\u201cIn the pluralism of words, sounds and their meaning the poet within us finds freedom from the restrictions that the theologian would apply.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cFor the ancients \u2026 if two words (or syllables) were phonetically similar, they felt obliged to postulate some relationship between them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGreek and Roman writers were more sensitive to the possibilities \u2013 including what they took to be the scientific, even divine possibilities \u2013 of wordplay than we are. Through them they make language sustain all meanings its phonemes are capable of evoking.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNuma and Ovid use etymologies and anagrams to shuffle traditions their predecessors have bequeathed them, to subvert, reshape and redirect the reader\u2019s thoughts. They are trying to change their societies\u2019 perspectives on reality and thus change reality itself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we do not do, we tend to assume our predecessors either did not do or were silly to have done. If forced to acknowledge anagrams, we resort to the knee-jerk response that they are not meaningful, or are accidental. Yet the odds against the random production of even short intelligible words are substantial.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we maintain that the generation of puns and other wordplays is accidental unless proved otherwise, we are following the popular tendency to exaggerate the power of chance. As Kevin McKean points out, the computer has shown us that the opposite is the case: \u2018In a world as crazy as this one, it ought to be easy to find something that happens solely by chance. It isn\u2019t.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll sorts of terms can transport the mind with equal delight, provided they be woven into equally massive and far-reaching schemes and systems of relationship. \u2026 The schemes and the systems are what the mind finds interesting.\u201d William James<\/p>\n
Professor Jonathan Culler, \u201cThe Call of the Phoneme”
\n<\/strong>\u201cStriking examples of wordplay in Virgil show that this was by no means a low or comic technique but a way of portraying significant relationships.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cThe relations perceived by speakers affect meanings and thus the linguistic system, which must be taken to include the constant remotivation produced by impressions of connection or similarity.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe use of etymologies to generate or extend reflection has a long if not altogether respectable history. Puns work the same way \u2013 lively instances of lateral thinking, exploiting the fact that language has ideas of its own.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe question then becomes, what happens if we try to put \u2026 the practice of punning at the center of thinking about language? Do we get a new understanding of language and what would it entail?\u201d<\/p>\n
Professor Avital Ronell, \u201cThe Sujet Suppositaire: Freud and Rat Man\u201d
\n<\/strong>\u201cThe Old Testament and the Talmud pun incessantly \u2026[creating] the paradoxical reunion of the linguistic accident with some sort of anterior substantiality.\u201d<\/p>\nProfessor Gregory Ulmer, \u201cThe Puncept in Grammatology\u201d
\n<\/strong>\u201c\u2026 that which distinguishes one language from every other one: a singular mode of making puns\u2026.\u201d Jacques Lacan, quoted by Gregory Ulmer<\/p>\n\u201cBachelard\u2019s most influential insight, dating back to the early thirties, was that the new physics rendered conventional thinking in philosophy obsolete. In order to overcome the obstacles to a new epistemology relevant to the new science, Bachelard argued that a pedagogy would have to be devised capable of reeducating human sensibility at its very root.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDerrida, with his interest in discerning and then transgressing the limits of philosophical discourse \u2026 builds an entire philosophical system on the basis of the homonym (and homophone).\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis inventio<\/em> (an aspect of Derrida\u2019s \u2018new rhetoric\u2019) functions on the assumption that language itself is \u2018intelligent\u2019, hence that homophones \u2018know\u2019 something.\u201d[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"[vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” top_padding=”5%” bottom_padding=”5%” overlay_strength=”0.3″ shape_divider_position=”bottom” shape_type=””][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_position=”all” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” width=”1\/1″ tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][vc_column_text] Why Play with Puns? “”When I use a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":125,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/137"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/125"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/137\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordmagicglobal.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}