Working Paper 5 in

Semantics
12th July 2000 1 Derivation of Meaning
in Proverbs
Derivation of Meaning in Proverbs: A Ka:rmik Linguistic
Analysis
Chilukuri Bhuvaneswar, CIEFL, Hyderabad, India

Symbols used in the Article

I-I-I Network Node; Impacts on; Gives Rise to by

Transformation;
Leads to in the Direction of the Arrow; Apparently Transforms
into;
∧ Reflected on (like an adjunct) ∨ Reflected in (like a quality);
Delink
intrer-categorially leads to as opposed to Intra-categorially
leads to
a:nushangikally gives rise to; inherently qualified ;
Through the Means of
Connecting Node in a Cyclic Network; Superimposed On
is analyzed
● Heart or Nucleus of the Circular/Cyclic Network
The Individual Consciousness (soul or the ji:va)

The Triad of Qualities [sattva (luminosity or cognitivity) giving knowledge of

activity; rajas (activity or analyticity) giving choice and pattern of activity by traits;
and tamas (inertia or substantivity) giving inertia or materiality of activity by
va:sana:s] of Disposition.

Horizontal Line; Vertical Line; Diagonal Line; Horizontal, Vertical, and

Diagonal Axes
I, II, III, and IV the quadrants 1, 2, 3, and 4

Reversal of Order
I. Introduction
When proverbs are used, they are understood, misunderstood, or even not
understood depending on the abilities of the participants in the discourse.
When both the speaker and the hearer 1. know the referential, prototypical,
and contextual meanings correctly and at the same time, 2. the performance
(by the speaker) and the reception (by the hearers) are also successful, the
proverb is understood; on the other hand, if any one of them is defective
either in the knowledge of the meaning of the proverb or the
performance/reception, the proverb will be misunderstood; and finally, if the
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

speaker is successful while the hearer is defective in the knowledge or

reception of the proverb and vice versa, the proverb may not be understood
at all. For a successful encoding or decoding of a proverb, the following
conditions are necessary.

1. The meaning of the proverb as an expression (sentence or phrase)-in-

context (an expression that was formed by its use in a context but now a
potential utterance, but not an actual utterance as opposed to a sentence-
in- vacuo which is not so formed) should be clear to both the speaker and the
hearer.

2. The speaker should have the proverbial competence to perform the

utterance of the proverb appropriately in an actual world and performed it
accordingly.

3. The hearer should have the proverbial inference (decoding) ability and
inferred it accordingly.

If any of the abilities are lacking in the participants, the use of the proverb
will be a failure, and if all of them are present, it will be a successful
performance. Therefore, it is essential to know why and how proverbs mean
what they mean and what is the process of their use and inference. Let us
discuss these issues one by one.

A. Propositional Meaning in Proverbs: Its Derivation

Proverbs have different meanings. First, as an expression (a phrase, a
sentence, or even more than one sentence including Wellerisms), it has a
literal meaning. A literal meaning is the expressional meaning derived from
the collective literary meaning of all the words in the expression. A literary
meaning is derived not only from literal proverbs such as Honesty is the best
policy; It is easier to forgive than forget; Reason succeeds where force fails;
etc. but also figurative proverbs such as Faraway cows have long horns; A
dead dog never bites; Sleeping cats catch no mice; etc. Let us take the
following examples for an illustration of their literal meaning.

1 Set: Literal Proverbs

i. Honesty is the best policy.
ii. A little learning is a dangerous thing.
iii. That must be true which all men say?
iv. When in doubt, leave it out.
v. Better late than never.

In Set 1, the literal meaning of the sentences is the sentence-in-context

meaning of the proverb in a possible world (because the proverb is not yet
used in a real world). For example, A little learning is a dangerous thing has
the meaning with the proposition P that a little learning is a dangerous thing
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

as an assertion. This is its literal or referential meaning. When the proverb is

used as an utterance, for example, in the following Indian English
conversation that took place between two brothers (A: elder; B: younger) in a
real world– A injured his leg badly while taking his moped up the footsteps
into the house and got a bandage from an allopath; after five days he took a
dose of Natrum Mur 200 on his own:

A: I thought a higher dose of Natrum Mur will heal my bruise quickly, but
now, all
over my body, I got black pigmentation.

B: A little learning is a dangerous thing. Consult a qualified homeopath

immediately. It is not good to take medicines without proper
knowledge.

A little learning is a dangerous thing means exactly that much with reference
to the use of medicines, i.e., an incomplete knowledge (about homoeopathic
medicines) is dangerous as dispositionally cognized by the speaker
irrespective of its truth value -- the user might or might not have used the
medicine according to the science of homoeopathy -- because it may not be
adequate enough to treat an illness and therefore such an inadequate
knowledge may lead to problems instead of solving the problem, if it is
prohibited. To put it technically, the literal meaning of the proverb is the
same as the utterance meaning of the same proverb – of course, it is
contextually extended to imply knowledge about homoeopathic medicines,
giving its third level meaning which is the contextual meaning (which will be
discussed later). Proverbs such as these whose literal (sentence or
referential) meaning and utterance meaning are the same are called direct
(as opposed to indirect) proverbial speech acts. This meaning is captured
in the following equation (1):

(1) Proverbial Meaning :

Literal (Referential or Sentence) Meaning Utterance Meaning
Proverb Meaning

2 Set: Figurative Proverbs

There are many types of proverbs which contain figures of speech such as
simile, hyperbole, paradox, metaphor, etc. A few examples are discussed
below to arrive at a generalization about the meaning in figurative proverbs.

2.1. Similaic Proverbs

i. News spreads like wild fire.
ii. Calumny is like coal – it either burns you or besmirches you.
iii. Money, like promises, is easier made than kept.
iv. Like mother, like daughter.
v. Disgraces are like cherries: one draws another.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

In 2.1. Similaic Proverbs, we have examples of proverbs whose literal

(sentence or referential) meaning is dependent on the figurative meaning of
the sentence. For example, the sentence-in-context meaning of the proverb
News spreads like wild fire is first, dependent on the figurative meaning
(simile) used in the proverb by implicature from the general and cultural
knowledge at the internal structural level. Like wild fire is the figure of
speech (simile) used in the proverb. That characteristic property which is
culturally associated with wild fire, namely, its spreading rapidly is first
attributed to wild fire – this property is generally selected out of a number of
other properties from its dispositional general cognition as a common and
familiar property which sticks out prominently (as salient). Second, this
characteristic property is transferred into the simile; and finally, the sentence
is endowed with that meaning. It is shown in the following equation (2) in
three stages.

(2) Proverb Meaning of News spreads like wild fire:

Stage I
a. News spreads [like wild fire]
S V A (Prepositional Phrase of
Manner)

b. News spreads [like wild fire spreads]

c. Wild fire spreads …. How? Very rapidly

Stage II
Adding this dispositionally chosen characteristic as a culturally chosen
characteristic into the sentence, we get:
d. News spreads like wild fire spreads very rapidly.
Stage III
Now if we delete the Adverbial like wild fire and retain the characteristic
property very rapidly (instantaneously), we get:

e. News spreads very rapidly.

[This is its Prototypical Meaning which will be discussed in the next
section.]

This is the meaning by paraphrase. But the hearer does not understand the
proverb with this paraphrased meaning; he understands the proverb to mean
this (2e) via the image but not independently of the image. Had the
paraphrased meaning only is meant, then the proverb would not have been
coined to be so with the image by violating the Gricean Maxims of Quantity
(stating more than what is required by giving the additional information
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

through the simile ‘like wild fire’) and Manner (by not being brief; by being
obscure). The very fact that there is an image which violates the Cooperative
Principle proves that it has a function to serve – this function here is either a
function of expressing the abstract meaning (of spreading so quickly) by a
concrete example as wild fire (does) for which there is no equivalent word; or
a function of creating aesthetic appeal by evoking a powerful image of wild
fire. So as this paraphrased meaning is derived, it is derived a:nushangikally
via the image in three stages as follows:
1 2 (Literal or
Referential Meaning)
f. News spreads like wild fire News spreads like wild fire
which spreads very rapidly (+News spreads like wild fire)
3 (Prototypical Meaning)
News spreads very rapidly [+ like wild fire spreads very rapidly +
(like wild fire)]

Therefore, if this proverb is used in a real world, its utterance meaning has to
be derived via its figurative meaning, if there is any such meaning. Most
importantly, this figurative meaning should be pro-culturally derived; if not,
its appropriate meaning will not be arrived at. For example, wild fire also
destroys the flora and the fauna in the wild (jungle or bush land) and so the
meaning can as well be News spreads like wild fire which ruins many people
around the hearers of the news which is not the intended meaning of the
proverb. Just like a literal proverb, the meaning of the proverb is determined
from the meaning of the words collectively but pro-culturally through
salience. That means that the literal (referential) meaning in proverbs is
simply not literal but socioculturalspiritually literal.

In a similar way, in the proverb More like the devil than St. Laurence, unless
and otherwise we know what characteristics are culturally bestowed on devil
and St. Laurence, we will not be able to construct the meaning of the proverb
as a sentence-in-context in a possible world. Since proverbs are thoroughly
culture bound, meaning in proverbs is intrinsically culture specific and a lack
of cultural knowledge causes a failure in understanding the meaning of the
proverb. Examples such as the ones given above are relatively simple
because of the familiarity of the words or concepts, but some proverbs are
very difficult to understand in view of the cultural obscurity of the proposition
in the proverb. Similaic proverbs such as As wise as Waltham’s calf in English
or Parama:nandayya sishyulu la:ga ‘Like Parama:nandayya’s disciples’ in
Telugu are difficult proverbs in the sense that they require more in depth
knowledge of the culture in a society. Even if we know the cultural referents
such as Waltham or Parama:nandayya, there is no guarantee that the
meaning can be correctly derived. For example, one may know about
Waltham but that does not give us any clue about the proverb; unless we
know that his calf ran a long distance to drink milk from a bull and came
back in vain, we will not be in a position to derive its meaning. In a similar
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

way, even if we know about Parama:nandayya (who is a learned scholar) but

not about his disciples (who always behaved stupidly), we will not be able to
understand the proverb meaning. Therefore, not only the salient meaning
chosen by the culture but also the knowledge of the legends associated with
the words to arrive at the salient meaning is required to calculate the
implicature correctly.

(3a) Similaic Proverb Meaning:

Literal Meaning Similaic Meaning (+ Literal Meaning)
Expanded Similaic Meaning (+ Similaic Meaning + Literal Meaning)

In the case of similaic proverbs, the same principle of comparison is used to

clarify and elaborate the social practice which can be categorially
instantiated in the conduct of the socioculturalspiritual living of the proverb
community and facilitate the appropriate use of the proverb to construct the
similaic dispositional (ka:rmik) reality of the categorial social practice.

(3b) Simile - Clarification and Elaboration of the Social Practice -

Clarified and Elaborated Prototypical Practice

2.2: Hyperbolical Proverbs

i. The buzz of a mosquito can drown out the ocean’s roar.
ii. Deviate an inch, lose a thousand miles.
iii. With seven nurses a child will be without eyes.
iv. The coward dies many times.
v. Don’t make a mountain of a molehill.

The referential meaning of these hyperbolical proverbs is simply the

meaning of the words taken collectively. For example, the proverb Deviate
an inch, lose a thousand miles means the P that You deviate an inch, you
lose a thousand miles; the proverb The coward dies many times means the P
that The coward dies many times; and so on. The hyperbole is a part of the
referential meaning a:nushangikally inherited from the referential meaning.

(4a) Proverb Meaning:

Literal Meaning Hyperbolical Meaning (+Literal Meaning)
Expanded Hyperbolical Meaning [+Hyperbolical Meaning (+Literal
Meaning)]

In the case of hyperbolical proverbs, the same principle of overstatement to

attract the attention by rousing the interest of the hearer is used as pointed
out by Leech (1983: 145); here, the maxim of quality (truth value) is violated
to achieve the effect; alternatively, it is also used to highlight the social
practice by increasing the prominence through the means of the hyperbole –
the hyperbole is used as a means to achieve the goal of highlighting the
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

social practice; the second use seems to be more applicable in the formation
of proverbs:
(4b) Hyperbole – Interest Arousal – Highlighted Prototypical Social
Practice
However, the hyperbole is on the social practice which can be categorially
instantiated in the conduct of the socioculturalspiritual living of the proverb
community and facilitate the appropriate use of the proverb to construct the
hyperbolical dispositional (ka:rmik) reality of the categorial social practice.

In this set, we also have sentences which are hyperbolical on the one hand
and metaphorical on the other hand. All of them taken literally do not fit the
world. Let us take an example. In the first sentence of The buzz of a
mosquito can drown out the ocean’s roar, a buzz (a property of sound) has
no property of drowning (a property of a liquid); second, an ocean cannot
roar, since roaring is a quality of an animate object such as an animal like a
lion; third, the sound made by the buzz of a mosquito is many decibels less
than that of the sound of an ocean’s wave (breaking on the shore). All these
states of affairs in the world do not fit with the sentence meaning. Yet, this is
a sentence-in-context in addition to a sentence in vacuo. Then, how is the
meaning derived by a speaker to mean “something” and how does the
hearer decode the “something”. Surely, there must be a process by which
the encoding should correspond with decoding and vice versa. In order to do
so, a hearer must first of all know the use of figurative language whose
conventions are equally shared by any member of the proverb community
without which successful communication fails. Once he understands this
convention, he tries to derive the meaning either algorithmically (if he has no
thorough knowledge about the proverb), or heuristically (if he has a partial
knowledge of the proverb), or automatically (if he has complete knowledge
about the proverb) – this is a very important cognitive processing technique.

In this case of this proverb, the hearer has to get the meaning of the proverb
in three successive stages of computation of:
1. the referential meaning;
2. the figurative meaning; and
3. the combined meaning by integration and binding.

In the first stage, the referential meaning of the proverb is interpreted and
cognized to be the collective meaning of all the words in the sentence form.
That is to say that the referential meaning of the proverb is the propositional
meaning P that The buzz of a mosquito can drown out the ocean’s roar as an
assertion.

As soon as he arrives at the propositional meaning P that The buzz of a

mosquito can drown out the ocean’s roar as an assertion, he realizes that
there is no fit between the state of affairs given in the sentence and the real
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

world but the sentence cannot be wrong since the speaker is following the
Cooperative Principle (CP) of Grice. Therefore, he interprets the sentence as
a proverb and the literal meaning as a figurative meaning based on the CP –
to do so he has the knowledge of such a linguistic convention in the society –
and comes to the intuitive understanding that it is a hyperbolical assertion
since the truth condition of the assertion is not satisfied: The buzz of a
mosquito cannot drown out the ocean’s roar. Again, a buzz cannot drown a
roar since sound cannot have the property of drowning and hence it should
be metaphorical (synaesthesia). The hearer unpacks the metaphorical
meaning and paraphrases it as equivalent to “make… inaudible”/
“suppresses”: The buzz of a mosquito can make the ocean’s roar inaudible.
Finally, he combines the meataphorical and hyperbolical meaning and
integrates them into the literal meaning as shown below.

(4c) Proverb Meaning:

Literal Meaning Hyperbolical Meaning (+ Literal Meaning)
Metaphorical Meaning (+ Literal Meaning + Hyperbolical Meaning)
Expanded Figurative Meaning [+Metaphorical Meaning +
Hyperbolical Meaning (+Literal Meaning)]

In formal linguistic analysis, there is a separation between literal and

figurative meanings since they are atomic in their approach but in ka:rmik
linguistics, they are not separated but interconnected-interrelated-
interdependent since it is a holistic approach: When the proverb The buzz
of a mosquito can drown out the ocean’s roar is used, it means all the literal,
figurative, and the combined meanings together as a whole in a single unit
called cogneme but not separately or in parallel. Let us call this the
Wholistic Meaning to distinguish it from the holistic meaning. What is
more, this cogneme is open-ended and expands, integrates, and binds the
referential into the prototypical into the contextual meaning also in it as it is
used in an exchange in a context and then leads to the experience of the
results of action as the Experiential Meaning. This experiential meaning is
derived as the Ka:rmik Meaning through Language as a Means. From this
ka:rmik meaning, proverbial ka:rmik reality is constructed when a
proverb is used in an exchange/discourse; and when they are remembered
by individuals, or stored in the collective memory of a proverb community, or
recorded in books, they are done so as proverbial-ka:rmik-reality-
realizing-linguistic-means. This is with reference to the use of language
as proverbs for the construction of (proverbial) ka:rmik reality.

These concepts are captured succinctly in equations as follows:

(4d) Typification of Meaning:

 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Literal Meaning / Figurative Meaning Literary Meaning (+

Figurative Meaning)
Atomic Meaning Holistic Meaning

Literal as the Figurative as the Combined Meaning as a Cogneme

Wholistic Meaning (Ka:rmik Meaning)

OR

Literal Meaning

Figurative Meaning Combined Meaning

Cogneme

Experiential Meaning Ka:rmik Meaning

Legend: Disposition; ● Consciousness; gives rise to by

transformation;
leads to; reciprocally leads to; inter-
categorially leads to;
● Dispositionally-Qualified- Consciousness
(D.Q.E.)

(4e)
Meaning of a Proverb:
i. Atomic Meaning:
a. Literal Meaning / Figurative Meaning
b. Referential Meaning / Prototypical Meaning / Contextual Meaning

ii. Holistic Meaning:

a. Literal Meaning + Figurative Meaning
b. [Referential Meaning + Prototypical Meaning + Contextual
Meaning]

iii. Wholistic Meaning (= Ka:rmik Meaning)

a. Literal Meaning as Figurative Meaning as Combined Meaning as a
Cogneme
b. [Referential Meaning as Prototypical Meaning as Contextual
Meaning as a Cogneme
= Experiential Meaning]

(4f)
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

[Ka:rmik Impulsion (Experiential)] [Dispositional Impulsion

(Choice of Action)
Cognitive Impulsion (Deliberation of Action)
Conceptual Impulsion (Binding of Action)
Actional Impulsion (for Materialization of Action): Will]
(gives rise to)
Action (Mental/Vocal (Proverbial)/Physical)
[Karma is an experiential principle of cause-effect reality in KLT and is
realized through disposition (svabha:vam) which gives rise to choice of
activity, impressionality of activity (va;sana:s) which gives rise to the
pattern of the concerned activity, and experientiality of activity
(bho:gam) which gives rise to the ultimate experience of action.]
(4g)
Action (Proverbial Utterance) [Deliberation of Proverbial
Meaning Interpretation Experience of the Proverbial
Meaning]
Realization of Ka:rmik Meaning

(5)
a. Consciousness (C) ∧ Karma (K) K – Qualified - C.
OR ● ∧ K K
●

b. K – Qualified - C ∧ Disposition (D) C – Qualified - D.

OR K ● ∧
●
c. C.Q.D. ∧ Context Desire Effort Differentiated
Awareness Conception
[d. Trait ∨ Knolwledge ∨ Va:sana Conception]
[Legend : ∧ Reflected on (like an adjunct) ∨ Reflected in (like a
quality)]

e. Conception:
Objectification (This and That - Cognition) Classification (So
and So - System / Paradigm) Qualification (Such and Such -
Structure)
(see the conceptual axis graph for a graphic representation of
Conception)
Consciousness is the unchangeable substratum of Pure Awareness (Static
Consciousness) and gives rise to Pure Cognition (Static Cognition). When it is
charged with Karma, it becomes Karma-Qualified-
Consciousness/Awareness/Cognition and gives rise to Disposition. Again,
when Consciousness is charged with Disposition, it becomes Disposition-
Qualified-Consciousness and gives rise to Disposition-Qualified-
Awareness/Cognition. Conception of an Object/State of Being/Action is an
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

apparent transformation of the Karma-Qualified-Cognition (K.Q.Cog.) which is

the Ultimate Cause into Dispositional- Qualified-Cognition (D.Q.Cog) which is
the Immediate Cause into the cognition of this and that as so and so in such
and such a manner as the conception (which is the means) into the
experiential cognition (which is the effect). The K.Q.Cog is the invisible cause
of D.Q.Cog. which is inferential. D.Q.Cog. remains as it is like light but
projects a conception on it by apparently transforming the sides of the
triangle of disposition into a star which can have many rays and so twinkles
(1…n) depending upon the nature of conception that gives rise to the
cogneme.

Basically, there are three components to disposition (Traits-Knowledge-

Va:sana) and Traits are further divided into the three qualities of Sattva
(Cognitivity or Luminosity) -Rajas (activity)-Tamas (Inertia). In equilibrium, all
these three qualities are static and do not create any disturbance in the
awareness of the Dispositionally-Qualified-Consciousness. To explain it
further, the state of cognition is static and remains inactive and therefore
remains as the basic cognition without any projections. Once the qualities
get disturbed by the impact of knowledge gained from sensory perception in
the immediate context/or previous experience (memory and va:sana:s), they
act upon the mind and stir the cognition into activity and thus make it
kinetic. Consequently, there will be a change in the state of rest of
cognition giving rise to an apparent transformation of blank cognition
(which is like a rock) into a cognition of conception of this and that as so and
so in such and such a manner (which is like the figure to be sculptured on
the rock) under the influence of disposition like the coloured crystals in a
kaleidoscope producing different colours under their influence.
Conceptualization is thus dispositionally generated, specified,
directed and materialized. Finally, the concept is formed to be so and the
state of cognition is synoptic (which is like the finished sculpture). Even
though Disposition has no power of cognition, by virtue of being qualified by
Consciousness, it springs into action and produces the specific cognition.

There is an interesting Principle of Reversal of Order in cognition also. First,

Disposition qualifies Consciousness to make it Dispositionally-qualified-
Consciousness (DQC); second, by a reversal of order, Consciousness qualifies
Disposition to make it Consciousness- qualified –Disposition (CQD); third, this
CQD is the one that produces phenomenal conceptualization and its
cognition.

(5f) D + C DQC CQD Dispositional Conceptualization of

Lingual Action

The transformation from static-to-kinetic-to-synoptic cognition is generally

automatic in casual conversation and fast writing but can be heuristic or
algorithmic in cultivated or contemplative or creative thinking. After the
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

conceptualization of the action, it is performed to get the desire fulfilled and

eventually the speaker experiences the result of the action as experiential
meaning as ka:rmik meaning, in this case, as proverbial-action-experience-
meaning as proverbial ka:rmik meaning. As he experiences the meaning, the
state of cognition is experiential and the awareness is experiential
awareness.

(5g:1 and 2) Evolution of Cognition:

…
1. ● ● …
.
Static Dispositional Kinetic . Dispositional
Synoptic Dispsoitional
Cognition Conception
Concept

Experiential Dispositional (Ka:rmik) Concept

Experiential Cognition
Experience of Action (Experiential Awareness).

2. Causal Cognition of Action Dispositional Cognition

of Action
Cognition of Action Experiential Cognition of
Action

[ intrer-categorially leads to as opposed to (Intra-

categorially) leads to]

2. 3: Parodoxical Proverbs
i. What is hard to bear is sweet to remember.
ii. The greatest hate comes from the greatest love.
iii. So near and yet so far.
iv. Many a good cow has a bad calf.
v. He that speaks ill of the mare will buy her.
vi. Life is hard by the yard, but by the inch, life’s a cinch.
vii. The only way to save an hour is spend it wisely.
viii. Least said, soonest mended.
ix. A good offence is the best defence.

