Goodman's Languages of Art

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Goodman's Languages of Art Paul Ziff The Philosophical Review, Vol. 80, No. 4. (Oct., 1971), pp. 509-515. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0031-8108%28197110%2980%3A4%3C509%3AGLOA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-Z The Philosophical Review is currently published by Cornell University.

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http://www.jstor.org Tue Jul 31 23:43:34 2007

GOODMAN'S LANGUAGES O F ART1

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ELSON GOODMAN'S recent book, Languages of Art, is worth reading: it makes one think. But it is hard to understand and then even harder to believe. The book is subtitled An Approach To A Theory Of Symbols. "The objective is an approach to a general theory of symbols" (p. xi). What is meant by "symbol" ? Symbol is used here as a very general and colorless term. It covers letters, words, texts, pictures, diagrams, maps, models, and more, but carries no implication of the oblique or the occult [p. xi]. I t is added that "the most literal portrait and the most prosaic passage are as much symbols, and as 'highly symbolic,' as the most fanciful and figurative" (p. xi). Is every painting and every piece of sculpture, whether representational or abstract or nonobjective, a symbol? Is a toy airplane a symbol? Is a mask? What about a doll, or a chess piece, or a lock of hair? I do not know what the answers to these questions are supposed to be : the author's usage is unclear. Goodman is concerned with "symbol systems." (He mentions that the word "languages" in the title of the book "should, strictly, be replaced by 'symbol systems' " [p. xii].) A symbol system "consists of a symbol scheme correlated with a field of reference" (p. 143). What then is a symbol scheme? "Any symbol scheme consists of characters" (p. I 3 I ) . And what are characters ? "Characters are certain classes of utterances or inscriptions or marks" (p. 131). The term "inscription" is used "to include utterances, and 'mark' to include inscriptions; an inscription is any mark-visual, auditory, etc.-that belongs to a character" (p. 131). SO a symbol scheme consists of characters, where characters are certain classes of marks. If characters are "certain classes of marks," which classes are they? Goodman does not seem to say. If someone's boots make marks on a newly waxed floor, do those marks belong to a character? They do belong to the class of marks made by that person and the presence of such marks could be of significance. Does such a class constitute a character? O r suppose a house decorator is instructed to decorate a wall with three 1

Indianapolis and New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc., 1968. Pp. xiii,

277.

PAUL