The Imagination of Reference II: Perceiving, Indicating, Naming

From the Foreword:

"Like a musical fugue, Morot-Sir's meditations lead up to impressive grand conclusions on religion and the arts as universal referents. . . . In this dense and exquisitely erudite essay, the author returns to the philosophical starting point of his professional career, as expressed in his <i>thèse d'état</i> on <i>La Pensée negative</i> (1947).  Without overly simplifying his approach, one could qualify it as a kind of<i> vector analysis of referential practices. </i>Central to his thought is the paradox that reference (and with it, language) can but refer to itself.  Equally central is his 'will--if wavering at times--to remain a coherent and stubborn prisoner of language,' i.e., systematically to explore the full range of linguistic experience, the dynamics of the act of naming.  Using once again the meditation as his preferred mode of expression, Morot-Sir offers in this second volume a fitting complement to the challenges he issued and the expectations he raised in volume I of<i> The Imagination of Reference." </i>--Raymond Gay-Crosier, University of Florida

At the convergence of philosophy and psychology, this work continues the venture of "meditating the linguistic condition" which Edouard Morot-Sir began in <i>The Imagination of Reference, </i>this time concentrating on "perceiving, indicating, naming."  Together, the two volumes constitute the intellectual autobiography of a philosopher and his response to Merleau-Ponty's famous book on phenomenology.
 While the first book examined psychological, ontological, and epistemological presuppositions, this one explores the positive consequences of reference in action, with examples from religion, painting, and poetry.  Morot-Sir visualizes human imagination as a field marked by four corners:  perception, conception, memory, and judgment.  Acting as point of intersection and center of gravitation in the center of that field, reference eventually reclaims the primacy of imagination.  "We are namers and nameds," he concludes.  "Without names we would be blind, deaf, and mute."

Edouard Morot-Sir, who died in 1993, was the Kenan Professor Emeritus of French at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and the author of the companion volume, <i>The Imagination of Reference: Meditating the Linguistic Condition </i>(UPF, 1993).  He was also the author of many articles and books, including <i>La Pensée negative, Philosophie et mystique, La Métaphysique de Pascal, </i>and <i>Les Mots de Jean-Paul Sartre. </i>He taught logic and the philosophy of science at the universities of Bordeaux and Lille and served for twelve years as the cultural counselor to the French Embassy in the United States.