As observed in the case of the hyperbolical proverbs, the referential meaning

is simply the meaning of the words taken collectively. For example, the
proverb What is hard to bear is sweet to remember means the proposition P
that What is hard to bear is sweet to remember; and so on in the case of
other proverbs also. The paradox is a part of the referential meaning
a:nushangikally inherited from the referential meaning.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

(6) Proverb Meaning:

Literal Meaning Paradoxical Meaning (+Literal Meaning)
Expanded Paradoxical Meaning [+Paradoxical Meaning (+Literal
Meaning)]
The paradoxical meaning is derived by a socioculturalspiritual implicature of
the shared knowledge of the proverb community. Otherwise, a proverb like A
good offence is the best defence becomes illocutionarily impossible. The
assertion of an offence implies an attack and not defence. Therefore, offence
cannot be defence. Consequently, it is illogical. However, if it is understood
that the meaning has a presupposition: That defending oneself is best
accomplished by attacking, the meaning becomes logical. By violating the
Maxim of Quality via the socioculturalspiritual knowledge of the proverb
community and embedding the directly paradoxical pair of words such as
hate and love, good and bad, save and spend, etc., or indirectly paradoxical
practices such as speak ill and buy, least said and soonest mended, etc.,
the concerned social practice is highlighted by increasing the prominence
through the means of the paradox – the paradox is used as a means to
achieve the goal of highlighting the social practice; alternatively, as
explained in the case of the hyperbolical proverbs, paradox is used to attract
the attention of the hearer by rousing his interest. The second function of
aesthetic appeal seems to be complementary to the first function of
highlighting the social practice in the formation of proverbs. From a synoptic
perspective, different functions are interconnected-interrelated-
interdependent and they may be linear, parallel, or radial.

2. 4: Metaphorical Proverbs
2.4.1: Literal Practices as Metaphorical Proverbs
i. Do not look a gift horse in the mouth.
ii. An early bird catches the worm.
iii. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink.
iv. You scratch my back; I scratch your back.

2.4.2: Metaphorical Words in Proverbs

i. What is the good of a fair apple if it has a worm in its heart?
ii. Don’t monkey with the bandwagon if you cannot play the horn.
iii. If the beard were all, the goat might preach.
iv. Every dog is a lion at home.
In the 2.4 Set, we have the so-called metaphorical proverbs which are
predominant in the proverbial genre. Surprisingly, most of these proverbs in
vacuo cannot be considered metaphorical in the first instance. For example,
Do not look a gift horse in the mouth simply means a directive to not look a
gift horse in the mouth; An early bird catches the worm means an assertion
stating a belief that P (where P= that an early bird catches the worm); and
What is the good of a fair apple if it has a worm in its heart? is a rhetorical
question with a negative assertion that P (where P= if it has a worm in its
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

heart). These sentences even as sentences- in – contexts in a possible world

need not necessarily be proverbs. For example, in the context of a possible
world, where one presents a horse to another – for instance as I was
presented horses by the Shehu of Borno, the Waziri of Borno, and the
Governor of Borno, Nigeria – and the receiver of the gift looks into the mouth
– it is a sociocultural practice to examine the teeth of a horse to determine
its age and thus assess its value: the younger the horse, the better its value
- the third person witnessing the action may say this sentence: Don’t look a
gift horse in the mouth. [In the mouth is a synecdoche for teeth – this use is
also not metaphorical. [Other simple examples are the common social
animal practices in proverbs such as You can lead a horse to water but you
can’t make him drink; A scary horse needs a stout bridle; A boisterous horse
requires a boisterous bridle (British). These proverbs have a real animal
social practice as their propositional content and the proverbs are literal in
their content but turned metaphorical in their application. In the case of You
scratch my back; I scratch your back, it is a human social practice.]

In such a context of use in a possible world, the utterance need not have the
force of a proverb if the speaker intended the utterance only as literal advice
or command, according to the custom. In such a case it means the same as a
proverb but not in the same manner. The meaning of the utterance is not
derived via the frozen cultural prototypical illocutionary force of the meaning
but as an individual opinion following the politeness principle. Such
utterances cannot be used metaphorically in other contexts – they are not
sortally incorrect. For example, one cannot say this sentence when you
receive a pen as a gift; if you say it, it is understood as a proverb via the
prototypical meaning. In other words all such utterances need not be
proverbs even though all proverbs can be used in such contexts exactly with
the same wording. Hence there is an asymmetric relationship between such
utterances and proverbs. That is why, a sentence like Don’t stare (at) a
guest in the house is not a proverb even though it is also a similar piece of
cultural advice in a similar syntactic structure.

When such a use is taken as a categorial practice and is made the exemplar
of such a social practice of condemning the evaluation of gifts as impolite, it
gains the status of a prototypical practice, consequently gaining a new
meaning that contains the core features of the categorial practice without
the image-meaning. [In literal proverbs, there is no image-meaning and
therefore the referential meaning is equal to the prototypical meaning:
(7) Literal Proverbs: Referential Meaning = Prototypical meaning.]

Here, the status of the same practice is apparently transformed by

superimposition (vivartam by adhya:sa) from an instance of an individual
practice to an instance of a categorial practice by looking at it as a member
of such similar categories of practices to an instance of a prototypical
practice by gradual evolution (karma srushti) in a linear, temporal sequence.
 Deriva
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In terms of cognition, an expressed meaning in the text of the proverb

embodying the individual practice evolves into a prototypical meaning
embodying an evolved meaning which when used in a context becomes the
contextual meaning embodying an emergent meaning.

(8) a. Individual Practice

Categorial Practice
Looking at the teeth of horse gifted Looking at the teeth
of a horse gifted
Prototypical Practice
Looking at the contents of a present

b. Referential Meaning Categorial

Meaning
Don’t look at the teeth of a gift horse Don’t look at the
teeth of a gift horse
Prototypical Meaning
Don’t evaluate the contents of a present

c. Expressed Meaning Evolved Meaning Emergent

Meaning.
OF a social practice THROUGH social practices IN a
contextual social practice
(Referential Meaning) (Prototypical Meaning) (Contextual
Meaning)
If the same sentence Do not look a gift horse in the mouth is considered a
sentence in a context in a possible world situation, other than the original
context of the proverb (i.e., a situation in which one looks into the mouth of a
gift horse), it will be a proverb in that context with that semantic
interpretation. That is to say that this utterance will be considered a cultural
practice and its referential meaning as such will be extended to derive its
prototypical meaning ‘that it is not good manners to evaluate a gift in terms
of its worth’ and furthermore, it will be superimposed on the categorial
action in the context to derive its final contextual meaning. Therefore, it is a
negative condition that proverbs used in their original context (from which
the proverb took off) need not be proverbial:

(9) a. A: Non-Verbal Action (presents a horse)

B: NV (looks in the mouth and checks the teeth)
C: Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
[literal advice in the form of a sortally correct sentence as not a proverb;
with a falling intonation on ‘in the mouth]

b. A: Non-Verbal Action (presents an ordinary horse)

B: How much is this?
C: Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

[a sortally incorrect sentence as metaphorical advice as a proverb]

c. A: Non-Verbal Action (presents an ordinary shirt)

B: How much is this?
C: Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
[a proverb as metaphorical advice]

d. A: Non-Verbal Action (presents a horse)

B: NV (looks in the mouth and checks the teeth)
C: ‘Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth’.
[a sortally incorrect sentence citation of a proverb; with a rising intonation
starting from ‘Don’t……’]

In (9a), the sentence-in-context as an utterance is not a proverb because it

had not yet become a proverb by cultural authorization whereas in (9d), the
already formed proverb is used in the context as an utterance by citation to
contextually mean the prototypical meaning but not merely the referential
meaning and so it can be considered a proverb.

The vivartam (apparent transformation) of an individual practice into a

categorial practice is by gradual evolution (karma srushti); it is generally but
not necessarily achieved when an individual uses this practice as a means to
interpret an unfamiliar (known to the society but not familiar) / unknown (not
yet discovered) /abstract practice or phenomenon by using it as a simile.
Later on, as this comparison/contrast is used and polished by many
individuals during the course of time and gains currency as a popular
illustration of the practice, it achieves the status of a standard example and
becomes salient. In the mean time, all other practices which are similar to
this practice are categorized as belonging to a class or group. By this
categorization, it becomes a categorial practice and again as a salient
practice, it is chosen as the exemplar par excellence of all other practices
which are classed with this practice. Hence, it becomes a prototypical
practice for all the other categorial practices by gradual evolution.

This is an interesting Process of Reversal of Order (indicated by / )

by the Principle of Individual – Contextual - Collective Standardization
observed in many ka:rmik linguistic processes. It offers an important
counter-evidence to the Innateness Hypothesis of Chomsky or Language as
Social Action of Halliday. First, an action is performed by a dispositional
choice; second, it is dispositionally used to interpret other similar practices
that are obtained in the conduct of living of the proverb community in which
it is used; third, as it is used to do so, all such similar practices are grouped
together as a class or category; and finally, this particular practice, by virtue
of being used as a means to interpret other similar practices, becomes
prominent or salient and is dispositionally chosen to interpret and represent
all other such similar practices that may occur in future. Salience of this
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

practice emerged out of its popular dispositional choice and not out of its
intrinsic value – for example, gold is still salient in our modern cultures even
though platinum is a nobler metal than gold in the periodic table; so also A
bird in the hand is worth two in the bush is salient whereas A pig in the pen
is worth two in the market is not in the English proverb community; green in
Distant hills are green in English is salient but not in Telugu where it is soft:
Du:rapu (far away) kondalu (hills) nunupu (soft) ‘Distant hills are soft’. In
other words, first it is dispositionally categorized, and next it is
dispositionally used to categorize bringing about a reversal in its use:

(10) a. Action Categorial Action Salient Action

Prototypical Action

b. Action Prototypical Action Categorial Action

An important point to note is the way in which proverbs are formed as

language. The Principles of Awareness, Cognition, Analyticity, Memory, and
Vocalization, and Disposition, Action and its Experience are all innate to
every human being. That is why we find them universally across all places,
and races governed by Universal Sciences of Action (physics, chemistry, and
mathematics), Living (physiology, psychology, cognitive science, and
medicine), and Lingual Action (linguistics). However, there is no universal
language but many languages in practice (Samskrit, Hebrew, Telugu,
Hixkaryana, etc). Just as human beings have developed many cultures, and
religions, so also many languages must have been developed by them
according to these Universal Sciences of Action, Living, and Lingual Action.
We can see this kind of evolution from a historical study of various language
phenomena such as the change in the syntactic typology of English from
SOV to SVO; loss of cases; semantic changes; new word –formation
processes, etc.

2.4.3. Motivation of Metaphoricity in Proverbs

a. Principle of Least Effort in Formation of a Proverb

One way to motivate the formation of metaphorical proverbs is through
cognitive processing patterns: Human beings tend to give preference to
simplicity over complexity in cognitive processing by the Principle of Least
Effort, in the absence of an easily available concept. Here, the prototype can
be cognized with effort but the users are lazy to do so. For example, an
already available social practice can be easily extended to other social
practices for categorization by the Principle of Productive Extension of
Variables (PEV) in which an already existing variable (obtained by ECV) is
taken as the base and modified either at the paradigmatic or syntagmatic
levels by dispositional creativity. For example, in affixation, the paradigm is
shifted from, say, prefixation to suffixation or circumfixation in word-
formation; in semantics, the meaning of an existing word is extended to
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

cover other meanings leading to polysemy (e.g., party having many

meanings: tea-party; congress party); similarly, a stitch in time saves nine is
extended to be metaphorical and made a prototype. This principle can be
overruled in favour of other principles such as the Principles of
Aesthetic/Functional/Structural Appeals according to the dispositionality of
the users: as the workman, so is his work.

b. Complexity in Prototypicalization
Another way to motivate the formation of proverbs is through the complexity
in categorization and derivation of a prototype:

i. The concerned prototypical practice is vague and invisible to naked

cognition and requires microscopic cognition through the instrumentality
of a metaphorical social practice and hence difficult to prototypicalize by
paraphrase; (e.g., Don’t expect three legs on a cat when you know he
has four; Revenge is like biting a dog because he bit you; as wise as
Waltham’s cow). In such formations, the derivation of the prototypical
meaning requires effort and the image is generally a complex category
prototype;

ii. so also, sometimes, the complex category prototype image forms an

integral part of the meaning and so requires the metaphor to capture
that shade of meaning precisely; in addition, the range, depth, and
variety of meaning is sometimes enhanced by the metaphor (e.g., He
who lives by the sword shall perish by the sword; An eye for an eye turns
the whole world blind; Like a fish out of water);

iii. someother times, the aesthetic appeal of the image rules

supreme and decides the metaphorical choice (e.g., A forgotten switch
may cause a wreck; One swine recognizes another; Who yaps like a dog
will be beaten like a dog). In addition, such proverbs reduce the premium
on encoding and decoding the meaning. Here, the image may be a
simple or complex category prototype.

c. Ease in the Computation of Meaning

It is easier to compute the contextual meaning of a categorial practice which
may be abstract/new/unfamiliar through a concrete/known/familiar practice
embodied in the metaphor. The computation is from category to category via
the already present attributes rather than the abstract meaning in the
prototype where the concrete attributes are not present. This is a pragmatic
advantage for both the hearer and the speaker: the speaker encodes the
new contextual meaning easily because he knows it already through
another category and so does the hearer decode it. For example, in the
following Telugu conversation between my mother and me about the
decoration of Sri Ka:lima:tha in Her Temple in our town, the meaning is
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

quickly and evocatively captured through the image of a decorated doll and
an undressed doll in the proverb:

(11) A : puvvulu ti:se:ste:, vigraham andamga le:du.

‘(If you) remove(ing) the flowers, the idol is unattractive’

B : avunu, undade:miti? Manishi ku:da: ante: alanka:ram

So will it not be ? Even a man (is) also like that, if the
decoration is
tise:ste:
removed.
Anni: pedite: bommakka, anni: tiste: timmakka.
(If you) put(ting) all Sister Doll, removing all Sister Thimma.
‘If put everything, Bommakka; if removed everything,
Thimmakka’

[Bommakka is a prototype of a beautiful well-dressed country lass; and

Thimmakka another prototype of an ill-looking country wench]

Some proverbs on the contrary – unlike metaphorical proverbs - can be used

only in restricted contexts when they refer to a particular subject only. A few
examples are given below.

3 Set: Restricted (Subject Specific) Proverbs

i. Women are saints in church, angels in the street, devils in the kitchen,
and apes in
bed.
ii. Good coffee should be black as sin, strong as the devil, and hot as hell.
iii. A woman’s place is in the house.
iv. Don’t spend all your money in one place.
v. A good surgeon must have an eagle’s eye, a lion’s heart, and a lady’s
hand.

Such proverbs as mentioned above are restricted in their application to

specific subjects: women, coffee, money, surgeon, etc. Their range is
restricted only to those subjects and not others unlike the literal or
metaphorical proverbs which can be applied to refer to various subjects. For
example, A woman’s place is in the house can be applied in situations where
women only are the subject, and not other subjects such as men. On the
other hand, literal proverbs like Honesty is the best policy or metaphorical
proverbs like An early bird catches the worm can be applied in a wide variety
of situations from business to marriage: an early bird can be anybody who is
early in doing some work; honesty can be in any situation.

B. Syntactic Meaning in Proverbs: Its Derivation

 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

B.1. Syntactic Meaning of Parallel Patterns

A proverb by definition contains the essential feature “prototype’ along with
the other essential features “cultural confirmation”, and “frozen textuality”
in its definition which
is given by Bhuvaneswar (2002) as follows:

(12) A proverb is a culturally confirmed frozen text of

a prototypical practice (or illocution).

In this definition, the concept of frozen textuality is easily determined as a

formal feature: a fixed and finite set of words in a syntactic pattern. Hence,
the number of words, their arrangement in an order, and the syntactic
pattern in which these words are arranged are fixed for a particular proverb.
Any variation in that particular order leads to a variation in the proverb and
the original proverb becomes the formal prototype for the rest of the
proverbs which are its categories. The core features of the formal-categorial
proverbs are largely determined by their semantic features (as indicated in
their referential meaning) and their similarity with that of the prototypical
proverb with a variation in the fringe features which are largely determined
by lexico-syntactic considerations. Let us take a proverb to illustrate this
point.

(13) Better late than never.

In this proverb, there are four words: better, late, than, and never and they
are arranged in that serial order of words in the elliptical syntactic
construction of comparative degree. Its referential meaning is:
(14a) (It is) better (to be) late (in doing something) than never (doing it).

This proverb is given as the original proverb and four variations in this
proverb are listed in ADAP (1992: 360-61; 51) as follows:

(14.b.1) Better to be late than never, but better never late.

(14.b.2) Better late than never, but better never late.
(14.b.3) Better late than never, but better still never late.
(14.b.4) Better late than never, but better yet, never late.
(14.b.5) Better late than not at all.

(14.c) A bird in the hand is better than two in the bush

Any proverb of this type has a typical syntactic pattern: Better X than Y. In
the formation of a proverb of this syntactic type, this pattern functions as a
prototype and the speaker creates a proverb with a particular social practice
as the content of the proverb. For example, the preference for being late to
not doing a thing at all; the preference for choosing something which is
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

available to choosing something which is not available; the preference for

buying to borrowing; and so on. Within that syntactic prototype, there may
be minor variations which do not affect the basic pattern of comparison. For
example, a comparative sentence may be ellipted or slightly changed in the
pattern or a new word may be used:
(14b) It is better to be late than never Vs
Better late than never (it is … to be ellipted) Vs
(14e) Better late than not at all Vs
[(14.c.1) Better to be late than never, but better never late
(to be … retained but it is … ellipted and an extension to the syntactic
pattern is introduced with a conjunction of exception but);
(14.c.2) Better late than never, but better never late (to be … is also
ellipted); and
(14.d.1) Better late than never, but better still never late (an adverb still is
added to the extension);
(14.d.2) Better late than never, but better yet, never late (a new adverb yet
replaces the old one in the extension)].
In the case of (14b) and (14e), the meaning is the same but there is a
change in the words: never is replaced by not at all. In the case of ellipsis,
there is a tension between clarity and brevity (via aesthetic appeal) and
brevity won the case; hence, there is an interrelation-interconnection-
interdependence (I-I-I) of syntax with disposition (as realized in the aesthetic
choices); in the case of the extension in the syntactic pattern from Better X
than Y to Better X than Y but better not X, there is a tension between the
social practice 1 as given in Better X than Y and a change of perception of
that social practice given in 2 as Better X than Y but better not X. This
difference of opinion resulted in the creation of another version which is a
category of the first version. Here, there is an I-I-I between the perception of
the social practice resulting in a change of meaning and the syntactic
pattern. Therefore, disposition (via the choice of perception), semantics, and
syntax are interconnected-interrelated-interdependent (I-I-I). What is more,
even the syntactic prototype might have been chosen by analogy to form the
other proverbs as it happens in the case of many proverbs. Such a
phenomenon is also seen in the synonymy of proverbs having the same
prototypical meaning but different images: Distant hills are green Vs
Faraway birds have fine feathers Vs Distant cows have long horns.

(15) Experience - Accident – Intention - Desire - Effort - Cognition

Principle
Here accident is a product of experience, an experience with latent
intentions for a specific observation; the awareness in accidental discoveries
is not really accidental but unconsciously intentional. When pencilin was
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

discovered by accident, the accident was grounded in the search for

antibiotic.

So categorization is also a similar process of discover by focused attention

and alertness.

The need for categorization in living is not accidental but intentional – human
beings want to categorize activity in order to fulfill their desires and this
desire is the necessary input to produce categorization.

B.2. Syntactic Meaning of Complex Sentences in Proverbs

In the syntax of proverbs, a number of examples of complex sentences are
given. All of them are not elementary speech acts. Therefore, their meaning
is denegational, complex, or conjunctional according to their semantic
interpretation.

An Illocutionary Denegation, according to Vanderveken (1996: 24,

Meaning and Speech Acts Vol I, CUP: Cambridge), is “to make explicit the
non-performance by the speaker of an illocutionary act F(P) and is given by
the form F(P)”. For example, a refusal is an illocutionary denegation of an
acceptance; permission is an illocutionary denegation of forbidding, etc.
Such an illocutionary dengation in proverbs has to be similarly interpreted as
a complex speech act. For example, the proverb Better be idle than badly
employed is an illocutionary denegation of an act of advising the hearer to
be employed.

A few more examples are given below.

4 Set.1: Illocutionary Denegation in Proverbs

i. Don’t rush the cattle.
ii. Don’t monkey with the bandwagon if you can’t play the horn.
iii. You can never tell about women, but if you can, you should not.
iv. Ask me no questions and I will tell you no lies.
v. Judge not of men or things at first sight.
vi. Don’t cry over spilt milk.
These types of proverbs have a purpose of making explicit the non-
performance of an illocutionary act F(P).

A Conditional Illocutionary Act, according to Vanderveken (1996: 24),

performs an illocutionary act F(Q), not categorially but on the condition that
a proposition P is true and is given by the form [P F(Q)]. For example, in
the proverb If the beard were all, the goat might preach, the speech act of
the preaching of the goat (F(Q)) is conditional on the proposition P that the
beard were all is true. In the proverb, Make yourself honey and the flies will
devour you, the speech act of the devouring by the flies is conditional on
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

making yourself honey: if you don’t make yourself honey, the flies will not
devour you.

A few more examples are given below. The conditions are shown in italics
and the speech acts in plain letters.

4.2: Conditional Illocutionary Acts in Proverbs

i. Fly your kite when it’s windy.
ii. Live your life, do your work, then take your hat.
iii. When a man’s coat is threadbare, it is easy to peck a hole in it.
iv. It’s too late to close the well after the goat has fallen in.
v. When in anger, say the alphabet.
vi. If you can’t beat them, join them.

In Conjunctions of Illocutionary Acts, according to Vanderveken (1996:

24, Meaning and Speech Acts Vol I, CUP: Cambridge), two illocutionary acts
F₁ (P₁) and F₂ (P₂) are performed and are of the form F₁ (P₁) & F₂ (P₂). For
example, in the proverb You scratch my back; I scratch your back, there is a
conjunction of two illocutionary acts You scratch my back (F₁ (P₁)) and I
scratch your back (F₂ (P₂)). The first one is an elementary directive and the
second one is an assertion.

A few more examples are given below. The conditions are shown in italics
and the speech acts in plain letters.
4.3: Conjunction of Illocutionary Acts in Proverbs
i. If anyone betrays you once, it’s his fault; if he betrays you twice, it’s
your fault.
ii. The early bird catches the worm – but who wants worms?
iii. Throw a stone in the mud and it splashes in your face.
iv. Give me liberty or give me death.
v. If ignorance is bliss, why be otherwise?
vi. The husband is the head of the house, but the wife is the neck - and the
neck moves
the head.

Conjunctional illocutionary acts can be homogeneous or heterogeneous. If all

the acts in the utterance belong to the same category, they can be called
homogeneous; otherwise, they are heterogeneous. For example, in If anyone
betrays you once, it’s his fault; if he betrays you twice, it’s your fault, both
the first (If anyone betrays you once, it’s his fault) and the second (if he
betrays you twice, it’s your fault) illocutionary acts are similar conditional
illocutionary acts (P₁ F₁(Q₁)) and (P₂ F₂ (Q₂)) respectively. In the
second example, the first: the early bird catches the worm is an elementary
assertive speech act (F (P)) and the second: but who wants worms? is a
negative rhetorical question. Vanderveken ( 1990: 149) considers questions
as requests (directives) but rhetorical questions are not requests – they are
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

positive or negative questions giving negative or positive assertions; so also

challenges are not. Hence questions of this type are not considered
directives. In the case of the third example, both a directive and an assertive
are conjoined. So both the examples ii and iii are heterogeneous
conjunctional speech acts. The fourth example is a conjunctional
illocutionary speech act with two elementary directives are conjoined. In
view of the examples i and iv, we get a further division of complex
illocutionary acts: 1. Conjunction of Elementary Illocutionary Acts; 2.
Conjunction of Complex Illocutionary Acts; and 3. Conjunction of Mixed
Illocutionary Acts.

