BOOKS
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extended far into the Victorian era? Did some hitherto-regarded
lesser lights in European intellectual history, such as Taine,
Madvig, Jesperson, Breal, perceive the fraud of philology and, in
their criticism of it, lay the groundwork for the transformation of
language study into the science finally established by Saussure in
the twentieth century? Does Saussure really represent the founda–
tion of a genuine science of language, i.e., linguistics, which must
be seen less as a continuation of philology than as its scientific
antithesis? Finally, was there a consistent and coherent tradition
of scientific study of language, extending from Locke to Saussure,
which should be regarded as the keystone of European intellec–
tual history in general? And, as a corollary of this, was philology
basically an ideology, the purpose or at least the effect of which
was to impede the transformation of language study into a science
and, at the same time, to serve the causes of reaction, obscur–
antism, idealist metaphysics, and even racism in the very bosom of
the developing human sciences of the late nineteenth century?
These are all issues that scholars interested in the history of
language theory are already debating and will no doubt continue
to debate, now that Aarsleff has stated his views in the form of a
book which ties together his various special studies within the
framework of a general narrative account of the rise of the science
of linguistics, Saussure style. These issues, however, bear upon
larger ones which even the nonspecialist will find of interest, such
as: how sciences are formed and established, the ideologies of the
human and social sciences, the theory of humanistic and especially
literary studies, and-of course-the general intellectual history
of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. And not only because
Aarsleff argues that, since language is the first and most basic of
all social institutions, the study of theories about language should
stand at the center of any general theory of society, culture, and
human nature; but also because, given this thesis, his account of
the
real
history of language theory implies a revision every bit as
radical as anything to be found in Foucault, of the way we have
conventionally conceptualized the general history of ideas.
Aarsleff might be seen as the liberal counterpart of the
nihilistic Foucault. He still believes in progress in the human
sciences. He finds continuities where Foucault perceives only
ruptures and gaps. Moreover, he believes that science is not merely
