Words and Images 10

Les mots qui servent à désigner deux objets différents ne montrent pas ce qui peut séparer ces objets l’un de l’autre.

Words that are used to designate two different objects don’t indicate what may separate those objects from one another. (In case you’re curious, the written units on the blob read “person character losing their memory” and “woman’s body.”)

In other words, the words in question don’t bear an intrinsic connection to the things they represent. If you know the word “wombat” refers to an Australian marsupial, you don’t necessarily know anything about what the word “brickbat” refers to.

This makes one of the small, possibly obvious points that cumulatively erodes the kind of presumed difference between words and images that undergirds the mystified approach to language that impedes clear thinking about meaning-making.

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