Therefore, any proverb whose meaning is to be derived is also dependent on

the nature of the speech act it represents as a sentence-in-context. If the
speech act representation is not given the appropriate semantic
interpretation, there is a danger of the failure of the speech act and hence
the proverb. For example, in iii, ‘the splashing of the mud’ – an assertion –
will be true only if the directive ‘Throw a stone in the mud’ is carried out. In
this proverb, ‘Throw a stone in the mud’ is not a condition and therefore it is
not a conditional speech act but a conjunctional speech act. As such a failure
to interpret it as a conditional speech act leads to a misunderstanding of the
proverb.

Look at the following hypothetical conversations to understand the

misunderstanding of meaning.

(16) i. A: I have quarreled with that useless man and he maligned my

name.
B: (You) Throw a stone in the mud and it splashes in your face.
(Assertion)

ii. A: I want to tell him what nonsense he has been talking about me.
B: (If you) Throw a stone in the mud, (and) it splashes in your
face.
[Implicature: Advice or warning: Don’t tell him…. because he
is bad.]

In the case of Give me liberty or give me death, there is condition in Give me

liberty and not an optional directive (as in Give me coffee or (give me) tea).

Sometimes in a conjunctional illocutionary act, there may be more than one

propositional constituent (i.e., more subjects) as in A dog, a woman, and a
walnut tree: the more they are beaten, the better they will be. As a
sentence-in-a context in a possible world, not all the three possible
constituents may be present together – only one may be present as it usually
happens in the actual world. In such cases, the other constituents become
redundant and the meaning flouts Gricean maxims of relevance and
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

quantity. Then, how do we derive the meaning? The only way out is to
consider all the atomic propositions as forming a single compound
proposition at a higher level abstraction and then apply it: A dog, a woman,
and a walnut tree are the categories of a prototypical concept X (stretching
across animals, humans, and trees) which have the characteristic of
becoming better by being beaten and so become exemplars par excellence
of X. Therefore, the prototypical meaning is: X becomes better by beating
with X having A, B, and C as its categories. Hence, when this proverb is
applied to a context where only B is the focus and A and C are not present or
relevant, there is no flouting of quantity or relevance since A, B, and C
separately represent the prototype as its categories and not collectively;
they need not be the focus together. Another example is: There are three
sides to every story- your side, my side, and the right side. Here, two
propositional constituents are always present (your side, my side) but the
third (the right side) may be optional because both the sides may be wrong
and all may be one.

A few examples of such proverbs are given below.

4.4: Compound Propositions in Proverbs

i. Feed a cold and starve a fever.
(Contrast)
ii. Men build houses; women build homes.
(Contrast)
iii. Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can. (Anticlimax: make,
save, give)
iv. If you are an anvil, hold still; if you are a hammer, strike hard.
(Contrast)
full.
(Climax)
v. First love, last love, best love.
(Climax)
vi. Haste makes waste, waste makes want, want makes a poor boy a
beggar.

(Anticlimax)
vii. For want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe, the horse was
lost; for
want of a horse, the rider was lost.
(Anti-climax)

The first example Feed a cold and starve a fever is based on a contrast of
feeding and starving and is subject specific with two different specific
subjects. So when the prototype has to be constructed we have a problem:
what common abstraction can be made out of such sentences? Feed a cold
F₁ (P₁) and starve a fever F₂ (P₂) are common only as directives making the
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

conjunction homogeneous. Hence, the prototype should be a directive.

However, the senses are different but they should be one. The only way out
is to consider cold and fever as sicknesses and have sickness as a
proposition in the prototype. Feeding and starving are degrees of eating; so
eating becomes another propositional constituent. Combining the two, we
get: eat proportionately to cure your sickness as the prototypical meaning
with F₁ (P₁) and F₂ (P₂) as the two subject specific categories restricting the
domain of application only to those two categories. When applied in a
context of F₁ (P₁) or F₂ (P₂), only one category is applicable but both
constitute the prototypical meaning. However, the contextual meaning is
derived with reference to the category referred to in the context.

In the case of climax or anticlimax, all the atomic propositions have to be

combined to make the whole. For example, the prototypical meaning of
Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can is derived by joining
make + save + give to get an abstract practice of dealing (with money) and
linking it with the adverbial clause all you can present in all the three atomic
propositions: deal with money according to your ability; so also in the case of
For want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe, the horse was lost;
for want of a horse, the rider was lost, the progressive effect of losing a
bigger thing for want of a smaller thing is extended to the biggest thing and
the cumulative effect from the smallest to the biggest thing is taken into
consideration through the anticlimax for deriving the prototypical meaning:
for want of a very small thing, a very big thing is lost.

The different types of complex speech acts are shown in the following
network (1).

Denegational

Complex Illocutionary Acts Conditional Elementary

Conjunctional Complex

Mixed

Network 1: Network of Complex Illocutionary Acts

II. Prototypical Meaning in Proverbs: Its Derivation

Prototypes in Proverbs
So far we have discussed how proverbial meaning is derived from a literal
meaning perspective, but we have not discussed separately how prototypical
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

meaning is achieved. Prototypical meaning at the core level is achieved by a

cultural convention:

(17) A particular practice is assigned prototypical status by its

capability of correlation with other actions, thus making them
categorial.
However, there are certain syntactic features which by virtue of their
structure convey fixed sentential meanings. These meanings are constant for
a given language. Therefore, utterance meaning is derived in extension of
the sentential meaning according to the context. As a result, context can
change only the utterance meaning but not the sentential structural
meaning. For example, Tense, Mood, Number, Gender, Connectives (like if,
but, or, yet, and, etc.) fix the meaning. As such, if there is a particular
pattern in a proverb, and if this pattern is seen recurring in a number of
other proverbs, then we can say that all of them are tokens of that syntactic
type. Let us take an example to illustrate the meaning of a syntactic type.

A. Comparison in Proverbial Syntax

Comparison in English is expressed by the inflected forms of the adjective -
er, and - est with a correlative construction introduced by than (Quirk, et al
1989: 130-131). In addition to it, the proposition expressed in the
superordinate clause is compared with another proposition expressed in the
subordinate clause by means of a comparative element (COMP-Element).
This comp-element specifies the standard of comparison and identifies the
comparison as equational (e.g., as….as) or as differentiating (adjective + - er
…than; less…than; more…than) in a scale but not with absolute values (ibid.
330-331). Such comparative constructions are also amenable to ellipsis. In
the proverb given in (18),

(18) Better a small fish than an empty dish,

the comparative element (a subject complement (Cs)) is differentiating and
the inflectional comparative is better for the adjective good. This proverb is
an ellipted form of:
(18a) A small fish is better than an empty dish (is)
with an ellipsis of the verb is and a fronting of the comparative element
(which is Cs) to the initial position for emphasis, thus giving rise to the
following operation:

(18b) A small fish is better than an empty dish Better a small fish than
an empty dish.

The standard of comparison (a small fish) in the superordinate clause A small

fish is X contains the object of comparison (an empty dish) in the subordinate
clause X which is a subject complement (Cs) with the comparative element.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

(18c) Better a small fish than an empty dish.

standardard of comparison object of comparison

comparative element

(18d) A small fish is better than an empty dish.

Subordinate Clause
Superordinate Clause

Therefore, the construction [Better X than Y] means a comparison between X

and Y in that sense and hence can be considered a prototypical syntactic
type for all proverbs with that construction in that sense. And all the
structures of such proverbs become the tokens of that prototype.
Furthermore, all the proverbs formed in the analogy of the first proverb
(whose temporal precedence may or may not be established easily owing to
the difficulty in getting the correct historical chronological evidence of the
usage of other similar proverbs) with minor variations in their syntactic
structure at the peripheral level such as ellipsis become ‘a sort of categorial
proverbs’ of the prototype proverb which becomes the prototypical syntactic
proverb type by virtue of being considered so by the culture. Hence,
comparative proverbs with ellipsis or without ellipsis are the two categories
of the prototype of comparative proverbs. Again, single comparison and
double comparison form another set of categories; absolute, comparative,
and superlative syntactic types form yet another set of categories. A few
examples are given below.

a. No Ellipsis in the Comparison

1. A live soldier is better than a dead hero Better a live soldier than
a dead hero.
2. The good that is, is better than the good that was.
3. It is better to be late than never Better late than
never.

b. Ellipsis in Comparison
1. Better a live dog than a dead lion.

c. Double Comparison
1. The more, the merrier.
2. The bigger the man, the better the mark.

A large number of proverbs are formed analogically either syntactically or

prototypically or both. For example, Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth has
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

a syntactically and prototypically equivalent proverb: Don’t look a gift

elephant in the tusk.

B. Lexical Prototypes
In the case of vocabulary, there are also certain lexical features which are
prototypical. For example, some words as proper nouns (dealing with
personal names) are prototypicalized. Johnny, Jill, Jack, etc. in English,
Venki, Subbi, Pullayya, Poli, Machakamma, Annambhotlu, Peddibhotlu, reddi
(a caste name – who is the village chief), etc. in Telugu are prototypical in
their meaning. Actually, these are repetitions of the same word and have the
grammatical status of a proper noun but they carry with them the status of
words having a common meaning X with certain characteristics. As such
every use of such a word in a proverb becomes a token of the prototype
rather than the same proper noun. In some cases, the common name is
further qualified to indicate the specific sub-characteristic by compounding
(as John Newcome; and John Raw). A few examples are given below.

5 Set: Lexical Prototypes in Proverbs

5.1. English Proverbs
i. Johnny is as Johnny does; What Johnny will not teach himself Johnny
will not learn.
ii. For every Jack, there is a Jill; A bad Jack may have a bad Jill; Jack of all
trades,
master of none;
iii. John (Jack) Blunt; John Bull; John Doe and Richard Roe; John Trot; John
Newcome; John Raw
iv. As James treats God, so God treats James
v. We are as many Johnstons as you are Jerdans (Jardines)
vi. Round Robin Hood’s barn makes a tedious yarn
vii. Rob Peter to pay Paul
viii. Tom Fiddler’s ground

5.2. Telugu Proverbs

i. Venki pelli Subbi cha:vukochhindi. ‘Venki’s Marriage came at Subbi’s
death’
iii. Po:li:! Po:li:! Ni: bho:gamenna:lle: ante: ma: atta ma:alapi(a)lli nunchi
vachhe:da:ka: (andita) annattu.
“If said, ‘Poli! Poli! How long is your enjoyment?’, she said, ‘Till my
mother-in-
law comes back from Malapalli’ “
iv. Aravayye:llo:ccha:ka Annambhatlu atakakekkite: va:llamaki
ade: apuru:pamayindita “After getting sixty years (of age), if
Annambhatlu
climbs up the attic, that alone has become very enchanting for his
mother.”
v. Ennadu: ekkani reddi gurramekkite: mundu venakayindi.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

“ When the never-climbed reddi climbed on the horse, the front

became the back.”

C. Semantic Prototypes
Certain semantic concepts such as antonymy, synonymy, and tautology
dealing with social practices recur in different images in the practice. For
example, all these three proverbs Faraway cows have long horns, Faraway
birds have fine feathers, and Distant hills are green convey the same
prototypical meaning: Things which are distant look better but the
participants in the action are different having different images. Such
synonymous proverbs belong to a semantic prototype exemplified by their
prototypical meaning.

In this article, we are not dealing with lexical and syntactic prototypes but we
discuss how prototypical meaning is derived in the case of literal, figurative,
subject specific, and compound propositional proverbs in general in the next
section.

C. Derivation of Prototypical Meaning

1. Literal Meaning as the Prototypical Meaning in Literal Proverbs

As we have already seen, proverbs can be literal or figurative. In the case of
a literal proverb, the prototypical meaning is itself encoded as the text of the
proverb. That it is so can be seen from the derivation of the contextual
meaning when it is applied in a context. The literal meaning is changed
accordingly to yield a categorial meaning which shows that the literal
meaning is the same as the prototypical meaning. Therefore,
(19) Prototypical Meaning = Literal Meaning (Referential Meaning).
2. Defigurativized Meaning as the Prototypical Meaning in
Figurative Proverbs
In literal proverbs, the prototypical practice is explicitly encoded in the text.
In figurative proverbs, the prototypical practice is not explicitly encoded in
the text but the figure of speech implicitly represents a categorial practice
which is turned into a prototype by apparent transformation (vivartam) for
one reason or the other in the forward direction:
(19a) Categorial Practice Prototypical Practice
Implicit Prototype
To derive the prototypical meaning,
1. the categorial practice meaning has to be reduced to its prototype in the
reverse direction by removing the image, etc.;

2. Then, the concrete meaning has to be turned into the abstract meaning of
the social practice to get the core features of the categorial practice and give
rise to the explicit prototypical practice.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

(19b) Categorial Practice Images Decategorized Proposition

Explicit Prototype
[ delink from … in the direction of the arrow; gives rise by
transformation to;
apparently transforms into]

The following types can be observed:

1. Simple Category Prototypes; and 2. Complex Category Prototypes.

In Simple Category Prototypes, the figure can be easily detached to give

the prototypical meaning; but in Complex Category Prototypes, it is
difficult to do so. The terms simple and complex are relative and fuzzy and
proverb specific. For example, the images of the bird in the hand and the
bird in the bush in the proverb A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush
can be easily detached to give the prototypical meaning: A small thing
obtained is better than a big thing yet to be obtained. But proverbs such as
The early bird catches the worm – but who wants worms? require effort in
cognitive processing of the prototypical meaning in a text because of the two
different meanings of the word worm: 1. succeeds (gets the desired object);
2. a small thing.

3. Subject Specific Prototypical Meaning

In subject specific proverbs, the prototypical practice is restricted to a
specific subject and it may be expressed literally or figuratively. For
example, the proverb Don’t spend all your money in one place is almost
literal and has the subject spending money. Its prototypical meaning is the
same as the proverb with an implication that you should not invest your
money in a single place (venture). In the proverb A good surgeon must have
an eagle’s eye, a lion’s heart, and a lady’s hand, the subject is a good
surgeon and the proverb has many figurative words such as an eagle’s eye,
a lion’s heart, and a lady’s hand. Their figurative meaning has to be
appropriately explained in literary terms as a sharp eye, a brave heart, and a
tender and skillful hand and they have to be combined into a brief attribute if
possible: A good surgeon should be skilful and brave.

4. Compound Propositional Prototypical Meaning

As explained in compound propositions in proverbs, the prototypical meaning
has to be constructed by motivating a higher level of abstraction of the
compound propositions as Literal Meaning 2 and then that abstraction should
be taken as the prototypical meaning of the proverb.

(20) Literal (Compound Propositional) Meaning 1 Literal (Higher

Propositional) Meaning 2 Compound Propositional Prototypical
Meaning
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

So far we have discussed how prototypical meaning of proverbs has to be

derived.

D. Contextual Meaning in Proverbs: Its Derivation

The derivation of contextual meaning of proverbs is complex and is not just a
matter of listening to the proverb and knowing the meaning. It is so because
the listener should possess different types of knowledge to derive the
meaning appropriately:
1. He should possess the background knowledge over which it is used;
2. He should know the cultural and pragmatic constraints that control the use
of the proverb (as shown in the Network of Pragmatic Constraints in
Bhuvaneswar (1999) given below) as well as the structural relations of the
proverb in the exchange/discourse;
3. He should take into consideration the shared knowledge, especially,
cultural knowledge between him and the other interlocutors;
4. He should be aware of the disposition of the interlocutors – their beliefs,
biases, likes, dislikes, and emotions; and
5. Finally, he should possess the cognitive skills of automatic prototypical-
categorial instantiation of the contextual action, i.e., mapping the prototype
in a proverb appropriately on to the contextual action and categorizing it by
its prototypical-categorial instantiation through the proverb. In the case of a
figurative proverb, there is an interesting process of ablation (apavadam) to
derive the prototypical meaning of the proverb and a superimposition
(a:dhya:ro:pam) of the categorial properties of the contextual action on to
the prototypical meaning to bring about an apparent transformation
(vivartam) of the proverbial meaning into the contextual meaning. In the
case of a literal proverb, there is no ablation but only a:dhya:ro:pam and
vivartam.

When 1-5 are missing in the hearer, then non-understanding, or

misunderstanding of the proverb may take place.

In a similar way, if the speaker does not know the appropriateness of the
proverb in a context, then the hearer may misunderstand the proverb; this is
especially true when the peripheral features of the use of a proverb such as
the pragmatic constraints are violated.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Network 2 for Pragmatic Constraints in a PE

L S Older
i o Age Peer
Type of t c Younger
K PK Proverbia e i
a Male
l r Sex
Pragmati l Eunuch
a Female
c r R
y e Social Superior
l Status Peer
a Inferior
t
C i Shared +
o o Knowledge _
Formal
l n
Informal
l s
A distinction between vulgar and Situation & Intimate
o Status
offensive proverbs is that the latter do not
q Geographical
contain taboo words (lexicon) but contain u Setting Social
i - Solemn (Setting)
images and themes that are offensive to
a + Intimate
Vulgar
the listener depending on differences in (Situation)
l
Peer, Sex, Age,
age, sex and social status according to
Social Relation
- Solemn
the cultural norms. (Setting) (Social Status)
Offensive * - Formal
(Situational)
(Literary or
Colloquial) Peer
(Adapted
(Social from
Relation, Bhuvaneswar
Age, Sex, Social
1999)
Here are a few real life examples.

D.1. Proper Use and Understanding of the Proverbs

When both the speaker and the hearer possess:
1. the background knowledge (which is the knowledge that forms the
background for the present contextual action);
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

2. the shared knowledge (which is the (relevant past, present, and future)
knowledge which is mutually shared by the interlocutors; sometimes, the
background knowledge may or may not be shared; sometimes, the previous
and ongoing discourse knowledge may not be shared owing to
inattentiveness, and lack of memory));
3. the knowledge of the cultural and pragmatic constraints (which is
the cultural information regarding the use of language, and the knowledge of
the traditions and customs);
4. the knowledge of the disposition of the interlocutors (which is the
knowledge of the character, temperament, beliefs, etc. of the interlocutors,
and the mood of the discourse impelled by the temperament and attitude as
well as the way the interlocutors use language) ; and
5. the cognitive skills of proverb processing (which are related to
memory, alertness, attention, prototype-categorial instantiation skill, and
dispositional creativity);

a proverb will be properly used and understood. An example is given below

for illustration.

(21a) A (Me): It is good that we have come this way.

B (Robin Fawcett): Every cloud has a silver lining.
A: Oh, you used a proverb!
B: Because of you.

[A (Me) and B (Robin Fawcett) were going on a sightseeing trip in Hyderabad

in 1999. We hired an auto to take us to the famous Golconda Fort.]

1. Background Knowledge
A is an Indian and a resident of Hyderabad but not very familiar with the
topography of the Golconda area. B is British and is new to this place and
came to attend a conference at CIEFL, Hyderabad. A is aware of the
Golconda Fort as a historical monument and the Jail of the famous saint and
poet Ramadas [Kancharla Gopanna, a Tehsildar of Bhadrachalam, who was
imprisoned by the Nawab Abu Al Hasan Tanasha of Golconda of 16 century
A.D., on a false accusation of spending the money collected from the people
to build a temple for Lord Rama; after he was tortured for 14 years in the jail,
Lord Rama along with His Brother Sri Lakshmana appeared to him physically
(Lord Rama belonged to more than 5000 B.C.) and paid the Nawab Tanasha
in the form of gold coins (16000 varahas – one is still kept in the museum)].
B wanted to see the Golconda Fort and A accompanied him to show the
place.

2. Shared Knowledge
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

i. A and B are interested in linguistics and A is aware that B is a linguist in

the SFL tradition and B is aware that A is doing research in linguistics (on
proverbs)
ii. B is not aware of the historic importance of the fort and so wanted to see
it.
iii. We went in auto to visit the Golconda Fort but the auto rickshaw driver
took us in a wrong road by mistake and it was near the Kutub Shahi Tombs
which B wanted to see also. We came to know about it as we saw the
Golconda Fort away from us.
iv. B does not use proverbs very often and I was told about it when I told him
about my work in proverbs.

3. Knowledge of the Cultural and Pragmatic Constraints

B is a native speaker of English while A is not. Both of them are aware of the
Cultural and Pragmatic Constraints of using proverbs in English. He is elder
than me and a Reader and I was a PhD student; he was a visitor and I was a
host. He knows that the proverb Every cloud has a silver lining is a standard
proverb that can be used in an informal context like ours. Moreover, it is a
follow up supporting my assertion.

4. Knowledge of the Disposition of the Interlocutors

B knows that A is interested in proverbs and so A likes proverbs. B wants to
please A because of politeness and empathy by using a proverb. In other
words, B is inclined (by his disposition) to use proverbs even though he does
not use them often.

A knows B as friendly and open-minded and learned and respects him. So he

is informal in his behavior with him. So he made an informal observation
about their missing the path thinking that B will not feel bad about it.

5. Cognitive Skills of Proverb Processing

1. B remembers the proverb Every cloud has a silver lining; He is alert to
know its contextuality and is attentive to my observation; he has categorially
mapped the contextual action on to the prototypical practice in the proverb
Every cloud has a silver lining and exhibited dispositional creativity (by
making the choice of the proverb to please me; and choosing an appropriate
proverb to suit the occasion) and made a successful performance.

2. In addition, as a hearer, I know the structure of the proverb as a follow up

(K2F in Berry’s terms (1981 a, b, c) or as a P1 proverb used as a support to
an assertion in Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory (Bhuvaneswar 1998, 1999)) and
understood the meaning correctly. Hence, the proverb is not only used
appropriately and but also understood according to the speaker intentions.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

D.2. Proper Use/ Improper Use and Non-Understanding of the

Proverb
When the proverb is used correctly, it may not be understood correctly if the
hearer does not have the full knowledge about the meaning and use of the
proverb. For example, if A does not know the meaning of the proverb Every
cloud has a silver lining he will not understand the proverb. He may have to
strain his imagination and test the truth value of this proverb in real world
and find it to be false because not all clouds have silver linings and finally fail
to understand the meaning. Proverbs are not truth-value based but
dispositionally practice-value based.

In a similar way, if the speaker does not know how to map the categorial
contextual social practice onto the prototype in the proverb and use it, the
hearer will not understand the proverb as there will be a misfire. Depending
on the proverb, it may be polite or impolite. For example, if B had used an
improper proverb A bad workman quarrels with his tools, the Relevance
Maxim in the Cooperative Principle is flouted and it might be understood as a
censure by A: there is an implicature that A did not know the way and so
could not guide the driver properly at the right time and hence B wanted to
challenge his assertion with a new move to censure his inefficiency. The
entire structure of the conversation would have changed, say, hypothetically,
as follows:

(21b) A (Me): It is good that we have come this way.

B (Robin Fawcett): NV (Pause a few seconds).
A bad workman quarrels with his tools.
[B is angry that he lost money because of the
mistake.]
A: Come on! Why do you say that?
I already told you that I am not familiar with
this route.
I am not a business man. [A is unhappy.]
Don’t worry. I will pay the difference of the
auto-fare.
B: It’s Okay. It is all right (condescendingly).

