Simone de Beauvoir on Language

Abstract

Throughout her autobiographical. philosophical, political, and literary works, Simone de Beauvoir displays a clear interest in language, both the spoken and the written word.1 This interest tends to focus not on language as a monolithic system but rather as what makes communication and participation in meaning possible-necessarily embedded in and embodied by a social-historical context. inseparable from existence. In what follows I present Simone de Beauvoir's conception of language. I use this terminology broadly to indicate a discussion of the nature and function of language, the between language and reality (e.g., meaning and truth), how language is transformed, and the role language plays between language-users in society. This is in accordance with how philosophers have generally approached language, and, with an emphasis on women's relation to language, how the linguistic turn in feminist theory (Bauer and Oliver 1992) has also been approached.2 I begin with a brief look at some anecdotes from her childhood memories that reveal Beauvoir's concern regarding the between language and reality. These anecdotes uncover how her own thoughts on language evolved and her rejection of language as representation. I then move on to discuss the adult Beauvoir's understanding by looking closely at this relationship between language and reality through a focus on words. Next. 1 use Beauvoir's feminist thoughts on language and the written language of literature and philosophy to further illustrate her commitment to language as an existential and political project. Rejecting Representation Early in her childhood, Simone de Beauvoir relates, she had a son of fascination with language. In particular, she was concerned with the connection between language and reality. Truth, it seemed, was constrained by the that the structure of language presented. That is, the truth of reality became insignificant because the fluidity of experience had to be fit into the rigid categories language presented. These categories were incapable of revealing the complexity of the reality they purported to represent. She describes this fascination with the insufficiency of language in Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter: White was only rarely totally while, and the blackness of evile was relieved by lighter touches; I saw grays and half tones everwhere. Only as soon as I tried to define their muted shades. I had to use words, and then I found myself back in a world of inflexible concepts. Whatever I beheld with my own eyes and whatever I experienced had to be fitted somehow or other into a rigid category: the myths and the stereotyped ideas prevailed over the truth: unable to pin it down, I allowed truth to dwindle into insignificance- (1959, 20 [1958, 20]) Thought was recognized as confined to the categories presented for use by language. These categories themselves became fact. Compelled to think in the terms provided by language, Beauvoir then assumed that language served a representational role. In this case, language might be studied as a static object. Additionally, however. as representation. language falsely construes reality as essentialist (cf. Davis 1990): As I had failed in my efforts to think without recourse to language, I assumed that this was an exact equivalent of reality: I was encouraged in this misconception by the grown-ups, whom I took to be the sole possessors of absoulte truth: when they defined a thing, they expressed its essence, in the way that one expresses the juice from a fruit. I could conceive of no gap into which error might fall between the word and the object: that is why I submitted myself uncreti cally to the Word, without examining its meaning. even when circumstances inclined me to doubt its truth. (Beauvoir 1959, 20 [1958,20]) In this early stage of the development of her thought, there is. for Beauvoir, an uncritical acceptance of the truth of words in their relation to reality. …