Verbatim quote · from the corpus

“What then is there about the originary sacred object that is “supernatural,” that cannot be encompassed by the “natural realism” of the creatures that preceded us? Thus we come back to the question of what did we need language for in the first place ? What is not “natural” about the referent of the sign is that it is not “my” referent but that of the community. It suffices to prolong Durkheim’s notion of the sacred as the embodiment of the values of the community to understand its “supernaturalism.” Whereas Durkheim himself, who considered the concepts of language, like those of religion, as représentations collectives , refused to speculate about the origin of these cultural foundations, the originary hypothesis views significance/sacrality as a quality embodied in the sign as a relationship among speaker, object, and community in a mode for which no previous object relation can serve as example.”

— Eric Gans, What’s the différance? · Saturday, September 7th, 2019 · Chronicles of Love & Resentment