This is a very clear cut instance to show how dispositionality generates,

specifies, directs, and materializes the discourse and its dynamic, synoptic,
and experiential structures. In (21a), the use of the proverb is caused by
sympathy and friendship and hence the proverb is used to mitigate the cost
to A and A feels happy; in addition, it might have been used to express his
own reaction to the contextual action but the choice of a proverb is not; and
(21b) will have been caused by intolerance and arrogance and hence a
proverb will have been used to censure and offend A – if at all, he has the
habit of using proverbs and knows the proverb - and make A feel unhappy
and change the direction of the discourse into accusations, challenges,
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

reconciliation, etc.; in a similar way, had A not felt friendly and informal with
B, he would not have made that assertion at all. Instead, he would have
apologized to B to save his (A’s) face: I am sorry. The driver missed his way
or found fault with the driver: Why did you miss the way. You should know
your way; here, disposition rules supreme and flouts the cultural norm of
courtesy: culture is derived from dispositionality as dispositionally patterned
behavior of the individuals by collective standardization without affecting
the autonomy of the individual dispositional behaviour.

The discourse structure is not probabilistic but deterministic by the

ultimate experientiality component of the interlocutors: it is not a
probable or an accidental structure that emerged out of the contextual
action, because there is a cause-effect sequence controlled by dispositional
behavior and coordinated by the context. For example, the choice of the
proverb is not probabilistic but determined by a dispositional impulsion
connected to my interest in proverbs; the abrupt termination of the
exchange followed by the initiation of the second exchange is not
probabilistic at all – Oh, yes/ Yea/You are right/ etc. might be probabilistic as
a supporting move - but might appear to be accidental where a new move is
initiated, completely unconnected with the normal expected course of
evolution of the discourse structure. However, it is not so. The normal
supporting move is abandoned and the turn is interrupted by a recollection
of the shared, background knowledge that B does not use proverbs in
general and A is surprised and expressed it immediately as a dispositional
reaction in a Cause (the use of a proverb by B) – Effect (A’s surprise) through
the Means (expressive speech act of speech). The use of an equine proverb
Ta:kur nata ma:tiha in (23) given later is also another similar example to
show the role of dispositionality – B (a native speaker of the Bura language in
Nigeria) knows that A has collected 325 proverbs on horses in Hausa (the
largest so far in African oral literature on a single animal) and asked B to
help him in collecting Bura proverbs on horses. So he is prompted to
remember this fact and consequently impelled to use the equine proverb
Ta:kur nata ma:tiha as it suits the context. Another example is a mild protest
against using an inappropriate proverb E:do: ku:se: ga:didochhi me:se:
ga:didani cherichindi given in (18a).

At every point in the dynamic structure of discourse, decisions are made as

to what to say or what not to say, how to say or how not to say, and when
and where to say or when and where not to say. These decisions are both
unconsciously (by va:sana:s) and consciously (by thinking) impelled by a
dispositional action/reaction in the context of action by the dispositionality of
the ka:rmik actor (here, as the lingual actor). They are systematically
impelled for the ultimate construction of the experiential reality which is the
ka:rmik reality. But these impulsions are generated in a huge mind boggling
interconnected-interrelated-interdependent network of action-reaction
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

sequences in the cause-means-effect principle of the Universal Science of

Action- Universal Science of Living- Universal Science of Lingual Action.

The conversational implicature (speaker meaning or the meaning nn in the

Gricean paradigm) is not just a matter of deriving implicature from the CP
but is a matter of deriving a (w)holistic implicature which is a unified product
of semantic, pragmatic, and dispositional implicatures to constitute the
experiential implicature.

The sentence meaning gives us the semantic implicature; the speaker

meaning (in the Gricean sense) gives us the pragmatic implicature via the
CP; and the dispositional interpretation which is constructed through the
semantic and pragmatic implicatures as a sum of the parts, and at the same
time greater than the sum of the parts gives us the dispositional implicature
from which arises the ka:rmik implicature which is all these and at the same
time beyond them. It is beyond them because in marked cases of
misunderstanding of meaning or a special understanding of meaning, the
conventional pragmatic implicatures do not apply – it is the ka:rmik (via the
dispositional reaction) that applies. What is more, the ka:rmik implicature
includes the socioculturalspiritual meaning and goes beyond it in the
derivation of the dispositional meaning by evaluating it and then accepting,
adapting, or rejecting it.
(21c ) Ka:rmik Implicature Pragmatic Implicature
Socioculturalspiritual Implicature Semantic Implicature
[Ka:rmatics Pragmatics Sociosemantics Semantics]
and
[Ka:rmatics Pragmatics Sociosemantics Semantics]

That is why, according to Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory, The Dispositional

Principle (DP), derived from the Ka:rmik Principle (KP), is above the CP and it
is the cause for CP and NCP (Non-Cooperative Principle) which makes the
speaker either ignore or challenge the speech act; pragmatics becomes
Ka:rmatics (Experiential Pragmatics as Actional Semantics).

CP

Ka:rmik Principle DP
Ignore
NCP
Modify
Challenge

Reject
Network 3. The (Ka:rmik) Disposition Principle
In the application of language in a context, or its comprehension, the
principle of reversal of order comes into force and pragmatics is
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

a:nushangikally derived from semantics, and sociosemantics from

pragmatics, and ka:rmatics from sociosemantics/pragmatics/ semantics in an
I-I-I star network.
(21d) Semantics Pragmatics Sociosemantics
Ka:rmatics

D.2. Improper Use and Misunderstanding of the Proverbs

When a speaker or a hearer does not know the figurative, aetiological and
cultural meaning of the proverb, its prototypical meaning will not be
correctly realized and he fails to understand its context and implication. As a
result, the speaker uses the proverb inappropriately and the hearer
understands it as such (that it is used intentionally to be so according to the
CP or that it is wrongly used owing to lack of knowledge of the use of the
proverb). What is more, the dispositional knowledge of the interlocutors
paralinguistically generates, specifies, directs, and materializes the improper
use as well as the misunderstanding of the proverbs.

D.2.1. The Role of Disposition in the Use and Comprehension of

Proverbs

D.2.1.1. Disposition: A Ka:rmik Linguistic Analysis

According to Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory, disposition (svabha:vam) generates,
specifies, directs, and materializes all action including lingual action for its
experientiality: language is not only dispositionally produced by human
beings living in a context but also dispositionally used by them for living in a
context. It is a complex of traits, knowledge, and impressionality of activity
qualifying the individual’s being (ego) like colour qualifying light. It is
basically action-qualifying knowledge shaping the individual’s behavior as
this and that to be so and so in such and such a manner; in a broader sense,
it qualifies all the three states of body, mind, and speech.

Let us see how action is qualified by disposition and how it affects the
formation, application, and comprehension of language.

D.2.1.1.a. The Structure of a Human Being

A human being consists of the following important components:
i. Organs of Perception
They are five: the ears; the skin; the eyes; the tongue; and the nose.
We see these organs of perceptions in our body physically; at the
same time, they also exist in a
subtle form. For example, tongue is the instrument of speech and is a
physical organ in our mouth. Its movement is obligatory in the
pronunciation of sounds. However, without moving the tongue, we can
also say the sounds mentally – close your mouth; rest your tongue
naturally and firmly; mentally say a word or a sentence and you see
 Deriva
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that it is possible to say it and hear it as well. So also is the case with
the eyes: you can see mentally by closing the eyes. The perception of
touch and smell are a bit more subtle but nonetheless possible as
mental experiences. For example, you feel a nauseating experience
even after you leave a stinking place and feel the softness of a baby
even after you kiss it. Therefore, we can say that there are subtle
counterparts of these gross organs of perception.

ii. The Internal Instrument of Perception (Antahkaranam)

The organs of perception by themselves cannot perceive an
object/action directly. They are like binoculars of the seer. Perception is
first processed through the mind. That is why, if a seer is not attentive
(i.e., is not mindful), he cannot see an object – it escapes his
perception. The process of perception of the Internal Instrument
(antahkaranam) is tetrastatal according to the Indian psychology:
deliberation as this and that (as mind - ‘manas’), decision of this and
that as so and so (as the intellect – ‘buddhi’), remembering this as that,
so as so (as memory – ‘chittha’), and ego (as I ‘ahamka:ra’ remember,
know, experience, do, etc.). For example, when the eye, as it were,
sees a Holy Tulasi (Indian Basel) plant, or tastes the Holy Zam Zam
water, the mind projects itself through the eye and takes the form of
the Tulasi plant / through the tongue and feels the taste of the water-
at this stage, there is only mere perception/taste. It (Mind)
perceives/tastes, again, as it were, the Tulasi plant / the Zam Zam
water as this or that – at this stage, it only deliberates and is not
sure about what plant it is/what water it is; so it functions as the mind
(manas or deliberating instrument): at this stage, the knowledge is
indeterminate. From analyticity, phenomenal knowledge (by direct
experience or valid information), and memory, it (Intellect) comes to
the conclusion that the object is so and so: a Tulasi plant/Zam Zam
water – at this stage, it decides about the nature of the object after
deliberation and analysis of the object to be such and such, and so
functions as the intellect (buddhi or deciding instrument): at this
stage, the knowledge is determinate. Later on when it sees the same or
a similar plant/water it remembers the past object and superimposes
the knowledge of the past object on the present object and recollects it
as a Tulasi plant / Zam Zam water – at this stage, the knowledge is
mnemonic and the mind functions as a mnemonic instrument or
memory (chittha). Finally, when this knowledge is related to oneself as
‘I know this Tulasi plant or Zam Zam water (I + knowledge of the Tulasi
plant/Zam Zam water)’, it is called the ego (ahamka:ram).

When this knowledge is culturally qualified, it becomes cultural

knowledge: the Tulasi plant/the Zam Zam water becomes the Holy
Tulasi plant for the Hindus/the Holy Zam Zam water for the
Muslims who revere it as so according to its religious significance but to
 Deriva
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others it is just another plant/water. In other words, when the

knowledge of the Tulasi plant/Zam Zam water is received via
religion/culture and related to oneself (ego), it becomes personal,
subjective religious/cultural knowledge. When an individual who is
attached to or identifies with his religion/culture, sees this plant/water,
he thinks of it respectfully owing to his attachment to his religion and
consequently shows respect in his behaviour towards it. At this stage,
when the Holy Tulasi plant/Zam Zam water becomes my/our Holy
Tulasi Plant/Zam Zam water, it finally becomes dispositional
knowledge a:nushangikally. [When someone outside the culture
respects it, one feels proud/happy; shows disrespect to it, one feels
offended because of the attachment of it to oneself. Therefore,
attachment to one’s ego is the root cause of misunderstanding and it is
derived through religion/culture in this case; sometimes, the
misunderstanding may be due to an error in cognition: you mishear a
word and so misunderstand it; or an error in contextual application: you
may wrongly use a word/an utterance which is due to ignorance of its
use but not due to intention. A similar response will also be generated
at other levels such as opinions, ideology, etc.]

This process is captured in the following equations.

(22a) Perception Deliberation Decision Personal

Knowledge
Dispositional Knowledge

(22b) Phenomenal Knowledge Socioculturalspiritual

Knowledge
Personal Knowledge Dispositional Knowledge

iii. Evolution of Cognition

Every individual is endowed with the power of awareness and ‘becoming
aware’, i.e., ‘the power to act’ and ‘acting’. ‘Becoming aware’ is a dynamic
process realized through energy. To explain it more, when awareness
reflects in energy, that energy will transform into ‘becoming aware’, i.e.,
cognition. If that energy is not qualified, it becomes unqualified cognition (or
blank cognition); on the other hand, if that energy (thought energy) is
qualified as this and that to be so and so in such and such a manner, say,
this flower to be a lotus flower in such and such big size and red colour,
that energy will transform into ‘becoming aware of this and that to be so and
so in such and such a manner’, i.e., the cognition of a concept of a big, red
lotus. This cognition can be emergent as when one sees an object or
recollective as one remembers something. Since there is a mutual
superimposition of one on the other, the transformed energy (thought) will
 Deriva
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appear as transformed awareness: in reality, the thought cannot be aware of

itself; awareness illumines the thought. To elaborate further, as the energy
(which is disposition) is, so will be the thought (energy); as the thought is, so
will be the action/reaction. Therefore, disposition(al energy) is the source of
qualifying thinking and further (lingual) action.

We all know that our awareness is basically of three categories in our folk
wisdom: 1. Blank Awareness (just being aware; be awareness as expressed
in such phrases as blank looks – looking without really looking at anything);
2. Qualified Awareness (Intellectual Awareness of ideas, thoughts – both
semiotic and non-semiotic; Emotional Awareness of feelings such as anger,
lust; etc.); and 3. Experiential Awareness (Experience of pleasure or pain
resulting from physical, mental, and lingual action). There is a progressive
addition to awareness: Pure-to-Qualified-to Experiential in an
a:nushangik manner. The point is that Awareness remains as it is but it is
qualified to become qualified or experiential: a man simply sitting (in blank
awareness) sees a beautiful flower blooming and knows that it is beautifully
blooming (by qualified awareness) and gets into a rapture (experiential
awareness). It is for this experience a human being performs action and uses
language as a resource to perform this action and conducts his living.

Graph 1. D: Triaxial Graph of Contextual Actionality: C. Actionality

Quadrant (4) in Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory

Spirituality Ideology Cogneme Concept

Society Participants
II III

Culture Relation
Guna:s Context

I IV

Vasanas Activity

Knowledge Knowledge (lingual)

(D) (P) Contextual
actionality
Actionality

Legend

The Individual Consciousness (soul or the ji:va)

 Deriva
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The Triad (sattva giving knowledge of activity; rajas giving choice of activity by
traits; and tamas giving inertia or materiality of activity by va:sana:s) of Disposition.

Horizontal Line; Vertical Line; Diagonal Line; Horizontal, Vertical, and

Diagonal Axes
I, II, III, and IV the quadrants 1, 2, 3, and 4

In the above graph, I, and III quadrants show how cognition takes place.
When consciousness reflects in the dispositional quadrant (according to his
karma), disposition becomes charged and projects a concept.

iv. Evolution of Action and Lingual Action

All the human beings are genetically endowed with the desire for pleasure
(sukhe:ccha in Sanskrit). From the sensory perception of the world,
phenomenal knowledge is generated in the individual and is stored in
memory. This knowledge impacts on this innate basic desire for pleasure in
the individual and generates different types of secondary desires to fulfill the
basic desire for pleasure through dispositional impulsions to be followed by
dispositional cognition of desire, function, means to the action, and
propositional(semantics) and formal conceptualization of action and its
materialization.

Dispositional Impulsion

Acti
on
Desire Propositional
Meaning
Relation
Function
Part
icipants
Cognition Means: Lingual Action

Conceptualization
Concept
P
aradigm
Form Pattern
S
yntagm
Form

Sentence/Speech Act
 Deriva
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Network 4: Cognition of Lingual Action and Its Materialization

These secondary desires can be broadly classified into physical (anything

related to physical or material planes), mental (anything related to
intellectual, socio-cultural, self-actualization, and emotional planes), and
spiritual (anything related to the knowledge of self, and the why/cause of the
world and life) desires. Lingual desires (such as writing novels, etc.) from a
part of the intellectual branch of mental desires (which consist of intellectual
and emotional desires). Desires trigger triple action (mental, vocal, and
physical) for their fulfillment by experiencing the results of action. When an
individual experiences the results as pleasure (out of success) or pain (out of
failure), it generates likes and dislikes in performing action according to his
state of being in the context of his living. The resultant likes and dislikes of
patterns of action form traits (guna:s) which produce tendencies for such
actions in future. At the same time, actions leave their impressions
(samska:ra:s) in the individual; and tendencies for a pattern of action
together with its impressions form the impressionality of activity or
internalized habit (va:sana) – strong or weak – which impels such actions
without any precedent or antecedent cause in a context; and they get
fulfilled or unfulfilled in a conducive or hostile context. Each experience
creates and enhances knowledge and influences traits, and knowledge
geared by traits controls action. At the same time, va:sana:s impel desires
for whose fulfillment action is performed and ultimately the results of action
are experienced.

Dispositional knowledge is the personal internalized knowledge of the

world around him out there, previous experiences with the interlocutor prior
to the immediate context of discourse and his own traits along with his
habits in the form of va:sana:s (the world in here in his personality) that
react to the contextual use of the proverb; and the whole [knowledge of the
world + (knowledge of) the traits + (knowledge of) impressionalized activity]
can be called personalized worldly knowledge or svabha:vam (there is an
abstract worldly knowledge in terms of principles and practice which is
personalized according to one’s own reception of it – this is individual and
may or may not be similar to others’ knowledge). It is distinct from
phenomenal knowledge, background knowledge, and shared knowledge in
the sense that these types of knowledge do not qualify one’s action like a
black dye changing the colour of the grey hair into black or carbon qualifying
iron to make it non-corrosive steel; dispositional knowledge is coloured
(qualifying) knowledge and directly controls the quality of behavior whereas
other types of knowledge only inform but do not modify behavior: only
dispositional knowledge directs practice and practice increases dispositional
knowledge.

Since dispositional knowledge is qualifying knowledge, it can impact on the

sentential meaning or the sociocultural meaning and produce a new
 Deriva
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meaning, according to one’s own dispositionality, that can cause an

enhanced positive understanding or a misunderstanding or unexpected
reactions because va:sana:s may trigger an automatic reaction (+ or -) by
their superimposition on the text in the context: as the Telugu proverb says,
Like, to a jaundiced man, the whole world appears yellow. Thus, if
dispositional knowledge colours the speaker meaning into a face threatening
meaning, misunderstanding springs forth automatically from this
dispositional reaction. Consequently, the dynamic structure of discourse also
will be changed – discourse is the means of the coordination-of- coordination-
of-action to achieve the goal of experiencing the results of dispositional,
contextual action. Let us see how it works in real life situations.

D.2.1. Impoliteness by Misunderstanding of the Proverb

Misunderstanding is understanding the intended meaning
otherwise. All discourse is a means to an end. Language is used to
coordinate the coordination of action; and this coordination is dispositional
and constructs dispositional reality and its consequent experience. Language
in this sense is used for the collective construction of individual dispositional
realities. In this process, personalized knowledge plays a crucial role in the
coordination of action and when there is dissonance in the communication of
the intended meaning, i.e., what is intended is not comprehended but it is
understood otherwise, misunderstanding occurs. When the intended
meaning is misunderstood, it may lead to: 1. an erroneous comprehension of
the contextual action positively or negatively; and/or 2. implicate
impoliteness in the contextual action. In the use of proverbs, both the
possibilities are observed.

2.1.1. Erroneous Comprehension of the Proverb

Proverbs in isolation as well as in context can be misunderstood with far
reaching implications in the life of individuals. Proverbs are generally taken
as guidelines for living successfully and this function of social-practice
guidance, if misunderstood, becomes pragmatically counter-productive.

a. One of my friends Mr. Sri Ramaligeswara Sastri (appx. 60 + years old; a

retired college Lecturer in English) told me that he misunderstood the
meaning of the proverb Speech is silver but silence is golden as “It is better
to keep quiet than to talk” and observed this practice of keeping quiet (even
when there is a necessity to talk) for decades in his youth and middle age.
Later on, he changed his talking behaviour to talk judiciously.

[Another man who practiced the proverbial practice Hit first and talk next
went to the court first and committed suicide last – He did not know this
English proverb but followed this proverbial practice.
 Deriva
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Here is a joke: A poor man who married very early because he heard the
proverb Strike while the iron is hot was struck by his wife (for money) till he
became old and then by his children till he became cold.

I heard another joke about a man who heard the proverb One at a time
delayed having children until he settled down and in the meantime his wife
heard another proverb poruginti pullaku:ra ruchi ‘the neighbours’s sour
curry is tasty’ and got a child from his neighbour.]

b. When I was in Maiduguri, Nigeria, one of my friends Balami, used a Bura

proverb Ta:kur nata matiha ‘(when you are in a hurry) Tie your horse to a
lump of (elephant) grass’. Here is the exchange reproduced by recollection.

(23) A (Myself): I want to conduct the tree-planting campaign in

Kano next
week, and then …the Molai Leprosy Rehabilitation
Visit, and
establish the Kanuri Folklore Society soon.
B (Balami): Buba… Ta:kur nata ma:tiha.
Buba (Bhuvaneswar)… Horse tie to a lump of
grass
‘Buba… (when you are in a hurry,) tie your horse
to a lump of
(elephant) grass’
You are leaving Nigeria soon and… You want to
do all these
things.
[The implicature is that I should not get involved in all these
extra-curricular
social welfare activities but care more for my personal career,
which I never
really bothered about.]

I remember this proverb and sometimes think about it when I want to do

something new or more and get discouraged. But it did not really affect my
way of life of doing many things at a place until now. But I feel about it and
unconsciously regret not following it. This is a reverse affect of not
understanding proverbs properly and following them. May be I will be more
cautious in future and follow this proverb.

2.1.2. Misunderstanding Leading to Impoliteness

a. Wrong Use and Misunderstanding

Sometimes we use proverbs without understanding their implications. In
other words, there is an intentional (cultural) misunderstanding of the
 Deriva
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unintentional (dispositional) implicature of the speaker’s intentionality. To

explain it further, the speaker uses a proverb, say, without knowing its
pragmatic constraints: he lacks the knowledge of application; he intends Iα (I
= Intention) but the proverb generates not Iα but Iβ according the culturally
shared pragmatic constraints. Consequently, an unintentional implicature will
be endowed onto the speech act of the proverb.

(24) Iα Iβ U.I. (Unintentional Implicature)

If the speaker B knows from his background knowledge and dispositional

knowledge of the speaker A that he is friendly and has not used the proverb
correctly, he will derive a modified implicature to that effect from the U.I. As
a result, he will not apply CP because the quality maxim is out of scope:
What he means through the utterance is not what he means through his
intention. This implicature is intuitional and subjective but it can be
constructed from the general mood of the discourse over a long stretch of
interaction, or repairs and the previous experience with the speaker.
However, if the hearer does not apply this consideration (owing to his own
dispositionality), a misunderstanding erupts leading to a conflict. Even in
other actions, dispositional reactions can become dangerous and lead to
violent clashes.

In (25a), there is a violation of the pragmatic constraints of status and age

between A (above 65 and a school teacher; middle class) and B (above 50
and a university lecturer; upper middle class) and therefore a potential case
for misunderstanding; when C pointed out in his turn that by using the
proverb, A has made him a donkey to which he made a repair by saying that
he (A) made himself a donkey and so he did not mean any offence. [C felt
that his positive face is threatened.] Here, first, the meaning is culturally
calculated as impolite through linguistic interpretation; second, it is
dispositionally determined to be not so by interpersonal interpretation; third,
it is contextually resolved as a misapplication of the proverb, but not an
intentional act of impoliteness, by pragmatic interpretation; and finally, it is
experientially reconciled through an interpretation by personality traits.

(25a) A: E:do: ku:se: ga:didochhi me:se: ga:didani cherichindani,

something braying donkey having come, grazing donkey spoiled
that
me:re:do: chaduvukunto:nte: ne:nochchi chedagodutunna:ni
anuko:kandi.
You are something reading I having come spoiling that think not
sirs
‘Sirs, don’t think that like a braying donkey spoiling a grazing
donkey I have
 Deriva
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disturbed you when you are reading something (about spiritual

matters –
which he heard)’
B: (B is not offended.)
E:vi: le:dandi … randi... (Laughs)… e:do: chaduvukuntunna:m.
ante:.
anything not there sir…come,sir… (Laughs)… Something…reading
we. That’s
all.
‘Nothing much, sir. Come, sir. (Laughs). We are reading
something. That’s all’
C: Ante: me:mu gadidato: sama:namannama:ta.
That means we donkey with equal saying like
‘That means that we are equal to a donkey’.
A: (Taken aback and embarrsassed).
Abbe:! Alla anuko:kan di.
Oh! Like that think not sir
Ne:nu: gadidakinda lekke: ayyanu kada:
I also donkey under counted, not!
A: (Looking at C)
Na:ku cha:laka:langa Ga:yathri mudralu ne:rchuko:valani undi.
Me to long time for ga:yathri postures learn to that is
Mi:ku telusani Subrahmanyam cheppa:du. ka:stha chebuduru.
You to known that Subrahmanyam told. Small tell (please)
C: Ayyo. Tappakunda:nandi. Mi:ku kha:liga: unnappudu cheppandi.
Ayyo. Failing not sir. You to leisure is then tell sir

(25b) is an open reprimand and there is no misunderstanding.

