SEMANTICS: USES AND ABUSES
19
Let us now examine a rather famous illustration which Henri de
Man employs in developing his voluntaristic half-truth that "socialism
is
a
passion
not a
cognition."
He recalls the case of Hassan, the date
vendor, who always whippcdup a brisk trade with the cry of "Has–
san's dates are larger than they are!" Here the sentence taken by itself
is
clearly meaningless; it is not even syntactically permissible. It may
V«try
well be that in this case, as in others, people may be gripped and
roused to action by sounds that make no sense. But before we reach
this conclusion there are at least two possibilities which must be ex–
plored. It may actually be a
fact
that whenever Hassan hawks his
wares with this cry, his dates are Ianger than those of other date ven–
dors. Some reason, perhaps fear, custom, or exaggerated politeness, may
forbid him to make invidious comparisons. In such cases, the cry is
a meaningful sound which enables Hassan and us to engage in mu–
tually profitable business. The other possibility is that those who rush
to do business with him may actually think he is
saying:
"Hassan's
dates are larger than others."*
What is meaningful in actual discourse cannot always be de–
termined by simply looking at sentences. It is necessary to observe
the wider context of interest, situation and activity in which the sen–
tence is used, and its effects upon the behavior of the rP:ople commu–
nicating with each other.
II
The modern theory of semantics has a great deal to recommend
it once it is rescued from its popularizers. Particularly in the field of
social theory and criticism its usefulness is great. It provides a method
by
which we may distinguish between definitions that are disguised
resolutions and general propositions that are predictions; between
propositions concerning what is the case and propositions concerning
what we regard as desirable, whether it be the case or not. Further,
it suggests many problems for further research, including among
others, the question of how we actually verify propositions concerning
what is desirable. And in doing so, it enables us to liberate ourselves
from many curious verbal fixations and fetishisms. These are as
*
For example, I have known people who have been induced to buy by the
assurance that the commodity "was cheap at half the price." When questioned,
they indicated that they thought this meant "cheap at twice the price." There is
also on record the case of the small boy who for years had been saying "no wel–
come" in acknowledging a "thank you" and had always been understood as
saying "you're welcome."
