What do we think we're doing when we interpret? And why does it matter?
The best way to resolve a problem is first to recognize that you have one.
This post is the third in a series of essays that will deal with language, what we think we’re doing when we interpret, and why what we think we’re doing when we engage language is absolutely crucial in arming ourselves against the predation of the left — and too many on the right.
Let’s begin this short essay with a series of questions we need consider: when we say we are interpreting something, be it a written note, a piece of art — any text, really, in any form where semiotics is an assessment tool — what is it that we are doing? What is it that we think we’re doing? And how do the answers to these two question, which appear very similar at first glance, map to two very different views of the world, one of which promotes and institutionalizes a collectivist epistemology; and the other of which — the correct view, one under relentless attack always — acts as a bulwark against this attempted linguistic and hermeneutic coup, protecting the idea of individual autonomy by naturally performing it in language.
To approach the first question — what is it we are doing when we interpret? — one must have a grasp of what interpretation is. The simple dictionary definition of interpretation, “the action of explaining the meaning of something,” is facially useful, but because it is offered in a second order system of representation (outlined in my prior post on sign theory), we must press it a bit more to get at its embedded assumptions. For instance, what are the requirements of the “action” described? What does it mean to “explain”? What counts as “meaning” in this formulation? And what is the “something” whose meaning the action is hoping to elucidate?
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