(25b) A: e: gu a paite: a: guato:i

(Surya Kamala Devi) what cloth falling if that cloth with
tui te:sta: e: ii ?
clean do will what ‘why are you cleaning with any
cloth?’
ai te:jji tuutukune: gualu
those(are) hand cleaning cloth s
[A]2
B (Suryavathi): No reply. She keeps quiet
[B]1
C (Kantham an i): anduke: anna:ru,
because of that said (plural)
ja:bra:siki panekkua lo:bikkartekkuani
Untidy person to work more miser to expenditure more that [C]1
 Deriva
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‘That is why they said that for an untidy person, work is more (and)
for a miser, expenditure (is) more’.

Here, the application of the proverb will become appropriate if only we

construct the implicature I that by using cloths for cleaning hands to mop the
floor will cause unnecessary extra work of getting new pieces of cloths for
cleaning hands again. Otherwise, the proverb appears to be inappropriate in
this context. Here, the proverb is construed by the speaker from her
background of behaviour, namely, doing things with meticulous care and
order.

Another example of a reprimand that can occur in a dialoguic exchange is given

in (20c) as follows:

(25c) A (Kanthamani): ginnelu ubraga: to:u.

vessels neatly clean
‘Clean the vessels neatly’.
B (Suryavathi): ne:nu subraga: to:aam le:da:ni
I neatly cleaning not, madam
‘Am I not cleaning the vessels neatly, madam’?
[B]1
A: diguruga: ununna:ji [A]2
greasy are (they)
B: ai ni: ani.
they(are) water, madam
[B] 2
………………………………. (gap of one second appx.)
[B]3

A: ma:alne:rtina kukkanu e:aku

pampite:
words learned dog ac.case hunting to sent if

usku: ane: usku: andia.

usku said if usku said that [A]3

‘If (one) sent a conversationally skilled dog for hunting, if

said, “usku (a cry for hunting)”, it said, “usku’, (I
understand) that.”

or
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

"(I understand) that, if one sent a conversationally skilled

dog for hunting, (and) if (one) said, “usku”, it replied back,
‘usku’.”

alla: undi ni: ja:pa:ram

like that is your behaviour
‘Like that is your behaviour.’
[A]4

This proverb is a dialoguic [adjective: dialogue + ic) proverb and the

participants in the conversation are a person and a dog. This dialoguic
proverb is further embedded in a dialoguic conversational exchange in which
two women participated in a house.

The difference between a monologuic proverb and a dialoguic exchange

proverb lies in the source of the Proverbial Base (PB). In the former,
generally, the speaker’s contextual action itself provides the proverbial base
while in the latter, another speaker’s contextual action provides the
proverbial base.

In (26) given below, there is also a violation of the pragmatic constraints of

status and age between A (above 40 and a cook; middle class) and B (above
75 and a very orthodox Brahman housewife; from rich parents but now upper
middle class) and therefore a potential case for misunderstanding. However,
the misunderstanding was not contextually reconciled and lead to a quarrel
between A and B.

(26) A: bayat + unnappudu pani + lo:ki rakandi.

outside being work into don’t come madam
“When you are in menses, don’t come for work“

B: cheppe:vi Sri:ranga ni:tulu du:re:vi

those being told Sri:ranga morals those being entered
dommara gudiselu.
Dommara huts
“Those being told are Srirangam morals, those being got

into dommar huts“

[+ indicates laison or Sandhi of the two words]

A is traditional and in their households, women are not allowed to touch the
inmates if they are in menses and she is very serious about keeping off from
domestic work those in menses. Such practice is cultural and it is being
abandoned by many now-a-days. B’s reply violates PP at the approbation and
agreement maxim levels. It is so because of the age difference; social status
 Deriva
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difference; and the offensive meaning attached to the phrase “dommara

huts”: traditional people (in the olden days) do not go to the houses of the
Dommara caste people who are low in their social hierarchy. The use of the
proverb sparked off a row between them.

b. Violation of Social Distance

When a proverb belonging to one level of social distance is used in another
level, it will misfire and leads to misunderstanding. For example, when a
proverb is used between two persons where the distance is more, it will
cause misunderstanding if it does not belong to that level: a taboo proverb
used between two people, one socially at a great distance from the user, will
be impolite and causes embarrassment and even anger. In the Yoruba/Igbo
Society, juniors refrain from using proverbs in front of elders. Offensive
proverbs are also not used between unequal interlocutors.

A few examples are given below under the four broad categories of social
distance given in Bhuvaneswar (1999).

6 Set: Literary Proverbs

7 Set: Colloquial Proverbs

8 Set: Slang Proverbs

9 Set: Taboo Proverbs

1. The shortest way to a man’s heart is through his balls.
2. A stiff prick knows no conscience.
3. Unable to fuck, (one) said that the cunt is crooked. (Telugu Proverb)
4. If the cat is blind, the rat showed its crotch. (Telugu Proverb)
5. Fucking less; noise more. (Telugu Proverb)
6.
 Deriva
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10 Set: Intra-Cultural Proverbs

a. Religious Proverbs
1. The Bible is printed in 610 different languages and read in none.
2. The nearer the church, the farther from God.
3. Many bring their clothes to church rather than themselves.
4. All are not saints that go to the church.
5. God heals but the doctor takes the fee.
6. God help the rich for the poor can beg.

b. Ethnic Proverbs
1. The only good nigger is a dead nigger.
2. Hit’s a mighty deaf nigger dat don’t hear de dinner ho’n.
3. Naught’s is a naught and figger’s a figger – all for de white man and none
for de
nigger.
4. Soap and water will not make a Negro’s face white.
5. A Jew can make a living by selling shoe strings.
6. An Indian scalps his enemies, while a white man skins his friends.
7. The only good Indian is a dead Indian.

11 Set: Inter-Cultural Proverbs

These proverbs are pragmatically constrained in terms of social distance and

solidarity.

(27) Linguistic Impoliteness – Cultural Impoliteness – Dispositional

Impoliteness
 Deriva
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D.3. Derivation of Meaning through Ka:rmatics

From the above discussion, we understand that language is used to
communicate, and interpret phenomenal activity to coordinate the
coordination of action and experience its results in the context of its
performance – non-phenomenal activity can only be indexed but not
communicated or interpreted or created by language. As already discussed
earlier, action is undertaken to fulfill one’s desires which are further impelled
by svabha:vam (disposition).

From this perspective, language, as one type of action, is generated,

specified, directed, and materialized by disposition – in other words,
language is holistically dispositional action and atomically formal, or
functional, or cognitive action in a part-whole relation. However, in KLT, the
whole is not only a sum of the parts, not only greater than the sum of the
parts, but also beyond the sum of the parts. Furthermore, its meaning is also
derived dispositionally (ka:rmikally) – which is (w)holistic in derivation. In a
(w)holistic relation, the whole is equal to, greater than and even beyond the
sum of the parts in an I-I-I star network relation according to the dispositional
choice of the interlocutor.

In such a relation, there is a centre of the star and it is the one that glows
(i.e., means (verb) by selective awareness) by taking all the parts together
as individual twinkles (sum of the parts), or some of the parts only as the
twinkles in a gestalt relation (greater than the sum of the parts), or by itself
going beyond the parts (beyond the sum of the parts): for example, in the
derivation of meaning in conversation, in a straightforward case of
implicature, it is the sum of the parts; in an ellipted utterantial implicature, it
is greater than the sum of the parts; and in a metaphorical implicature or
indirect speech acts, it is beyond the sum of the parts. In a gestalt relation,
the whole is greater than the sum of the parts; whereas in a holistic relation,
the whole is only a sum of the parts; and in an atomic relation, the whole is
interpreted by the part and so equated to the whole by this relation.

In other words, the meaning is either formally (semantically or formally in

isolation), or functionally (in use in a context or pragmatically), or cognitively
(mentally or psycholinguistically) derived which is atomic and then equated
to the whole as if it were the whole – like the three mythical blind men
describing an elephant as like a tail, like a leg, and like the trunk which they
have individually touched in isolation; or dispositionally (ka:rmikally) derived
which is wholistic – like the zoologist who examines the whole anatomy of
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

the elephant and its evolution in a formal-functional- ecological matrix of

space, time and matter. A wholistic interpretation is selectively open-ended,
all inclusive and the most comprehensive in contrast with the atomic
interpretation which is close-ended, exclusive and inadequate.
Meaning in semantics and pragmatics is exclusive in an a:nushangik
process – pragmatics ultimately excludes semantics and vice versa; whereas
meaning in ka:rmik linguistics is inclusive of all in an a:nushangik manner –
pragmatics includes semantics, and ka:rmatics includes pragmatics and
semantics. Karmatics is not only a sum of semantics and pragmatics but also
(at the same time) greater than and beyond them. In ka:rmatics, the
sentence meaning embodies the contextual sentence meaning (consisting of
the socioculturalspiritual, contextual, and sentence meanings) which
embodies the experiential meaning as an emergent meaning (arising out of
the dispositional, cognitive, socioculturalspiritual, contextual actional, and
lingual actional meanings in a single I-I-I cognemic unit).
(1) Experiential Meaning (Ka:rmik Meaning)
Contextual Sentence Meaning (Pragmatic Meaning)
Sentence Meaning (Semantic Meaning)
In semantics, meaning is derived in a code model of communication: the
code is supreme and it does not take the functional context into
consideration; in Gricean pragmatics, meaning is derived by formal
implicatures in an inferential model of communication: inference is supreme
and it does not take into consideration the socioculturalspiritual and
dispositional dimensions into consideration in the derivation of meaning;
Gricean pragmatics is based on the cooperative principle and the politeness
principle – on the assumption that all implicatures in conversation take place
by following these principles of cooperation and politeness. But in real life
situations, they may or may not be followed. One or more in a two party or
multiparty conversation may be non-cooperative by indifference and/or
hostility towards each other or one another and disrupt the path of
cooperative conversation. In such cases, not only the meaning but also the
structure of discourse can only be derived dispositionally and not otherwise:
in the absence of rational behaviour, there is still irrational lingual behaviour
- a misnomer, in ka:rmatics, since all behaviour is dispositional - which has to
be accounted for, only by recourse to disposition. Therefore, we have two
situations, cooperative and non-cooperative behaviour, and both of them
have to be accounted for to get a comprehensive description. By taking
recourse to disposition, we can include both of them as options in behaviour
and thus provide a comprehensive account.

It is captured in a network as shown below once again.

CP

Ka:rmik Principle DP
Ignore
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

NCP
Modify
Challenge

Reject
Network 3. The (Ka:rmik) Disposition Principle

In a similar way, in interactional sociolinguistics, ethnography of

communication, and conversational analysis, meaning is derived in an
interactional model of communication: “utterances contextualize and are
contextualized by one another” (Schiffrin 1994: 407). However, the
supremacy of disposition is not taken into account in these models. For
example, in the ethnography of communication, utterances are generated
and gain meaning within a sociocultural framework only. Therefore, it has to
be modified to accommodate this new dimension of deriving meaning
through the ka:rmik process of experiencing the results of action in an
experiential model of communication.

In an experiential model of communication, the code, the inferential process,

the socioculturalspiritual meaning, and the contextualization of the code
meaning through the inferential, socioculturalspiritual interpretation are all
interconnected-interrelated-interdependent in a unified network to produce
the cogneme of meaning. In this experiential model of communication,
intersubjectivity is transformed into a dynamic dispositional co-construction
of inter-experientiality of the contextual action. What is aimed at is
experientiality, what is achieved is experientiality, and what is used as a
means is language ± the other non-linguistic means.

An illustration is given below by taking (21a).

(21a) A (Me): It is good that we have come this way.

B (Robin Fawcett): Every cloud has a silver lining.
A: Oh, you used a proverb!
B: Because of you.

The derivation of meaning of the proverb by A is made dispositionally and

the lingual reaction is also made dispositionally. However, the meaning is
derived in an I-I-I manner as follows:

1. The utterance “Every cloud has a silver lining” is first recognized as a

token of
that proverb by memory of the proverb since A is familiar with it and
remembers
it, and further able to recall it to be so. [Had he not known this to be a
proverb, he will follow a different process of deriving the meaning.] That it is
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

a proverb is its cognized (cognitive) meaning; if he does not know it as a

proverb, then that it is a sentence will become its cognitive meaning.

2. Since he knew it as a proverb, he has taken the sentential meaning which

is the referential meaning and superimposed the socioculturalspiritual
meaning of the proverb on it and derived the socioculturalspiritual meaning
which is the prototypical meaning. Thus, the utterance carries with it both
the sentence meaning and the socioculturalspiritual meaning of the proverb
at the same time; what the speaker does is first he takes the sentence
meaning into consideration and recognizes the utterance as a proverb and
then – after he recognizes it as a proverb – he leaves the sentence meaning
and takes the socioculturalspiritual meaning (that in every mishap, there is
an advantage) into consideration in an a:nushangik manner as captured in
the following equation:
(27) Sentence (Referential) Meaning
Socioculturalspiritual (Prototypical) Meaning [+ Referential
Meaning]
Here, the socioculturalspiritual meaning as the prototypical meaning is the
cognitive meaning.

3. The proverb is contextualized and then its contextual meaning is cognized

as that the speaker B supports the assertion of A by a follow up move with a
proverb: that missing the way (cloud) gave us the advantage of seeing the
Kutub Shahi Tombs (silver lining). This meaning is derived by categorizing
the contextual action under the prototypical action represented by the
proverb by the socioculturalspiritual convention. Therefore, the sentence
(referential) meaning apparently transformed into the socioculturalspiritual
(prototypical) meaning and again transformed into the contextual meaning.
Thus, the utterance carries with it the sentence meaning, the
socioculturalspiritual meaning, and the contextual meaning of the proverb at
the same time; what the speaker does is first, he takes the sentence
meaning into consideration and recognizes the utterance as a proverb and
second – after he recognizes it as a proverb – he leaves the sentence
meaning and takes the socioculturalspiritual meaning (that in every mishap,
there is an advantage) into consideration in an a:nushangik manner, and
then extends the prototypical meaning to derive the contextual meaning by
superimposition in the same a:nushangik manner as captured in the
following equation:
(28) Sentence (Referential) Meaning
Socioculturalspiritual (Prototypical) Meaning [+ Referential
Meaning]
Contextual Meaning [Prototypical Meaning + Referential Meaning]
Here, the sentence meaning as the prototypical meaning as the contextual
meaning is the cognitive meaning.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

4. Finally, from the contextual meaning, the experiential meaning is derived

dispositionally: that B supported what he felt, and in doing so he used a
proverb – which he said that he does not usually do – and pleased A by
showing solidarity or empathy. By deriving meaning like that and to be so,
he felt happy and superimposed the happiness on that meaning. Thus,
dispositional meaning leads to the experience of (meaning) happiness
over that contextual meaning and so it finally becomes ka:rmik meaning.

To explain it more, language is experiential action which is ka:rmik action

realized in its hierarchical, a:nushangik evolution as dispositional-cognitive-
socioculturalspiritual-contextual actional-lingual action. In that sense,
discourse is Experiential-Interactional-Contextual-Utterantial-Sentential
coordination of coordination of action. What is more, karma (via
disposition) rules supreme and decides the choice of interpretation
by highlighting (giving prominence to) any one or more or all means
of calculation of meaning in a star network.

To reiterate it further, first, disposition generates the lingual action and so it

becomes dispositional lingual action; second, it is contextually generated
and so it becomes dispositional contextual action; third, the dispositional
action is patterned and specified to be so and so in such and such a manner
in such and such a context and becomes dispositional, socioculturalspiritual,
contextual, lingual action; fourth, when this dispositional sociocultural lingual
action is generated, specified, directed, and materialized in a context for the
fulfilment of a desire and its consequent experience, it becomes experiential,
dispositional, socioculturalspiritual, contextual, lingual action: in short
ka:rmik lingual action.

(29) a. Disposition Lingual Action Dispositional

Lingual Action

b. Dispositional Lingual Action Context Dispositional

Contextual Action

c. [Pattern + Specification] Dispositional Contextual

Action
Dispositional, Socioculturalspiritual, Contextual, Lingual action

d. Experience Dispositional, Socioculturalspiritual, Contextual,

Lingual action

Experiential, Dispositional, Socioculturalspiritual, Contextual,

Lingual action
(= Ka:rmik Lingual Action)
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

An interesting feature in the performance of lingual action is that each type

of action is dispositionally qualified and hence dispositionally chosen. For
example, in the PRE- socioculturalspiritual stage of a community, action is
performed as dispositional action. However, as a community develops its
own culture, this dispositional action becomes dispositional,
socioculturalspiritual action. Nonetheless, since it is chosen by disposition,
the disposition of an individual has the power to follow, modify, or
violate the cultural norm and perform his action. When there is a
dispositional flux (which is not erratic but gradual evolutionary from an
individual as well as collective perspective), it qualifies the new activities in
living systems as dissipative structures and sets in a bifurcation process
which gradually separates the emergent system from the original system.
That is why we get variations in social behaviour. Historically (diachronically)
any deviation occurs by only CEV, PEV, and CNV of the principles in the
Universal Science of Action as reflected (like the sun in a lake) in the
Universal Science of Lingual Action and manipulated according to the
dispositional choices. This principle is applicable across all types of action
and hence it is paramount in the formation, comprehension, transmission,
and retention of all types of lingual action.

Another significant point in the derivation of meaning is the Spherical

Processing by Radiation Technique in a gradual evolution
perspective: first, meaning is processed in a linear model: form –to-
function-to-context-to-implicature-meaning; second, meaning is processed in
a parallel model: form; function; context; implicature; and meaning; third,
meaning is processed in a radial model by I-I-I technique in a star network.
In this model, disposition rules supreme and chooses its options of deriving
meaning either formally, or functionally, or cognitively, or dispositionally, or
ka:rmikally; or some of them joined together selectively; or all of them joined
together collectively by a dispositional choice. That is why, there are
misunderstandings in communication owing to the choice in the
multidimensional networking of meaning.

Let us capture this distinction more vividly through the following equations.

a. Sentence Meaning [(S)M]

(30) (S)M = W₁ + W₂ + W₃ + .... Wn

[Sentence Meaning ((S)M) =
a sum of the meanings of the individual words (W) in their concatenated
form]
This is the semantic meaning (literal or referential meaning).

b. Contextual Sentence Meaning [(CSCS)M]

(31) a. (S)M = (CSCS) M
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

[Sentence Meaning ((S)M) = the Contextualized Socioculturalspiritual

Meaning (CSCS)M]

This is the meaning of the linguistic utterance in its socialized context. Here,
the soicocultural meaning is superimposed on the utterance and the
sentence meaning is apparently transformed into the sociocultural meaning.
Here, the implicature should be drawn through the sociocultural meaning
rather than the mere linguistic meaning in a context by implicature. The
utterance is the substratum and the sociocultural meaning is the
superimposition by vivartam.

(31) b. (S)M = (S)M = W₁ + W₂ + W₃ + .... Wn (CSCS) M by

c. Dispositional Meaning [(D)M]

(32) a. (S) M = (CSCS) M = DM
[Sentence Meaning = the Contextualized Socioculturalspiritual Meaning
= Dispositional Meaning]

This is the meaning of the linguistic utterance in its linguistically,

socioculturalspiritually dispositionalized context. Here, the dispositional
meaning as the soicocultural meaning is superimposed on the utterance, and
the sentence meaning is apparently transformed into the dispositional
meaning. Here, the implicature should be drawn through the dispositional
meaning rather than the sociocultural or linguistic meaning. The utterance is
the substratum and the dispositional meaning is the superimposition by
vivartam.

(32) b. (S)M = W₁ + W₂ + W₃ + .... Wn (CSCS) M DM by

d. Experiential (Ka:rmik) Meaning [(E(K))M]

(33) (S)M (CSCS) M DM E(K)M
[ I-I-I Network Node]

This is the meaning of the linguistic utterance in its linguistically,

socioculturalspiritually, dispositionally, experientialized I-I-I star network.
Here, the dispositional meaning as the experientialized meaning is
superimposed on the utterance, and the sentence meaning is apparently
transformed into the experiential meaning. Here, the implicature should be
drawn through the experiential meaning rather than the dispositional, or
sociocultural or linguistic meaning. The utterance is the substratum and the
experiential meaning is the superimposition by vivartam.

The following principles are proposed to initiate further research in this

direction.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

The Ka:rmik Law

Introduction
According to the Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory, the theory of language should be
derived from a theory of living which is essentially a theory of experiential
action. That language should be motivated from a theory of experiential
action can be inferentially proved from the cause-from-effect reasoning
approach. We all know that:

1. We exist in a birth-survival-growth-transformation-decay-death continuum

in a spatio-temporal-material changing context from generation to
generation as physically-mentally-spiritually embodied beings. This is a fact
and is the first piece of empirical evidence about us.

2. As we exist, we perform action and experience the results of action

as pleasure and pain, or sometimes merely witness the action and its results
in detachment. This is a fact and is the second piece of empirical evidence
about us.

3. We choose the type of action that we want to perform and its choice is
controlled by our likes and dislikes which fashion out our response bias
towards a choice. For example, my response bias towards vegetarianism is
controlled by my liking for vegetable food and disliking for meat products;
and this response bias produces my choice of action, namely, eating
vegetarian food. Furthermore, my dislike for meat products is created by my
personal trait for non-violence and to avoid killing as far as it is possible, and
not for ecological imbalance against the laws of Nature: human beings are
biologically not suitable for meat eating (e.g., their teeth, their digestive
system are not fit for meat consumption). Therefore, there is a dispositional
basis that produces a dispositional bias which controls my response bias
towards the choice of an action. This can be captured in the following
equation of Choice of Action Principle. The same type of logic can be equally
applied to non-vegetarians from their own point of view.
(34) Disposition Dispositional Bias Response Bias
Choice Action
This is a fact and is the third piece of empirical evidence about us.

[Such type of choice of action is generally motivated by recourse to culture

and tradition in sociolinguistics. However, on a close examination, we find
that it need not necessarily be culture bound and hence such motivation
suffers from the defect of hasty generalization: if it were solely due to
culture, then there should not be any non-conformity within a culture, for
example, some belonging to my culture (Hindu Brahman sect) violate this
norm and eat non-vegetarian food; in the case of linguistic habits also we
see such divergences – some of the members of my culture do not aspirate
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

the voiced bilabial plosive uniformly. In fact, culture is an offshoot of

disposition – as dispositionally patterned behaviour – and can be overruled
by disposition: disposition decides cultural choices and not vice versa.
Therefore, it is motivated through disposition which is the highest cause at
the human level (karma is considered to be the ultimate cause because of
the variability in disposition among human beings and groups.)]

