Verbatim quote · from the corpus

“Once this non-possessive and apotropaic gesture came to be expected and interpreted as a sign , the need for variance in its performance would follow as a matter of course to distinguish among possible referents, a process in which we must assume that the verbal accompaniment would become the principal vehicle, as it is in virtually all human languages. The focus of TOOL was on the origin of the syntactical forms of utterance, from ostensive to imperative and thence declarative/interrogative, but that is not my subject here. For although it was not foregrounded in TOOL, the hypothetical circumstances of the emergence of the sign are inseparable from our understanding of language. Linguistics stricto sensu as the study of mature languages need not take them into account, but their neglect has prevented reflection on the originary identity of sacrality and significance , and more broadly, on the key factor that made the invention of language necessary, which is to say, in René Girard’s terminology, mimetic desire . The originary hypothesis postulates that what made necessary the invention of language was the need to resolve a crisis brought about by an intensification of mimetic tension that accompanied the increase in proto-human intelligence. (See Chronicle 770 for a more detailed discussion.)”

— Eric Gans, The scene of culture and consciousness I · Saturday, December 2nd, 2023 · Chronicles of Love & Resentment