CONCEPT TO SEE:
ALTERED MEANINGS: UNRECOGNIZED EFFECTS, RAPID SPREAD
Behaviors contributing to cultural tragedies can be described as cultural hazards, behaviors that have the potential to be destructive to a culture. There are many, some obvious, some so subtle as to be neglected. A type of neglected behavior that is observed to be particularly hazardous to cultures is a group of confusing and harmful behaviors clustering around the concept of meaning. This idea of meaning, in personal relationships, in lives, in cultures, will be the central topic to be examined and understood as a source of social damage and disintegration.
Behaviors have meaning. Behaviors participating as causes of cultural tragedies often do so through an alteration of meaning that becomes detrimental to social groups. Altered meaning has significant detrimental effects within a culture because of its nature: a victim or an observer detects what appears to be a change of meaning, and is unsure if it is a change, whether the change is detrimental to him, and whether the potential harm is significant. This delays a response, often indefinitely, and the altered meaning goes unopposed, encouraging its later use once again. The response delay, and its causes, lends altered meaning great power within relationships, groups, and cultures, and prompts the further observation and study of meaning.
At the extreme of altered meanings we consider overt lies. It is remarkable to observe how often overt lies are either not detected or are ignored. Societies exist in part through a shared commitment to truth in their communications, and its violation evokes many problems – in particular, providing the temptation to not “see” the lie or to ignore it.
By comparison, more subtle altered meanings are much more difficult to respond to — to detect with certainty, to determine their potentially harmful impact, and to estimate their significance – in other words, the complexity of how to respond to subtle altered meanings is markedly greater and more demanding. These characteristics of altered meanings make them a candidate to be among the particularly malignant cultural hazards, and confirm them as a practical focus of study.
For example, an overt lie, with obvious aggressive intent, can be observed and recognized by a victim without difficulty. An overt lie is often the engine of a mystery, capturing the attention of observers who are uncertain about what actually happened and entraining them in the evolving story.
A TASTE OF LIFE
On the other hand, apparent aggressive intent that is placed within a situation that makes the aggression ambiguous — such as a military setting — renders the vicim, and the observers, uncertain about the meaning of the actions and much less likely to respond.
A TASTE OF LIFE
Altered meaning can spread rapidly across individuals and groups, becoming cultural hazards because the altered meanings change the understanding of cultural values and rules, can evoke other hazardous behaviors, and have the potential to accumulate and build to a tragedy.
In order to recognize altered meanings in our lives we must understand what meaning is. This will be the initial step toward understanding these cultural hazards, an interesting journey with some curious turns in our path.
Commonplace altered meanings in our personal relationships and daily lives can accumulate, and, when ignored, eventually influence larger groups. Altered meanings can have harmful influences on cultures. Individuals using behaviors that are culturally hazardous (often without awareness of their risk) can form groups using similar behavior, and small groups become large groups; simultaneously, the risk of cultural harm increases. Altered meanings, especially when subtle and unrecognized, are a cultural hazard particularly well suited to rapid spread within groups.
In reality, answers to cultural disorder and violence are in plain sight, in front of us, but unrecognized. We protest that we want to see the answers, but too often we refuse to look. We turn what is accessible to our understanding into an obscure mystery that is permissive toward our inactivity.
The solutions can be understood and validated scientifically.
The answers are not concepts too complicated for us to understand.
A simple example of a common type of altered meaning, acting as a cultural hazard, will illuminate how such ingredients nurture cycles of cultural order and disorder.
VOICES
Tzu-lu said, ‘If the Lord of Wei left the administration [cheng] of his state to you, what would you put first?’
The Master said, ‘If something has to be put first, it is, perhaps, the rectification [cheng] of names.’
Tzu-lu said, ‘Is that so? What a roundabout way you take! Why bring rectification in at all?’
The Master said, ‘Yu, how boorish you are. Where a gentleman is ignorant, one would expect him not to offer any opinion. When names are not correct, what is said will not sound reasonable; when what is said does not sound reasonable, affairs will not culminate in success; when affairs do not culminate in success, rites and music will not flourish; when rites and music do not flourish, punishments will not fit the crimes; when punishments do not fit the crimes, the common people will not know where to put hand and foot. Thus when the gentleman names something, the name is sure to be usable in speech, and when he says something this is sure to be practicable. The thing about the gentleman is that he is anything but casual where speech is concerned.
Confucius (?500 BC/1979/2009). The Analects (D. C. Lau, trans.). London: The Folio Society, pp. 119 – 120.