4.a. We know that we get desires and we exert ourselves and perform action
in order to fulfil our desires. When our desires are fulfilled, we feel happy,
and when they are not, we feel unhappy. But all of us want happiness only,
and therefore, we try to fulfil our particular desires to get happiness only.
Again, when a desire is not fulfilled and gives us unhappiness, or we find out
that such desires lead to unhappy experiences, we try to resist from fulfilling
such desires, and very often successfully resolve them. In other words, we
get desires, and fulfil them for the sake of experiencing happiness (called
sukheccha ‘Desire for Pleasure’ in Sanskrit).
(35) Sukhe:ccha Desire Effort Action Result
Experience
This is a fact and is the fourth piece of empirical evidence about us.

b. What is more, the desire for pleasure as well as the desires for other
objects, actions, and states of being are impelled by our disposition. For
example, the personality trait for serving sick people is impelled by
sympathy for the sick people, which is a quality in disposition. This trait
further produces the desire to become a doctor and an effort is consequently
made to become a doctor. To put it differently, Disposition is the cause of
desires; again the same disposition specifies, directs, and materializes the
effort, action, and experience of action. For example, a person may be
impelled to read very hard (effort) and apply for admission (sub-action) in a
famous university and experience the result (pleasure if successful; pain, if
not), or may read normally and try to get admission in an ordinary university
according to one’s dispositional bias triggered from his specific disposition.
Here, the Dispositional Impulsion (that I) to Desire (D) to Experience (E)
the Result (R) as Pleasure (PL) is produced from a top-down /bottom-up
processes in the Vertical Axis of the Dispositional Plane of the Ka:rmik
Process; in a similar way, the Dispositional impulsion leading to the
manifestation of action is processed in the Horizontal Axis of the Actional
Plane of the Ka:rmik Process; and finally the experience of the results of
action is processed in the Diagonal Axis of the Experiential Plane of the
Ka:rmik Process.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Dispositional Impulsion (I)

Desire (D)

Disposition Experience (E)

Result of Action (R)

Pleasure (PL)

Fig. 1 . The Vertical Axis of the Dispositional Plane of the Ka:rmik

Process:
Top – Down Process of Action
In the case of a reaction, a bottom-up processing will take place. Here, the
action is first perceived, then interpreted to produce the dispositional
reaction. From this dispositional reaction, the ka:rmik actor experiences
pain/pleasure/witnessing as he is dispositionally inclined towards the
perceived action.
The process is captured in the following figure.
Pleasure or Pain or Witnessing
Experience

Disposition Reaction

Interpretation

Perception

Fig. 2. The Vertical Axis of the Dispositional Plane of the Ka:rmik

Process:
Bottom-Up Process of Reaction
However, when the action is manifested, it is done so in the horizontal axis
of the Actional Plane.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

(36) Disposition Effort Process / Concept Pattern

Form
Fig. . The Horizontal Axis of the Actional Plane of the Ka:rmik
Process:
Linear (Beginning – Middle – End) Process
Finally, when the results of action are experienced, they are experienced
radially – all around.
Disposition Action

Experience

Result
Fig. 3 . The Diagonal Axes of the Experiential Plane of the Ka:rmik
Process:
Radial Process

Therefore, disposition is throughout the cause for generating desires, or

efforts, or actions, or experiences. However, the results of actions are not
decided by his disposition in the sense that they are controlled by external
forces in the context. Nonetheless, the results are due to his dispositional
effort in that particular context in that particular way. To explain further, a
lame man cannot dance without legs. If he gets a desire to do ballet, he is
bound to fail. This failure is contextually decided but dispositionally caused:
he should not desire to dance which he did out of his dispositional bias: As
you are, so you think; as you think, so you act; as you act, so you reap the
result; as you reap the result, so you experience. Hence, we can say that
disposition generates, specifies, directs, and materializes the desire, effort,
action, result, and experience of action in a cyclic process:
(37) Disposition Desire Effort Action Result
Experience

This is a fact and is the fifth piece of empirical evidence about us.

c. If we look at our lives, we observe that right from the first cry immediately
after birth to the last gasp of breath immediately before death, we
ceaselessly perform one act or the other to fulfil our desires generated,
specified, directed, and materialized by our disposition in a context through
the material means of our environment. In other words, we lead our lives to
simply fulfil our desires and experience the results of our actions by
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

performing all kinds of actions. Here, the experience of action and its
results is the basic and ultimate cause for performing action; otherwise,
there is no need for all this activity. Hence, it is reasonable to say that living
is a matter of existing for experiencing the results of our actions performed
to fulfil our desires.
(38) Living = [Desires Efforts Actions Results
] Experiences
This is a fact and is the sixth piece of empirical evidence about us.
d. This has a serious implication for a theory of language since language is
one type of action human beings perform throughout their lives. What is
more, language is primarily used as a means to create, communicate,
interpret and coordinate the coordination of action. As such, it is at the
centre of all human activity and is used fundamentally as a means for
experience of action, and not otherwise. Therefore, it is too naive and
simplistic to consider language only as mental action (as in the Chomskyan
Formal Linguistic paradigm), or social action (as in the Hallidayan Functional
Linguistic paradigm), or cognitive action (as in the Cognitive Linguistic
paradigm) but more empirical and scientific to consider it as experiential
action (i.e., action for creating experience, but not the action of
experiencing) as postulated in the Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory of Bhuvaneswar:
language is used as a resource for the construction of ka:rmik reality (i.e.,
experiential reality).
(39) Living = [Desires Efforts language
Actions Results]
Experiences
This is a fact and is the seventh piece of empirical evidence about us.

e. When we look at language from this perspective, linguistic meaning must

and should be primarily experiential meaning and not otherwise. That is
why in Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory, linguistic meaning is ultimately derived as
experiential meaning via sentence meaning (in isolation), sentence meaning
(in context), sentence meaning (in culture), sentence meaning (as cognized
through socioculturalspiritual contextual action), and sentence meaning
(dispositionally). Experiential meaning finally becomes the ka:rmik meaning.
(40) Sentence Meaning = [Sentence Meaning in (Disposition
Cognition
Socioculturalspirituality Context Isolation]
Experiential Meaning Ka:rmik Meaning
This is a fact and is the eighth piece of empirical evidence about us.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

5. In such a view, human beings perform only and only three types of action
in their broadest sense. In a bottom-up process (ascending order), they are:
1. Physical Action; 2. Mental Action; and 3. Spiritual Action.

Physical action can be further sub-divided into two classes: a. +Vocal and
b. –Vocal. + Vocal action is the vocal organ action which is used to produce
lingual action in collaboration with mental action organs.

Mental action can be further sub-divided into three classes: a. Intellectual;

b. Emotional; and c. Experiential. Intellectual action is associated with the
action of thinking organs: a. mind (called manas in Sanskrit) which
deliberates on phenomenal activity as this and that (indeterminate
awareness which typifies a phenomenon, say, as an object), as so and so
(determinate awareness which classifies by partially qualifying the
phenomenon, say, as a horse), and such and such (detailed awareness
which elaborately qualifies a phenomenon, say, the object horse as having
a body with four legs, mane, hooves, etc.); and b. intellect (called buddhi in
Sanskrit) which decides what is deliberated to be this or that (that the
phenomenon deliberated is indeed an object), as so or so (that the
phenomenon is indeed a horse) , and such or such (that the phenomenon
deliberated is the object horse with a body with four legs, mane, hooves,
etc.); the former performs the deliberating function and the latter the
deciding as well as the choosing function (decision and choice). The result of
thinking is thoughts, ideas, and concepts.

Emotional action is associated with the action of feeling organs: a. the

heart (not the biological heart but the psychological one called hrdayam in
Sanskrit) which feels what is thought in terms of emotions such as anger,
greed, vanity, envy, lust, and desire which are studied elaborately as 9
emotions with 31 attendant sub-emotions in Bharatha’s Na:tya Shastram;
and b. the mind which perceives these emotions.

Experiential action is associated with the action of experiential organs: a.

the ego which experiences the action (attendant with its cause, process, and
effect (product)), and its result as pleasure or pain or both – this is due to the
attribution of agency to itself; alternatively, it merely witnesses the action
without being affected by the action and its result - this is due to the
attribution of non-agency to itself in association with b. hrdayam; c. buddhi;
d. manas; and e. chittham (memory) which construct the experience of
action, and its results through their respective functions. In fact, it is the
same internal organ (antahkaranam in Sanskrit) which functions as mind that
functions as intellect; and also as heart; and also as memory and generates
the experience as ego. All of them are indicated by a single term mind in
English: it is the mind that thinks, decides, feels, remembers, and
experiences. These components can be captured in the following network.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Spiritual Action is not really any action per se. It is related to the
Consciousness in a human being. The concept of Consciousness is a
controversial issue among scientists. Some consider it as an emergent
phenomenon; others – along with some theologians – consider it to be a
distinct phenomenon. Even Philosophers like Socrates, Plato, and Descartes
considered it to be a distinct phenomenon. In Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory also,
it is considered to be a distinct phenomenon but for a different reason:
whether Consciousness is an independent phenomenon or not, it is existent
as subjectively experienced by us; and it is perceived as a distinct
phenomenon from the body and even the mind in higher states of
awareness. It is a fact of experience: for example, when a person lies down,
closes his eyes, thinks of something (which is thought of something plus
Consciousness) and then stops thinking (which is leaving out the thought of
something), he still experiences awareness of his being (which is
Consciousness minus Thought). Therefore, the very act of being is
considered as another type of distinct action: it is simply BEING (as a verb).
The verification of its objective existence is beyond the scope of Ka:rmik
Linguistic Theory and is left to scientists for proof.

+ Vocal
Physical
- Vocal
Mind

Lingual Action
Mental Intellect

Action Memory

Heart
Mental Emotional
Mind

Experiential Ego
Spiritual Being

Network 5 : Human Action Organ Network

The Ka:rmik Law can be stated as follows:

 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Karma generates, specifies, directs, and materializes the required lingual

contribution by collective construction of individual dispositional realities for
their experiential reality through lingual actional reality by the contextual
coordination of coordination of action in a causal star network of action-
reaction sequences in the framework of living.

Karma operates in a huge mind boggling system within the System of

Creation. It is a dynamic system with several layers spanning from the supra-
cosmic (the pre-big bang state of creation– to – the macrocosmic (the post
big bang state of creation) - to – the microcosmic (the individual level of the
living and non-living systems) - to- the contextual – to – the actional –to – the
experiential levels. Within this causal ka:rmik system – within – the system
of creation, the linguistic system operates as a means to realize the
experiential system as the effect. To elaborate more, for a man to say a
sentence in a context, a whole creation has to take place from the pre-big
bang to the post big bang to the present state of human evolution to
produce the context for the utterance to have been materialized.

[The concept of a computer, hardware, and software can be used to explain

the operation of a linguistic system. The computer is like the body of the
human being; its hardware can be divided into four components: 1. Physical;
2. Mental; 3. Dispositional; and 4. Experiential. The physical component,
mainly, through the vocal organs, provides the means for VOCALIZATION.
The mental component provides the means for the PATTERNED
STRUCTURATION of the vocalization, its MEANING, and its EXPERIENCE. The
dispositional component provides the means for the choice (specification) of
the (lingual) action in terms of its form, content, and function as well as its
generation, direction, and materialization in a ka:rmik plane. These four
components are genetically inherited by all the human beings and are
subject to change as a man lives in the world in a birth-death sequence.
However, the software package that produces a specific language is not
inherited by the human beings. In a KLT perspective, this software is
contextually acquired as an additional but critical instrument or resource for
a larger experiential programme by a human being when it is applied by
other human beings in his context of living. Nonetheless, the positive choice
to acquire the system is genetically inherited. Since it is so, when a language
is used, its system (the software package) is acquired, integrated into
the larger system, and used in order to facilitate the experience of
existence (living).

The body, mind, and soul of the human being (like the hardware produced by
a manufacturer) are produced by Nature – whether it is God, or the pre-
existing Immanent Intelligence Principle or the emergent intelligence in
Nature by various chemical reactions is not the issue here - and it is used by
the Being in a human being (like a user of a computer who acquires and uses
it). As this Being decides, so he uses his body, and mind according to his
 Deriva
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dispositional choice (like the operator deciding to use the computer

according to his likes and dislikes). The only difference between a computer
and a human being is that the former is a non-living, mechanical system with
artificial intelligence and therefore not capable of experience while the
human being is a living, cause-effect experiential system with egoistic
intelligence and therefore capable of experience and that is an
insurmountable categorial difference. The computer also suffers breakdowns
(health problems), and malfunctioning (mental problems), but no
experiential problems.]

To explain it further, in KLT, discourse is a causal structure that includes a

process and a product along with the causal explanation – the WHAT (the
effect or the product) is derived from the ultimate WHY (the cause or
the dispositional conception) through the HOW (the process or the
spatiotemporalmaterial where, when, and what manner); whereas in other
theories, it is an exclusive structure of either the process or the product
without a causal explanation – the what is derived from the what (formal
approaches) or the how (functional and the cognitive approaches) but not
from the why. Even when the causality is given, it is not the ultimate
causality: for example, social reality (as in functional theories) is not the
ultimate cause for using language since there is no uniformity within
sociocultural patterns of lingual behaviour and therefore not the whole truth.

Cause: Why
(WP)
When
Structure of
Discourse Process: How Where
(Means) (AP)
How

Product: What (AP)

(Effect)

[WP Wholistic Process; AP Atomic Process]

Network 6: Structure of Discourse in KLT Network

The Ka:rmik Law is realized through three important principles that control
lingual action. They are: 1. The Principle of Karma; 2. The Principle of
Karmaphalam; and 3. The Principle of Karmaphalabho:gam: Every action is
generated by the disposition which is produced by karmaphalam of the
previous actions in a cyclic network; again, every action produces results
which are experienced by human beings to constitute their living. The
 Deriva
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Principle of Karma deals with action (karma) and gives The Disposition
Principle which fashions out action; The Principle of Karmaphalam deals with
the production of action in a context to yield the results of action
(karmaphalam) and gives The Actional Principle; and The Principle of
Karmaphalabho:gam deals with the experience of action
(karmaphalabho:gam) and gives The Experiential Principle by apparent
transformation.

They are as follows:

THE KA:RMIK LAW
Karma generates, specifies, directs, and materializes the required lingual
contribution by collective construction of individual dispositional realities for
their experiential reality through lingual actional reality by the contextual
coordination of coordination of action in a causal star network of action-
reaction sequences.

1. The Causal or Dispositional Principle

A lingual contribution is triggered as an action or reaction according to the
dispositional impulsion specified by the traits, contentualized by the
knowledge, and materialized by the impressionality of activity of the
interlocutor. Such an impulsion is therefore ka:rmik and not probabilistic. A
choice of an impulsion is decided from above by karma through va:sana:s
impacting on the context. To explain it further, the ingrained habits produce
that specific dispositional impulsion and not another by the ka:rmik
contextualization of that action at that specified Spatio-temporalmaterial-
Socioculturalspiritual- Contextualactional- (Lingual) Action for its experience.
Again, the cause of the specification of context can also be traced back to
the previous karma (action-result-experience) of the individual in his
individual-collective-contextual living.

When a lingual action is performed, it sets in a functional cyclic network of

application-comprehension-reaction in which the hearer understands the
meaning according to his disposition that rules supreme in the derivation of
meaning. Consequently, the choice of the process is decided according to his
disposition and he may derive the meaning either as linguistic meaning, or
as socioculturalspiritual meaning, or as contextual actional meaning in an
atomic way by choosing one or more than one option, or as dispositional
meaning in a wholistic manner.

The Dispositional principle can be stated as follows.

The Disposition Principle

The disposition of an individual acts or reacts in a context for the fulfilment
of one’s desires and produces an appropriate desire – effort – action
sequence towards that end. Such an action/reaction is produced by an
 Deriva
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interplay of Traits, Knowledge, and Va:sana:s in the context of their

occurrence.

It consists of three maxims: i. The Traits Maxim; ii. The Knowledge Maxim;
and iii. The Va:sana (Impressionality of Activity) Maxim

i. The Traits Maxim: Introduction

Each individual is constituted with certain guna:s (constituent qualities of
cognitivity, activity, and inertia). According to their state, they produce
personality traits in an individual’s disposition (svabha:vam). Traits are linked
with his (phenomenal) impressionality of activity (va:sana:s) in a context and
produce their corresponding desires which impel the individual to make an
effort and perform lingual action.
(46) a. Guna:s Traits Desires Effort
Lingual Action.
As traits produce desires, they do so by controlling the choice and
specification of action: its type, function, and form. Consequently, the
interlocutor acts or reacts (type); cooperates, or non-cooperates by
challenge or neutrality, or indifference (class); chooses the style (standard,
or colloquial, or slang, or taboo) and manner (polite/impolite); and the
content of action (the proposition or the conceptual specification as process/
objectification/state of being). The Consciousness in the individual charges
the Trait Component in Disposition and the Consciousness-Qualified-Trait
impacts on the (Dispositional) Knowledge component which embodies it.
(46) b. Trait Knowledge Specific Knowledge
Va:sana
Desire Conceptualization
The Traits or Specification Maxim can be stated as follows.
The Traits Maxim:
The concerned traits in svabha:vam (disposition) generate the required
lingual contribution by specification of the entire lingual action in its
variety, range, and depth.
In other words, it is the CHOICE maxim that deals with the lingual action; it
specifies the type of action (as action or reaction), the class of action (as
cooperation / neutrality / challenge), the style of action (standard /
colloquial / taboo; poetic / prosaic; figurative / literal, etc.); the manner of
action (polite / impolite); the content and the action itself (the utterance) as
well as the nature of the impact on the Knowledge (its choice and content) of
the speaker. In short, it is the maxim that decides the conceptual
specification of the lingual contribution.
In Ka:rmik Linguistic Theory, the Traits Maxim is the heart of all lingual action
and is critical not only in the derivation of linguistic meaning or the
 Deriva
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socioculturalspiritual meaning but also the dispositional meaning as the

ultimate meaning.
It can be captured in the following network.

Action
Type
Reaction

Cooperation
Class Neutrality
Non-Cooperation
Challenge
Polite
Manner
Impolite

Standard

Colloquial

Taboo

The Trait Maxim Style Poetic

Prosaic

Figurative

Literary

Impact on knowledge
More
Quantity
Required

Less

True
Content Quality
Action
False
Form
Relevanc
e
 Deriva
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Network 7: The Trait Maxim

ii. The Knowledge or Conceptualization Maxim
The knowledge possessed by the individual is charged by the Consciousness-
Qualified-Trait and the conceptualization of the lingual action is achieved.
The knowledge maxim
can be stated as follows.

The Knowledge Maxim

The knowledge component in disposition will embody the specified
conceptualization of the object / state of being / action by the traits to
produce the patterning of the semiotic lingual action.

In other words, the type/class/style/manner components will be

superimposed on the content of the lingual action and the specified lingual
action will be embodied to give its pattern (of the meaning and form) to
mean the lingual action in that particular form. This lingual action will be
further superimposed on the context to make it contextual lingual action.
Finally, its function is superimposed on the form of the meaningful lingual
action to intend that functional meaning contextually. So far, there is triple
superimposition on the content: 1. the traits specification to pattern the
form, and 2. the meaning in that form to perform the intended function and
3. the context. Furthermore, knowledge is a:nushangikally produced from
traits:
(41a) Trait Specification Knowledge (+Trait Specification)
In automatic lingual action processing, all of the superimpositions happen in
a single cogneme as explained earlier.

The knowledge in a human being is a product of sensory perception,

intellection, emotion, and experience. Every experience impacts on the
knowledge of action and directly interacts with the pleasure principle
(sukhe:chcha) in a human being. As a result of this interaction, the present
inclinations may be strengthened, weakened, or new inclinations may be
born. According to the nature of inclinations, choices will be made and
consequently actions are performed according to the choices made. When
such actions are habituated, they develop traits. The traits in turn set up a
chain reaction of impelling desires, etc. The pleasure principle holds good in
all types of action, and at all levels – be it in the simple case of taking a cup
of milk for rejuvenation, or going to jail for achieving freedom for a country.
(41b) Experience – Knowledge – Desire for Pleasure – Inclinations –
Choices – Action – Habituation – Traits

iii. The Va:sana Maxim

The va:sana maxim impels the embodiment of the pattern as the form
through va:sana.
(42) Trait Specification Knowledge (+Trait Specification)
 Deriva
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Conceptualization of the Form [+Knowledge (+Trait Specification)].

2. The Actional Principle

What is generated, specified, and directed by disposition transforms into a
desire and an action is performed to fulfil it and experience the result. It is
achieved by assigning a function, a meaning, and a form to the action and is
finally materialized through this principle. In other words, the dispositional
reality is embodied in the (lingual) action. It consists of three maxims: 1. The
Function Maxim; 2. The Meaning Maxim; and 3. The Form Maxim.

i. The Function Maxim

Assign the speech act function.
Embody the desire through the function.

ii. The Meaning Maxim

i. The Patterning Maxim (Meaning): Assign the propositional meaning via the
functional and formal meaning.
ii. The Patterning Maxim (Form): Assign the pattern (paradigm + structure) of
the proposition as a speech act. (Resolution of the Chosen and
Conceptualized Utterances in terms of the Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic
Axes in a Pattern)

The meaning embodies the function as well as the form that realizes the
function.

iii. The Form Maxim

i. The Phonation Maxim: Embody the pattern of the proposition as a speech
act by
vocalization in the context. (Materialization of the Pattern in Sound/
letters)
ii. The Binding Maxim: Bind (by Interconnection-Interrelation-Inter-
dependence-
Integration (I-I-I-I) all the Components of Lingual Action as well as
the other actions into a Ka:rmik Context))

The form embodies the phono-lexico-syntactic pattern of the proposition on

the one hand, and embodies the meaning and the function as well as the
implicature on the other hand to finally embody the desire and the
disposition. Each succeeding stage embodies the previous stage in an
a:nushangik process. In a formal-functional structuration of meaning,
((Paradigm + Structure) of Action) Meaning but in a functional-
formal structuration, meaning precedes the ((Paradigm + Structure) of
Action).
 Deriva
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(43) a. Disposition Desire (+Disposition) Action (+Desire

+Disposition)
b. Action:
Concept Pattern [Function Meaning ((Paradigm +
Structure) of Action)]
Form

1-3 in II give the speaker meaning.

3. The Contextualization Principle

A contribution to the discourse and the discourse and its structure are
created, sustained, and dissolved in the form of an appropriate context
to bring about the ka:rmik reality for the experience of the participants in
the discourse via their dispositional realities.

It consists of three maxims: 1. Contribution Maxim; 2. Comprehension

Maxim; 3. The Experiential Maxim

i. Contribution Maxim
The Contribution Principle is a part of the Contextualization Principle. To
explain further, the Contextualization Principle is a:nushangikally derived
from the Contribution Principle in an I-I-I-I network.

It can be stated as follows.

Contribution Maxim
An appropriate contribution is made by the contributor in the context
according to his disposition to bring about the emergent contextual action
and thus construct his dispositional reality.

The Context is an adjunct (like the space around a house) which acts like a
stage, and not a qualifier (like the redness in a lotus) which acts like a
constituent to the creation of the discourse. Furthermore, it is created by
discourse in a bottom-up process as an effect and becomes the stage for
discourse in a top-down process as a means with karma (via disposition) as
the cause in a cause-means-effect model of experiential action. What is
more, it is reflexive in the sense that it facilitates a contribution as an action
and also facilitates a contribution as a reaction to the action to constitute
discourse. It consists of two maxims which are basic to the other two
principles of Contribution and Comprehension in an a:nushangik relation:

(44) Contribution Contextualization Comprehension

Experience
Action Reaction
Dispositional Interaction
 Deriva
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Ka:rmik (Experiential)
Reality

a. The Causal or Dispositional Maxim

(Choice and Conceptualization of Utterance and its Use: Objectification and
Process of Action along the Cognemic Axis)

b. The Lingual (Actional) Maxim

i. The Patterning Maxim (Resolution of the Chosen and Conceptualized
Utterances in terms of the Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic Axes in a
Pattern)
ii. The Phonation Maxim (Materialization of the Pattern in Sound/ letters)
iii. The Binding Maxim (Interconnection-Interrelation-Inter-dependence-
Integration (I-I-I-I) by Binding all the Components of Lingual Action as well
as
the other actions in to a Ka:rmik Context))

2. The Comprehension Maxim

The interlocutor comprehends the lingual contribution dispositionally in the
overall framework of his living in the context.

