scientific Rationalism

Abstract In this article, I want to make the following points, none of which are totally new, but their constellation here is meant to be challenging. First, world is not a (Cartesian) thing but an event, the event of sense. This event is opening and meaning – verbal tense. God may be a philosophical name of this event. This is recognized by late-modern religious atheist thought. This thought differs from modern scientific rationalism in that the latter’s so-called areligious atheism is actually a hyperreligious theism. On the way, the alleged opposition between philosophy and theology, between thought and faith is seen to erode. The core matter of this philosophy of religion will be the absolute reference, the system of objectivity and the holiness of the name. All this because of a prefix a- that has its sense turned inside out by the death of God.

scholarly journals Non-philosophical Christ-poetics beyond the mystical turn in conversation with continental philosophy of religion

2016 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Johann-Albrecht Meylahn
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Continental Philosophy ◽  
The Other ◽  
Negative Theology ◽  
The Uncanny ◽  
Close Proximity ◽  
Mystical Theology ◽  
Critical Conversation ◽  
Language Text ◽  
The Way

The religious turn in continental philosophy has opened the door for postmetaphysical mystical theology. Postmetaphysical mystical theology seeks to understand the non-relation relation of language (text) to the Other. Yet, this non-relation relation to the Other, who is every other, can also be interpreted differently to the mystical understanding. For example, Žižek argues that the Other, which is often experienced as the uncanny, the unpredictable and the contingent (lived spirituality), is not necessarily the result of some mystical unknowable Otherness but is a consequence of the way the subject’s own activity is inscribed into reality. These experiences of lived spirituality or experiences of Otherness can, rather than being interpreted as an in-breaking of the mystical Other, be interpreted otherwise, as a grammatological consequence of the inability and impossibility of language (Lacan). Therefore, in this article, Žižek’s thoughts function as a bridge to bring this mystical turn back into critical conversation with continental philosophy and particularly with the thoughts of Derrida, Laruelle and Stiegler. The contemporary mystical turn in theology rediscovers something of this non-religious religion. Derrida’s thoughts are in close proximity to negative theology and yet there is an important difference. This difference will be explored and further developed towards Laruelle’s non-philosophy, which does not translate into a non-religion religion or postmetaphysical metaphysics but remains a non-philosophy or maybe a science of Christ. This article will conclude with a tentative exploration of a postmetaphysical Christ-poetics beyond the mystical turn.

scholarly journals A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY OF THE OFFER AS FOUND IN AMERICAN MOVIES

Lexicon ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Musadad Musadad
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Descriptive Study ◽  
Practical Implementation ◽  
English Learning ◽  
The Real ◽  
English Grammar ◽  
Utterance Length ◽  
American Movies ◽  
The Way

The offer is one form of speech act realizations. Making offer in English belongs to a real example of communicative English learning for it requires practical implementation in some ways. Accordingly, one should not only comprehend the offer in English from what is stated in English grammar books, but also from certain situation providing imaginary life aspects as can be found in the real ones. Such a situation, which is later on called as context, can be displayed through American movies. This study found interesting features in the way the subjects manipulate and manage offers intended to their hearers. The features are mainly noted in three aspects which are utterance length indicating offer (offer-sequence), speech act classification indicating offer, and the most frequently used semantic formulae in accordance with the differences of age, familiarity, and status.

scholarly journals What may words say, or what may words not say. A corpus-based approach to linguistic action

2005 ◽  
pp. 189
Author(s):  
Monserrat Martínez Vázquez
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Approach ◽  
Corpus Analysis ◽  
Reliable Information ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Communicative Process ◽  
Linguistic Action ◽  
British National Corpus ◽  
National Corpus ◽  
The Way

In this paper I present an empirical approach to the analysis of the way English speakers conceptualize the communicative process in English. Most linguistic expressions about language in English are surface manifestations of what Reddy termed the "conduit metaphor". Reddy's model implies several interrelated cognitive associations: words are conceived as containers in which speakers introduce their ideas and send them to listeners, who will take these ideas out of these containers. Central to this model is the metaphor words are containers. It has also been claimed that there are other ways of perspectivizing the language process apart from the notion of containment (Vanparys 1995). In fact, Reddy himself notes that there is approximately a 30% of metalanguage not based on the conduit metaphor. The pervasiveness of the container metaphor would reasonably be most directly tested in expressions with the lexeme word. In order to measure what falls inside and outside these containers I carry out a corpus analysis of the lexeme word excerpted from the British National Corpus (BNC). The systematic evidence obtained from a large but delimited corpus gives us more reliable information about the frequency and use of this metaphor than an intuition based analysis or an arbitrary search in multi-source corpora.

Derrida, Agamben, Wynter

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent W. Lloyd
Keyword(s):  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Giorgio Agamben ◽  
Black Feminist ◽  
Religion And Theology ◽  
Homo Sacer ◽  
Religion And Race ◽  
Race And Religion ◽  
The Way

This chapter explores the way race and religion are articulated together in the work of leading critical theorists Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben. It probes how these theorists stand on the border between philosophy of religion and theology, and it argues that it is only because of secularist assumptions that this divide between outsider’s philosophy of religion and insider’s theology can be maintained. For Derrida, both religion and race function as loose threads that can be pulled in order to unravel a system of thought. For Agamben, the protagonist of modernity, homo sacer, is both racialized and sanctified. Yet Derrida and Agamben’s accounts are skewed by a Eurocentrism and a failure to take religious ideas sufficiently seriously. The black feminist Sylvia Wynter offers an antidote, similarly linking race and religion but doing so in a way that attends to how racialization is produced theologically and goes hand in hand with patriarchy. Wynter’s work implies that philosophy of religion that refuses secularism is always black theology and that black theology must engage seriously with questions in philosophy of religion.

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