Sociological Semanticide: On Reification, Tautology and the Destruction of Language

Abstract

Classification, a fundamental human act, is the ultimate foundation of science, as well as the basis of everyday life. Exercising the prerogatives of science and the arts, the social sciences are rich in metaphoric classifications: mechanistic, organismic, systemic, and dramaturgical to name a few. Metaphors like similes, parables, and models are useful tools only as long as they are remembered as what they are-constructs. A beguiling temptation exists to treat such classifications literally as reified entities and as hypostasized tautologies. This paper addresses the misuse of language-semanticide-in the social sciences and particularly the sociological concepts of attitude, norm, and role. Semanticide occurs when these concepts are converted from behavioral descriptions into tautological causes. A renewed emphasis on the philosophy and sociology of language is needed.The tendency has always been strong to believe that whatever receives a name must be an entity or being, having an independent existence of its own: and if no real entity answering to the name could be found, men did not for that reason suppose that none existed, but imagined that it was something peculiarly abstruse and mysterious, too high to be an object of sense.-John Stuart MillWhat follows here has been said before, many times by many people. We say it again because the discipline of our first allegiance, sociology, is particularly guilty of the errors to which we will point, and the effectiveness of its arguments and the power of its analysis are being seriously eroded by the cavalier disregard of the issues which we raise. The basic issue is how we classify. Classification, a fundamental human act, is the foundation of science, as well as the basis of everyday life. Having progressed beyond the mythology of Adam and Eve arbitrarily naming the animals in the Garden, human beings have refined their classificatory schemes many times and in many ways, with each new scheme heralding the latest discovery of reality. Classification creates pragmatic degrees of order and regularity as people seek to define the world about them as humanly meaningful and significant. Not only do classifications help mitigate the threat of unexpected events, but also they are tools for mastering that which is named: a type of social control by linguistic fiat. By codifying the objects of existence, mapping "reality," human communities use language to introduce and maintain order in everyday life experience; thus what otherwise would appear tenuous, problematic and transitory, becomes patterned, predictable, and precise.We have had many voices reminding us of this problem. Whatever one thinks Dl980 by The Sociological Quarterly. All rights reserved.

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