It is a complicated principle and draws from many sources to create the

comprehension of an utterance. The utterance may be comprehended
atomically by taking only the referential meaning, or it may be
comprehended by taking the sociocultural meaning, or by contextual
implicatures, or it may be comprehended by taking the meaning
dispositionally through all these meanings, or simply directly without any
filters.

3. The Experiential Maxim

The experiential maxim is a fallout of the contribution and comprehension
maxims.
It can be stated as follows:

The participant in a discourse experiences the results of the contextual

lingual action as a product of the ka:rmik reality generated by it.

The Dispositional Principle can be called The Causal Principle since the
choice and conceptualization of an utterance as well as its use are triggered
by disposition and then materialized by it. That means, it is the cause of the
patterning and phonation of the utterance leading to its subsequent
experience. The Patterning and Phonation Principles constitute the phonic
realization of the utterance and hence can be joined together under one
principle which can be called The Lingual (Actional) Principle. Finally, the
lingual action is experienced by the individual speaker/hearer or
writer/reader to produce the effects of pleasure and pain under The
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Experiential Principle, leaving behind the impressions of the action and its
experience that are stored in the individual. These will produce their own
effects in future and create a cycle of cause-effect and action-reaction
sequences.
(45) Disposition Action Experience ● Karma .......
Cycle

The entire phenomenon of the creation, patterned structuration, processing,

and using, and transmitting is done under the theoretical principle of karma-
karmaphalam-karmaphalabho:gam in a procedure of constructing the five
realities ( at the conceptual level) through another set of five procedures at
the actional level [Physical – Mental – Vocal (Lingual) – Dispositional-
Experiential] by using different phonological, lexical, syntactic, semantic,
discourse techniques

3. The Experiential Maxim

(Experience of Results of Lingual Action as Pleasure/Pain for all the
participants)
a. The Interpretation Maxim
b. The Experiential Maxim
c. The Ka:rmik Maxim
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

AVGSatsang Page # 1
ManmanËbhava1
Swami Dayananda Saraswati
In the BhagavadgÌtË, whenever Lord Krishna uses the first person singular,
he is
referring to himself as ½Úvara. In other words, VyËsa presents Krishna as
BhagavËn. Thus, the meaning of the compound manmanËbhava would be
ÌÚvaramanË
bhava, may you become one whose mind is with me, ½Úvara. Either the
mind objectifies ½Úvara or dwells upon ½Úvara.
Keeping the Mind in BhagavËn
There is a certain possibility of continuity of thought, sajËtÌya-vÎtti-pravËha. A
vÎtti, a thought-form, does not have any staying power; it is always kÛaÙika,
momentary. It has got to be so. VÎttis are momentary, like the frames in a
film.
Because they are moving, you will see the same person, but with a
difference,
and thereby, you capture motion. The number of frames is adequate so that
there
is no jerk in the movement. So too, we have enough frames in our mind so
that
we can recognize continuous motion; otherwise, it would be seen in fits and
starts. Being momentary, a thought is there, and it is gone. It does not stay.
That
is how the whole jagat is; jËyate gacacti, it comes into being and goes away.
There is always a newness about it. A single object, which is recognized, is
coming and going, but because it is the same object. You see a swami
sitting,
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

even though it is not constant. There is a flow of the same object, so you see
the same thing, with small differences. SajËtÌya-pravËha is a flow of the
same
type of thing, as in mental pÍjË, worship, in which there are different steps.
Every step has the stamp of pÍjË, but the steps are different—Ësanam,
offering a
seat; pËdyam, water to wash the feet; arghyam, water to wash the hands;
snËnam,
bath; vastram, clothes; ËbharaÙam, ornaments; candanam kuÑkumam,
sandle
paste and vermillon powder. Each step is different, but the category, jËti, is
the
same, pÍjË-jËti. You are not moving away from pÍjË, but the mind has
different
occupations. Though it is not the same occupation, the particular name, pÍjË,
continues to be there in all the steps. That is the jËti. The specific item in the
pÍjË category, the step, is different. The main thing is pÍjË and these are all
auxiliaries for the pÍjË. This is an ingenious way of keeping the mind in the
same occupation. You give the mind enough scope to move around, but at
the
same time, the occupation is the same. This is possible in pÍjË, etc., which is
a
pursuit which has me, ½Úvara, as the topic.
In the GÌtË, from the second chapter onwards, so much is covered about
ËtmË,
the truth of everything. From the seventh chapter onwards, there is more
½Úvara
1 Arsha Vidya Gurukulam, Saylorsburg, 2007
AVGSatsang Page # 2
presented. The nature of ½Úvara, essentially, and what makes ½Úvara,
½Úvara are
elaborately discussed. At the end of it BhagavËn says, manmanËbhava, may
your
mind be with me always. Does that mean you cannot do anything else?
Because
the mind has one occupation, it will have no accommodation for another
occupation, since it can only entertain one thing at a time. If ½Úvara is
always
there, then you cannot do anything else. This is what one who has no
exposure
to the teaching, thinks. Then he complains, "Swamiji, the mind does not stay
with me. It goes to various unfinished jobs and gives up BhagavËn." By the
same logic through which it went away, it comes back also. It is a loop. From
anything, you can go and come back to the same thing, without thinking.
What
is the logic for going away? Nothing.
 Deriva
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The mind keeps coming and going. If that is the truth, then there is nothing
much to talk about. Krishna becomes another object, through some
association,
and is one more person in the world. He cannot say that he is all-pervasive2,
or
“I am the one who is in the heart of everyone, I am the one who sustains the
entire jagat, and I pervade the entire jagat. From me, is memory; your
faculty to
know; from me, is this power to suspend what you know, what you
remember,”
BG 15.15.3 That all this can be suspended is a great blessing. The capacity to
suspend makes your mind fresh so that it can see something new. Even old
notions can get negated in the wake of knowledge. You can get rid of
ignorance
and ignorance-born wrong notions because the mind is capable of being
open,
having suspended all notions for the time being. That is the grace of ½Úvara;
it is
given to you. He says, “From me, is your faculty to remember and recollect,
to
know and the power to suspend. I am the one to be known in all four Vedas
and I am the one who revealed the Vedas. I am the revealer and I am the
revealed,” BG 15.15. Like this BhagavËn uses the first person singular in all
these sentences.
BhagavËn is Not an Object
BhagavËn cannot be an object enclosed by a given thought. An apple is
enclosed
by a thought, excluding every other thought. This is how we learn to
recognize
objects discretely. A discrete object is the object of a thought form excluding
everything else. When you thread a needle, everything else in the world is
excluded. Even the needle is excluded. Only the eye of the needle is the
object
in focus. That alone exists. When you see a tree, and then see the trunk of
the
tree, the focus, the intended perception, tËtparya, is the trunk, even though
the
tree is there. And if you see the leaf, then only the leaf is there, and so on.
You
can go on reducing the focus down to the molecules that make the
chlorophyll.
2 mayËtatamidaÑ sarvam jagadavyaktamÍrtinË, BG 9.4
3 sarvasya cËhaÑ hÎdisanniviÛÖo mattassmÎtirjÕËnamapohanaÑ ca, BG 15.15.
AVGSatsang Page # 3
In the same way, you can have a collective object-vÎtti called forest. There,
the
 Deriva
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entire tËtparya is different. This is how the mind works. When you think of
one
thing, other things are necessarily excluded.
When you think of BhagavËn everything else is excluded. The question is: Is
there BhagavËn and everything else? What is other than BhagavËn? The
Upanisads tell us that whatever you see here is ½Úvara;4 what you know and
do
not know. Nothing is outside ½Úvara including the given ignorance an
individual
may have. If the whole thing is ½Úvara, then when can your mind be away
from
½Úvara? Practice this a little bit—instead of sending the mind to ½Úvara, try
to
send it away from ½Úvara. For this, you must necessarily have knowledge of
what ½Úvara is.
Another way of looking at this is, “Wherever my mind goes and lands, that is
your lotus feet.” 5 Whether it thinks of time, it is you; a place, it is you; an
object, it is you. The sun, moon, constellations, mountains, oceans,
continents,
laws, forces are all you. Let the mind go; where will it go? Outside BhagavËn,
how will it go? If the mind stays, if it is attracted towards something glorious,
that is you. If someone is very strong, that strength is you.6 The burning
power
that fire has, that is you. Any glory anywhere, which attracts, is you. In fact
the
word 'krishna' means the one who attracts everything 7 . Whichever quality,
feature, attribute attracts, that is BhagavËn. Lord Krishna says, “The
brilliance in
the brilliant person is me8.” The faculty to think is given, and objects to think
about are given. Ignorance is given and the capacity to dispel it is given, for
which there must be truth. The whole thing is given. How can anyone say,
“This
is my brilliance”? The ‘my’ is gone. My brilliance or someone else's brilliance
is
½Úvara's brilliance. That is the law.
Understanding BhagavËn
To understand BhagavËn it takes a certain way of looking at what 'is'. It is
not
your usual way of looking at something, as a product made by someone. You
see the jagat and wonder by whom it was made. By BhagavËn. The eyes go
up
immediately. Unless this orientation goes, there is no BhagavËn. The
question of
where BhagavËn is should not even arise. “What 'is' BhagavËn?” alone
should be
the question. “What 'is'?” will yield everything. You are not going to search
 Deriva
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elsewhere, because searching for something else presupposes

understanding of
4 idaÑ sarvam ÌÚvara-buddhayË ËccËdanÌyam, yad idaÑ sarvam ÌÚvaraÒ, based on
½ÚËvËsya
UpaniÛad 1.1
5 yatra yatra mano yËti tatra tatra tava pËda paÔkajam
6 balaÑ balavatËÑ cËham, BG 7.11
7 ËkarÛati sarvasmin sarvËn
8 tejastejasvinËm aham, BG 7.10

AVGSatsang Page # 4
what is in front of you. But what is in front is not understood, because that
has
the solution. It is the product, it is the cause, and it is everything. You do not
search for ½Úvara outside of what you see. That orientation does not work.
Therefore, question “What is it that I see here?” In what you know, ½Úvara
reveals himself. You require only one object, because you are the subject,
the
enquirer. The object can be the universe or one system or the sun or the
earth or
a rock. The object should reveal the truth of the object.
If the object that you see is a table, what is its truth? 'What is?', is the
question.
You think it is created by a carpenter who is not here, because when you see
the
table, you do not see the carpenter. What did he make? A table. Can you see
the
table without seeing another object, the meaning of which is not the same as
table? We have an object table, which means that we have a word ‘table’
and
that word has an object. Then there is a word, 'wood'. It also has an object,
wood. When you see the table, do you see wood at the same time? There are
two words, 'table', and 'wood'. Both must be synonyms if they are referring
to
the same object. ‘Table’ refers to an object and ‘wood’ refers to the same
object,
therefore, wood and table are synonyms. What does it mean if two words are
synonyms? It means that wherever there is a table there is wood, and
wherever
there is wood, there is a table. Both are wrong. Wherever I see a table, I do
not
see wood, and wherever I see wood, I do not see a table. Here, wood and
table
have assembled together. A certain logician 9 said, "They are two different
objects connected by a principle called samavËya." He says so because he
has a
commitment to proving that they are two different objects. Let us
understand
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'what is' and not try to prove anything. 'What is', is this table, which I cannot
even imagine without imagining a substance other than table, referred to by
the
word 'wood', ‘plastic’ ‘steel’, etc. Some other object has to be seen by me in
order to see the table. Without seeing that, I cannot see the table. Not only
can I
not see table, I cannot even imagine it. Any one thing you look into is like
this.
You cannot think of a given thing without thinking of another. That ‘another’
also, you cannot think of without thinking of another. The more you know,
the
more you have 'another'. Can you think of an object without its cause? No. If
there is a cause for this entire jagat—the maker and material being one
cause—
can you think of the jagat without it,? Can you take the mind away from any
one object to ½Úvara? How can you think of an object outside ½Úvara? You
can
think of ½Úvara perhaps without the jagat, but can you think of a jagat
which is
outside ½Úvara? Which object will take you away from ½Úvara? No object.
When
you understand 'what is', with the answer to that question, “What is?” you
have
all the answers. All questions become redundant. In all the chapters of the
GÌtË,
BhagavËn has made such questions redundant. Therefore, manmanËbhava—
we
9 This is the VaiÚeÛika who considers samavËya as one of the seven categories of substance
in the jagat.
AVGSatsang Page # 5
have to see that whatever we see is ½Úvara, because the product is
nËmarÍpa, just
name-form, which is not separate from ½Úvara; it is ½Úvara. You do not
need to
rub your eyes and see something more. Inside one has to be totally free from
not recognizing 'what is'. If you see only the table and fail to recognize the
wood, you will search for wood.

The World is Only Words

We have only words and their meanings. We think there are tangible objects
for
which there are words, but there are just words and their meanings. The
word
'shirt', for instance, has its meaning. Whether it is in English or any language,
it
 Deriva
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is the same. The word 'shirt’ is a word because it has a meaning which we
both
understand, and therefore, I can communicate that to you, and we can deal
with
it; that is vyavahËra. This is a shirt and it can be used only as a shirt, not as
pants. ‘Pant’ is a different word and has a different use. For every word we
have
a meaning, and when we see the meaning, we use the word. We see the
meaning in the mind, and also, outside, which we call an object. We have the
word and the meaning in our head, and when we see something outside that
corresponds to the meaning of that word, we recognize it as an object, like a
shirt.
Sometimes, the word and its meaning are only in my head. I imagine it, but
cannot see it with my eyes. I imagine a song, but I do not hear it through my
ears. I can imagine a particular fragrance, but I do not find a source outside
from which I can pick up the fragrance. Then we say this is imagination,
subjective. When you are able to see the shirt with your eyes, it is not an
imagined shirt. It is not “I think, therefore it is,” but rather, “It is, therefore, I
am able to recognize it,” the word and its meaning. You get a concept of
reality
out of this. What is imagined is subjective, not available for public
perception,
but seen only in your mind. It is purely a subjective perception. We do not
say
that it is not valid, but when we are talking of realities, we are talking about
what is objectively real. What we make out of it is subjective. Sometimes you
fantasize, visualize and then produce. That has its own use, but it is all
subjective.
Because we see objects outside, we think that each one is different from
everything else, which is true. Having accepted that, we consider that these
objects are the meanings of words, which we necessarily perceive. We
accept
that kind of objectivity, but that does not give the shirt any status of
tangibility.
This is because shirt has no being. The 'isness', the being, of the shirt
belongs to
the fabric. The fabric ‘is'; the 'is', resolves into the fabric. I see the existence
of
a shirt, but I touch the fabric, not the shirt. When I say it is a cotton shirt, I
transcend the fabric, the yarn, and then go to the cause, the cotton. The
capacity
AVGSatsang Page # 6
to transcend and see without doing anything is Vedanta. A shirt continues to
be
a shirt; fabric continues to be fabric; yarn continues to be yarn; but I
transcend
 Deriva
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all of them and say that it is cotton. If you are quantum physicist, you will go
further—up to quantum objects, particles. A shirt is nothing but particles. All
the
way the shirt is an effect.
The material cause is where the effect is. The material cause for the shirt is
fabric, and is referred to by another word. The shirt is referred to by the word
'shirt' with its own meaning, but what is referred to by the word 'shirt' is not
separate from what is referred to by the word 'fabric', the cause of the shirt.
This
is the method, prakriyË, of revealing the truth through cause-effect. The
effect is
the cause, and therefore, there is no cause-effect, so we call it a prakriyË.
The
shirt is produced and is a value addition. Fabric is the cause, but is also an
effect from the standpoint of its cause, yarn. Where the shirt is, the fabric is;
where the fabric is, the yarn is. Both causes are there, so I can even say that
the
shirt is but yarn; and further, yarn is but cotton; cotton is but fibers with their
own molecular structure, and the molecule is atoms, so the shirt is atoms. I
am
wearing a bunch of particles. The body is a bunch of particles. One bunch of
particles is wearing another bunch of particles. The glory is that particles can
wear particles. Therefore, in non-difference there is no joy; the joy is in
difference because difference does not make a difference. If it makes a
difference then it is a problem. Let the differences be. Is there any cause,
more
fundamental, even for the particles? If there is a cause, then the particle is
the
cause, and therefore, the shirt is that cause.
You are asking, “Where is god?” The shirt is the effect; the effect is the
cause.
If there is a fundamental cause, it is in the form of effect, which, in terms of
its
reality, is called mithyË. You can neither dismiss the shirt as non-existent,
nor
say it exists by itself. If I use the word 'reality' for what is self-existent, then I
cannot use the word 'reality' for the shirt; I cannot use the word 'non-
existent',
for the shirt because I wear the shirt. The very object that you confront is
nonseparate
from its cause. And one more thing—things are intelligently put
together.
The Cause; All Knowledge
We, with our knowledge based upon our experiences, know that we cannot
create a thing without really understanding, visualizing, what it is, and for
what
 Deriva
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purpose it is going to be created. The extent of knowledge required to create

a
given thing is the extent of knowledge the author must have to create that
thing.
In creating an object, like a shirt, the tailor knows why he is buying the
fabric,
why he cuts it the way he does, why he stitches it in this way. And the shirt is
created. Because there is adequate knowledge, after the creation process,
the
AVGSatsang Page # 7
meaning of the word 'shirt', is there. Previously, it was in his head; it was
subjective. Now it has become objective. This ‘objective’ is amazing. Even
the
word 'objective', has its limitations. Really, there is no object, but when you
look
at it, you can recognize it as a shirt. When it is in your head, I cannot look at
it,
but after creation it is available for public perception. This is what we say
sÎÛÖi.
Here it is knowledge that there is such a possibility that accounts for the
creation of a shirt. Whatever name you give an object, it is there because it
is a
possibility in this world.
If a shirt presupposes shirt-knowledge, then the body also presupposes
bodyknowledge.
When the body is born, it presupposes knowledge of it and the
programming required for it to grow. The knowledge that the existence of
this
body pre-supposes must be somewhere. The father does not have this
knowledge,
nor does the mother. Where is that knowledgeable person? Never ask,
“Where?”',
because there are people who will say that it is not locally available. What is
non-local? This whole jagat is in the form of knowledge, word and its
meaning.
Possibilities are all words and meanings. Buddhi, intellect, is a word and its
meaning; manaÒ, mind, a word and its meaning; cittam, memory, a word
and its
meaning. That is knowledge. ‘Body’ is one word, and when you look into
that,
there are words, words, words, and their meanings, nËmni nËmËni. The
meanings
of many words are the meaning of one single word, ‘body’, and not only this
body, but the bodies of all living beings. Limitless knowledge, resting in a
conscious being, is the cause, is the effect. The question of “Where?” does
not
 Deriva
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arise here, because the effect is the cause. We swallow the material cause
and
the efficient cause. The effect is the meaning of the word 'knowledge', and
the
cause is all-knowledge, ½Úvara.
Anything you focus your attention upon is all-knowledge ½Úvara. Within that
allknowledge
alone is this individual knowledge. This is 'what is'. Where is the
necessity of questioning 'where' and 'how'? This is how it is. "Swamiji, I
understand all this but why did god create this?" God did not create all this;
this
is god. This is how god is—the maker and material; male and female; god
and
goddess. If somebody is sitting somewhere and creating, then you can ask,
“Why did he create this?” This is how ½Úvara is, and it necessarily includes
you.
That ½Úvara who is inside and outside, who is all-knowledge, one
consciousness,
you are. You are that conscious being. All that is here is one knowledge, and
within that, from the standpoint of your mind, which has limited knowledge,
etc.,
this all-knowledge is the being. Small-knowledge is also the same being.
Smallknowledge
is not outside consciousness; all-knowledge is not outside
consciousness. Therefore, all-knowledge, being, consciousness is ½Úvara,
and
small-knowledge, being, consciousness is jÌva, the individual. Are you away
from ½Úvara? Can you think of an object outside ½Úvara? The greatness of
a
AVGSatsang Page # 8
human being is that even then he can think that he is away. Therefore,
BhagavËn says, manmanËbhava, may your mind always be in me.
Missing and Non Missing the Presence of ½Úvara
When you are bringing ½Úvara into your day-to-day life, there are areas
where
you are bound to miss the presence of ½Úvara in your awareness and
understanding. First, it is in your understanding. Even if someone has
understood, there are certain areas where one is bound to miss the presence
of
½Úvara. The awareness is never out of sight, but can be missed. Even if a
person
is within sight, there can be remoteness if he is not recognized. Then, in
one's
awareness, there is alienation. ½Úvara also seems to be far removed from
me.
That 'me' is very loud. In the noise of the jÌva, who is so loud, ½Úvara is not
 Deriva
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heard even if he says, “I am here.” We are going to look into those areas
where
the presence of ½Úvara is likely to be missed. In those areas, this sentence—
manmanËbhava—will become very valid. Given the understanding of the
ninth
chapter, which we have covered so far, all that is here is ½Úvara. Then at
the end
of this chapter, BhagavËn says, manmanËbhava, may your mind be always
in me;
madbhaktobhava, may you be devoted to me; madyËjibhava, may you
worship
me; mËÑ namaskuru, may you surrender to me, mat parËyaÙo bhava, may I
be
the most important to you; mËmeva yeÚyasi, you will not be separate from
me.
'What is', is ½Úvara—before the manifestation of this jagat, including my
bodymind-
sense complex, and after the manifestation, because only what is
unmanifest can manifest. If what is manifest is ½Úvara then the un-manifest
is
also ½Úvara. The unmanifest ½Úvara is the cause, and the manifest ½Úvara
is the
manifested ½Úvara, so the effect is not separate from the cause. All-
knowledge
½Úvara being the cause means that the jagat was un-manifest in the form of
pure
knowledge. In the beginning, there was the word, and the word was with
god,
and the word was god. This is our understanding; word is nËma. We see this
in
BÎhadËraÙyaka UpaniÛad. All this was unmanifest; then it became manifest
as
name and form.10 That is how ½Úvara manifests. What was undifferentiated
is
now manifest in a differentiated form, like a plant in a seed.
In an orange seed, you do not see the orange tree. When you break the seed
open, there is no indication of an orange tree there—no presence of a trunk,
branches, leaves, fruit, etc. It is all undifferentiated, in other words, an
unmanifest, tree. The manifest orange tree was, ËsÌt. The manifest tree was
in
the seed at the causal level as unmanifest. If you look at anything at the
causal
level, it is unmanifest; it is pure software. What is unmanifest,
undifferentiated,
10 taddhedaÑ tarhyavvyËkÎtamËsÌt tanËmarÍpËbhyËmeva vyËkriyata, BrU
1.4.7.
 Deriva
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AVGSatsang Page # 9
becomes differentiated in time. This is called sÎÛÖi, creation. Look at the
creation
now. It is not that someone created it. The entire jagat was there,
undifferentiated and that is ½Úvara. Differentiated ½Úvara, is also ½Úvara.
What was,
what is and what will be is ½Úvara.
In this manifestation, the individual is also a very significant component.
When
we talk of DakÛiÙËmÍrti as the Lord, the Lord is incomplete without the
individual who is looking at the Lord. The Lord is one, but just for our
understanding he is presented with eight components. It is an eight-fold
model.
The five elements, sÍkÛma, subtle and sthÍla, gross: ËkËÚaÒ (time is
assumed
with space), vËyu, air; agni, fire; ËpaÒ, water and pÎthivÌ, earth, plus the sun
representing all luminous bodies, the moon for all planets, and the eighth
factor
in this eight-fold form, aÛÖamÍrti, is the significant person, you, who is
looking
at the Lord. You have to include yourself for the Lord to be the Lord.
You are the significant person because everything else is unlike you. If you
examine the meaning of the word 'I', it does not take much time for you to
understand that you have no comparison, so how can you have a complex?
Comparison leading to a complex is only between things that are similar. You
cannot sit by a rock and say, "You are impervious to sun, rain, people. I am
jealous of you." A classical musician who spent all his time learning music,
found that when he performed, people generally slept. If he compares
himself
with a rock-star who attracts large crowds, he can have a complex. He can
have
jealousy, anger and frustration, but not while sitting by a rock. Everything is
unlike you. You are the only significant person in this world. You are the only
subject; everything else is an object. All that is here is objects of your
consciousness—the whole jagat. That is why consciousness is unlike
anything
else. And this is why god cannot be an object of consciousness. God has got
to
be that consciousness, and everything. What 'is', is ½Úvara. In this, there is
the
total and the individual; that is the manifestation. If you look at yourself
through
your body-mind-sense complex, which gives you individuality, that is the
truth
about you. In the total, ½Úvara, there is the individual, another individual
and so
 Deriva
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on. This is called nËnË, differentiated creation, and it is all intelligently put
together.
Among the various laws, there are certain genetic laws and karmic laws.
They
work in tandem because it is all one phenomenon. You look at it through a
particular model and say that it is a genetic flow. If you ask “Why?” then
there
is a karmic connection also, according to ÚËstra. You do not separate the
laws
from their outcome, because if the outcome is not there, you cannot even
discern
the law. You discover the law because there is an outcome of it. Otherwise,
how
are you going to understand the law? Each individual is different. Karma is a
part of that. When you look into it, it becomes a very important law. You can
AVGSatsang Page # 10
never discern the law without the outcome. Even if the ÚËstra tells you
something, you cannot assimilate it unless the outcome is experienced by
you.
We see ourselves missing the bus and getting the bus. These outcomes we
see.
ÉËstra tells us that there is a law of karma. We accept that and can
assimilate it,
because in the outcome, we see the law. Whether you study the physical
order,
the biological order, or psychology, etc., they are all orders. In physics, if you
find in the dual behavior of a particle, that it is a wave now, that is the order,
as
far you know now. There is no contradiction because you are trying to
understand 'what is'. What 'is', is ½Úvara. Therefore, the study of all the
orders is
bhagavat-darÚanam, the vision of god. That is why when you discover or
understand something there is such a joy. The quality of it is not comparable
with any other pleasure, because you are having a clearance of your
ignorance,
which separated you from all-knowledge ½Úvara. With reference to a
particular
fact, there is ignorance or no ignorance. When there is no ignorance, there is
joy.
You are in harmony with ½Úvara. Even a joke you understand when there is
clearance. That is knowledge. Any understanding puts you in harmony with
½Úvara.
What 'is', is ½Úvara. Alienation is ignorance. Subject-object are both ½Úvara.
Let
us take an object like music—rock, classical or any other music. Then there is
a
 Deriva
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person, you, significant you. Music is the object; you are the subject. You sit
there judging the music, then you give yourself to the music. Then there is
no
subject-object, just fusion. The subject-object are not standing opposed to
each
other, and because there is fusion, there is joy. Subject-object is ½Úvara,
nonduality. All within the non-dual whole, the wholeness is experienced,
whether
it is the joy of knowing, vidyËnanda, or the joy of fusion with an object,
viÛayËnanda, or some clearance and joy from prËÙËyËma or meditation,
yogËnanda, there is only one Ënanda, ÌÚvarËnanda.
Here is where your growth lies. How much you allow ½Úvara to be in your
life,
how much you are in harmony with ½Úvara, is your growth as a person.
Being in
harmony with ½Úvara is not being in harmony with one single person,
because
everything is ½Úvara. It is not a single person that you have settle account
with.
You have to settle account with the whole world, and only then will you settle
account with ½Úvara. How do you settle account with the whole world?
The world is not that simple. When I admire the rose, holding it in my hand,
the
thorn pricks me. This is how it is. Some will say that the thorn is evil. No, the
thorn is part of creation; it is there so that a goat will not eat the rose. The
plant
wants to keep it for some time, until it withers away. It is part of its survival
mechanism, its intelligence. There is no evil. The word 'evil', the way of
looking
at something as evil, is the only evil in the world. This is because of some
inner
AVGSatsang Page # 11
problem. One has to create that evil so that one can deal with it. There is no
evil;
there are only causes and effects. Using words like, ‘evil’, ‘beggar’, etc., only
shows a person's insecurity, how vulnerable he is. One has to come out of
this
survival pattern of living. These are all words that give one some kind of shell
behind which one seeks some security. This is not security, because you are
out
in the world; you have to breathe fresh air.
There is an order in psychology. The moment you say that something is evil,
there is no order. If someone is born evil, who is to blame? It is all in order.
Once you understand that there is order, you can relax, because in the
appreciation of order there is the presence of ĪÚvara in your mind. You can
 Deriva
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understand that ĪÚvara's presence is purely cognitive, because the presence

is
there already. Absence is only due to your disowning or not seeing.
Therefore, it
is cognitive. The moment you say that any particular emotion is in order, you
are recognizing the presence of ĪÚvara. That is what BhagavËn says in
manmanËbhava, let your mind recognize the presence of me in any
situation.
The emotional order is a very critical order because all our problems are
emotional. People who do not deal with emotions and want to transcend
them
should understand that they have a lot of emotions to process. They are
afraid to
touch the Pandora's box. If you understand the order, then you are not afraid
of
anything. This is an order that is more critical, more important, because it is
connected to the order of dharma.
Dharma
I have no word to translate into English the word 'dharma'. Dharma has a
vast
manifestation. It is present every moment in your life. Dharma is ĪÚvara's
manifestation. Interaction with the world is governed by dharma every
moment
of your life. The presence of dharma is there. If you transgress, there is
adharma
and if you conform, dharma is there. If you conform to dharma, it is very
much
there and you are not separate from it. Dharma is ĪÚvara, and therefore, you
are
in harmony with ĪÚvara. If you are transgressing, it is because you are
already
alienated. There is guilt and hurt, which is alienation. The joy of living is
gone.
Therefore, manmanËbhava, may you be that person whose mind is with
½Úvara.
That is the literal meaning. ManmanËbhava implies that the presence of
½Úvara is
already there, and has to be recognized. The recognition should be such that
presence cannot not be lost sight of. Suppose, physically you want to go
away
from space, where will you go? Space is non-separate from ½Úvara. At least
from
this place you can go to another place, even another order of reality, as you
do
in a dream. Leaving this place-time, you create your own place-time in which
the time series is different. It does not have the relativity that you have here
 Deriva
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AVGSatsang Page # 12
based upon the speed of light. There, you create another time series and
place;
that is possible and is within the order of ½Úvara. Why should there be this
particular dream? It is all within the order. The dream is controlled by the
order
of ½Úvara just as the physical universe is. The presence of ½Úvara cannot
be
missed by anyone who is awake to ½Úvara.
A certain critical area of ½Úvara's manifestation, where one is likely to miss
½Úvara, is the area where there is conflict between desire-produced
pressure and
dharma. Dharma is universal, and anything universal cannot be created by a
human being. So knowledge of dharma is there in every person. Consider
one
value, like hurting. I do not want to get hurt; no one should hurt me. Who
doesn't want this? 'Who' includes all life forms. A cow does not want to get
killed. It wants to survive. That is innate in creation. It is the order of ½Úvara.
Every living being is given this instinct for survival, and survival implies not
getting hurt. This is universal. But the cow does not seem to have the
knowledge that you do not want to get hurt. It does not look at it as a value.
If
it did, then it would have regret after hurting somebody. It has no guilt
because
it knows that it should not get hurt, but does not seem to know that others
do
not want to get hurt either. That is why the cow is called dharma-
adharmËbhyËÑ
vimuktaÒ, free from dharma and adharma. PaÚupati is called vimukteÚvara,
the
lord of the vimuktas, where vimukta means an animal, paÚu.
I do not want to get hurt; no one wants to get hurt; this knowledge is
complete.
That is why non-injury is the highest dharma, ahiÑsËparamo dharmaÒ.
½Úvara is
manifest in the form of dharma. Dharma is not ‘outside’, but is manifest
where
it has got to be, right in your mind. That is the basic knowledge of yourself.
You are a cognitive person, basically, not an agent. First, you are a knower;
open your eyes, and you become a seer. No will is involved and no decision
is
involved. Just by opening your eyes, you become a seer. If there is a sound,
you
are a hearer, if your ears are open. You are a knowing person, a cognitive
person, and in that person this knowledge of the universal value structure is
given. This knowledge is there by common sense.
 Deriva
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For human interaction you require a mechanism that will allow you to say,
“No”
when you have to. All the impulses are there, the desires are too numerous,
and
the pressures created by them are too great, because every human being is
insecure until the person understands that he is the source of all security.
There
is a long way to go to know that, and until then, he is insecure and
incomplete.
His desires have got to be fulfilled in order for him to feel that he is
‘somebody’.
These kinds of desires produce a tremendous amount of pressure called
vega—
the pressure of desire, the pressure of anger. Anger is not the problem; it is
the
pressure, the force that is created by desire that is the motivating power. It
moves mountains. It can be positive or it can go against dharma, which is
innate
AVGSatsang Page # 13
to the cognitive person. This is what we weakly refer to as conscience. It is
really knowledge of dharma, which can become highly assimilated
knowledge.
There is always pressure to cut corners when one does not have an
assimilated
value, so the advantage of conforming to dharma has to be assimilated.
What do
I lose when I go against dharma? That assimilation has to take place. What I
gain is very clear—money, power, and advantage. “The one who is able to
neutralize this pressure is successful11.” The pressure is a motivating force,
but it
turns into a harmful thing, for others and yourself, when it drives you to go
against dharma, against ĪÚvara, and against yourself. Dharma is sensed by
all of
us, without exception. It is universal. You have knowledge of dharma in your
mind, where you require a mechanism to regulate your actions, because you
have freedom. The pressure created by desire is so great that you can abuse
and
destroy, so the brake mechanism has to be within yourself. That is the
knowledge. Because you are a cognitive person, you have freedom to do, not
to
do, or do something differently. Therefore, you can say 'yes', or 'no'. This
capacity and freedom being there, the mechanism has to be there. That is
how
we are all able to live; that is how you can leave your house and come here.
Dharma does not always transpire because of law and order. We control
ourselves because we have a mechanism for that.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

Dharma is not only a mechanism given to you to stop you from doing what
you
feel like doing when it is harmful to yourself and others, but also, to make
you
reach out and grow into a compassionate person. That dharma is given to
you to
help you grow into a huge human being. It is all-knowledge and it has an
object
which is not outside of you. The object of each value is inside you, and is not
anything other than ĪÚvara, even though there is really no object at all.
AhiÑsa is
not an object; compassion is not an object; love is not an object; giving is not
an object. They are all the nature of ĪÚvara. Dharma is a critical
manifestation of
ĪÚvara, manifest in the mind of every human being, innate to the basic
person
who has this knowledge of dharma, ĪÚvara’s manifestation. It is in every
human
being, providing a basis on which to make his or her choices. The alienation
from ĪÚvara is going against dharma. When you go against dharma, you are
there
very much; you have fallen victim to your own pressure. What was given is a
privilege—to desire, to do, not to do. When one succumbs to the pressure
caused
by desire and it turns into passion, it makes the person go against ĪÚvara,
against
oneself. What kind of joy can one have when one goes against oneself?
Vaidikadharma
holds dharma as a puruÛËrtha, an end to be accomplished by a human
being. Dharma is a manifestation of ĪÚvara, not a mandate of god. The
difference
is the difference between the aggressive and the objective.
11 ÚaknotÌhaiva yaÒ so×huÑ prËk ÚarÌravimokÛaÙËt
kËmakrodhodbhavaÑ vegaÑ sa yukta sa sukhÌ naraÒ, BG 5.23
AVGSatsang Page # 14
The world of objects has two categories—rËga-dveÛa, objects you love to
have
and retain and objects you love to avoid and get rid of. You have the
privilege
to desire, and therefore, you have raga-dveÛa. There is no harm in them;
they
make you a privileged human being. That you can have desires is a privilege
but
one should not come under their spell, tayoÒ vaÚaÑ na Ëgaccet, BG. A spell
is
the motive force you come under only when you go against dharma. Until
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

assimilation of dharma takes place what is the deterrent? Norms in the

society,
punitive, discouraging laws are all deterrents. You have to be a mature
person to
assimilate dharma, and that comes only with one's own initiative. That is why
dharma is a puruÛËrtha. You cannot achieve it as a rule, like physical
maturity.
ÉËstra recognizes that a human being has to grow to conform to dharma
naturally, spontaneously. The growth is up to that point where you do not
have
any conflict, because what you like is exactly what is to be done, and what
you
do not like is what is not to be done. Then dharma, the puruÛËrtha is yours.
You
are a successful person. That is vaidika-dharma. See the difference. Only
then
will you have the capacity to make proper choices and to make use of the
privilege that you have. Dharma is ĪÚvara, and when you conform to dharma
you
become manmanË, one whose mind is in ĪÚvara. And for that you should
have
madbhaktaÒ, devotion to ĪÚvara.
At the end of all the discussion in the 9th chapter of the Gita, BhagavËn says,
manmanËbhava, may you become one whose mind does not lose the
presence of
ĪÚvara. In the awareness of such a person, the presence of ĪÚvara is not lost
sight of. But unless you understand ĪÚvara properly, that is not possible.
Suppose
you understand that wherever you go, all that is there is ĪÚvara, where will
the
mind go? That is what the whole teaching is. That is the difference between
an
object and ĪÚvara. A given object or a person is not any other object or
person.
You should not reduce ĪÚvara to one of those objects. Such ignorance cannot
be
further heightened. Therefore, there is so much discussion by Lord Krishna to
make himself very clear about ĪÚvara, “May the presence of me (ĪÚvara) be
always in your awareness,” because it is possible, because that is the truth.
Dharma is a manifestation of ĪÚvara in your mind, not outside of you. It
manifests in the form of your interactions with the world born of your
knowledge of dharma. Because it is a manifestation of ĪÚvara, we have the
expression, rËmaÒ vigrahavËn dharmaÒ, the Lord as dharma is manifest
with a
body, called Rama. Dharma itself assumes a body in the form of Rama.
RËma
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

means the one in whom people discover joy.12 Krishna is Ënanda-avatËra, so

his
expressions are in the form of dance, music, etc. When dharma is there,
Ënanda
12 ramante yasmin iti rËmaÒ
AVGSatsang Page # 15
will follow, and without dharma, there cannot be Ënanda. There can be artha
and
kËma, objects of pleasure, avenues of pleasure, for which there is enough
wealth
and so on, but only with dharma do they yield Ënanda. That is why Rama is
first, and then Krishna.
BhagavËn is there in the form of dharma, but not only that. BhagavËn says,
"I
am in the form of your desire, as long as it is not opposed to dharma.13 "
Even
if your desire is against dharma, in your mind BhagavËn is there in the form
of
dharma. In terms of desire, he is there in the desire of all living beings, which
is
unopposed to dharma. In an animal, the desire is unopposed to dharma
because
it is programmed. A human being, however, has knowledge of dharma, and
therefore, he alone is talked about here. “In human beings, I am in the form
of
dharma and desire that does not go against dharma.” Even if a desire is
against
dharma, like wanting to rob someone, if you do not act on the thought, then
you
do not go against ĪÚvara. Because you had no control over that thought,
even the
occurrence of that desire is according to an order and that order is ĪÚvara.
There is an order because of which there is greed, coveting and so on. That
kind
of thinking is because of pressure that arise due to the psychological order.
Psychology works along with the order of dharma. Anyone one who goes
against dharma is not intrinsically healed. There is a background which is
controlled by the psychological order, which is a manifestation of ĪÚvara. We
understand ĪÚvara only in this way. Like the physical order is a manifestation
of
ĪÚvara, the biological order is another manifestation, the physiological order
is
another manifestation of ĪÚvara, and the psychological order is another
critical
manifestation of ĪÚvara, because it is intimately connected to dharma.
The order of dharma is one side of the coin, and the other side is the order of
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

karma. Therefore, even a desire, which is not in keeping with dharma, can be
accommodated within ĪÚvara's order as long you do not go along with it.
When
one goes along with that desire, it becomes karma—adharma becomes
karma.
Only then is it adharma, otherwise it is all within dharma. It is against
dharma
only in action. Therefore, the Gita says, “You have a choice only over your
action. 14” One can argue, “Why don’t we say that this wrong action is also
ĪÚvara's order?” Yes, that is also ĪÚvara, but it turns into guilt and fear, which
is,
again, all within the order. Therefore, there is pËpa, suffering, unpleasant
experiences in this life, and the hereafter also. This is not an intelligent,
pragmatic proposition. If you think you are gaining by robbing, then the loss
is
bigger than the gain; it is yourself. Everything that you want is to please
13 dharma-aviruddho bhÍteÛu kËmo’smi BG 7.11
14 karmaÙi eva adhikËras te BG 2.47
AVGSatsang Page # 16
yourself; that is the basic want.15 You need to see yourself as a pleased
person.
How can you be pleased with guilt and fear inside? The very action has guilt
involved in it. Therefore, a fancy is not taken into account. In keeping with
the
order, there are so many fancies occurring in your head. When you go along
with one, make sure that the means of fulfilling it is in keeping with dharma.
Therefore, karma becomes so important. Dharma is the basis and karma is
what
you choose. So you have a choice over your action; you can do it or you need
not do it. That is the human choice. If that is lost, then the human status is
lost.
Therefore, you should be able to say, “No.” Up to this point, it is simple. Then
you take it to another step.
When you are in harmony with dharma in your actions, then, whatever be
the
situation, there is dharma involved. Dharma is not merely right and wrong. It
has other shades covering your life. Dharma is a dynamic order because life
is
dynamic. Situations keep on changing, but one thing never changes. In all
situations, your response is appropriate or inappropriate. That is also an
invariable. The appropriateness, called svadharma, is invariable. That this is
appropriate at this place, at this time is all hooked on to dharma. Conformity
is
consideration of others. It is a high degree of sensitivity. You conform to
certain
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

conventions, which are all man-made conventions, but then, because you
are
doing what is appropriate, it will not cause any resistance from anyone.
Therefore, you live a life of least disturbance. That is our understanding of
ahiÑsa. At the time of sannyËsa, ahiÑsa alone is the commitment. It is a life
of
least disturbance to others and one's self, which is svakarma.
A situation calls for a certain thing to be done, and when you do it, you feel
free because you have done your svakarma. If you do not do the laundry in
time,
nothing will happen, but the load of laundry will sit inside your head. I say
this
because when you finally do it, you feel lighter. It is clear that the load was
unloaded. BhagavËn says, “The human being gains success in life by doing
what
is to be done.16” BG 'To be done' also implies appropriateness and etiquette.
If
you have any doubt as to whether something is dharma or adharma, then
ask
and follow what the elders say or do. Conformity to dharma implies that what
you do is not in any way harmful or disturbing. It includes the environment,
flora and fauna also. Seeking help in knowing dharma is intelligent living. To
be
ignorant is not a special privilege of someone. Everyone is ignorant, until the
person knows. Svakarma, whatever is to be done, whatever is appropriate, in
all
situations, is BhagavËn. If you recognize the presence of ĪÚvara by doing the
appropriate thing, then you are manmanË.
15 Ëtmanastu kËmËya sarvaÑ priyaÑ bhavati BrU 2.4.5; 4.5.6
16 svakarmaÙË tam abhyarcya siddhiÑ vindati mËnavaÒ BG 18.46
AVGSatsang Page # 17
manmanË bhava madbhakto madyËjÌ bhava mËÑ namaskuru
mËmevaiÚyasi yuktvaivamËtmËnaÑ matparËyaÙËÒ BG 9.34
To be that person whose mind is awake to the presence of ĪÚvara in all
situations, you do your svakarma with an awareness of, and conformity to,
the
order of dharma. Then you are in harmony with ĪÚvara. Whether you know
ĪÚvara or not, when you do what is to be done, you feel at home. That is
because you are in harmony with ĪÚvara, 'what is'. At all times the 'to be
done',
is given. You have no choice. When you do that without conflict, there is
harmony. The awareness is important; dharma implies all this. It is not only a
universal value structure; it is also duty. Even giving is dharma, because it is
also something to be done. In a given situation, when you are in a position to
give, you give. The SËmaveda tells us dËnena adËnaÑ tara, overcome the
incapacity to give by giving. Being this kind of a person is not something you
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

can decide about and be. It is a matter of understanding and living.

The Devotee
manmanË bhava madbhaktaÒ
Being manmanË is not possible if you are a devotee, bhakta, of something
else.
If you look at the devotees in the world, they have a certain understanding of
ĪÚvara in different degrees. They have some kind of Úraddha, belief in
ĪÚvara,
and want ĪÚvara to help, but what they want is most important. If someone
wants redress from his difficulties, relief from distress, he is a distressed
devotee,
an Ërta-bhakta. If everything goes well, then ĪÚvara does not come into the
picture, because this person thinks he is in charge. When things do not go
well,
then he invokes the grace of ĪÚvara, which is the right thing to do. That
bhakta
is a devotee in distress. The second kind is a devotee in distress too, but he
is
also an arthËrthi, a devotee invoking grace for the success of an
undertaking. He
is more aware of the need of some grace. He understands that ÌÚvara-
anugraha is
necessary for achieving his ends, artha. Besides the course of action that
one
employs for achieving a given end, one works for grace, because in between
there are too many problems. That is religious pragmatism.
There is a third type of bhakta. He will pray when in distress, seek help, do
what is to be done and invoke grace when he wants to accomplish an end.
But
primarily he is a jijÕËsu, one who wants to know. The Lord says, "He is the
one
who wants to know me. Knowledge of me becomes his primary end."
Everything else subserves that end, and that end is there all through his life.
It is
not that it is there at a given time and not there at other times. It is always
there.
If one is a bhakta, a jijÕËsu, it means that all through he or she is that. No
matter what kind of altar one prays to, a bhakta is always a bhakta. He is the
primary person, because primarily he is related to ĪÚvara.
AVGSatsang Page # 18
A wave in the ocean may be related to another wave because it was born of
that
wave. It also has a relationship to other waves as a sister, brother, friend,
etc.
But there is one relationship, which is not variable. In other relationships,
when
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

one is there, the others are absent—when the sister is there, the daughter
has to
be gone. In the invariable relationship, the bhakta wave is related to ocean.
When the bhakta relates to her mother, does the bhakta go away, and the
daughter come? No. Let us look at the mother and the ocean—the
relationship is
that of the individual and total. If there is a mother's mother, that mother
also is
individual and total; mother's daughter, individual and total. Mother's
daughter
related to mother's mother is not the same. She is granddaughter, but still,
individual and total. Small, big, old, young are all individual and total. In
other
words when this relationship is recognized, the individual becomes a
permanent
bhakta. We have to create a word for this person, the one who recognizes
the
presence of the total pervading him or her. The ocean pervades the wave.
Therefore, as an individual she is always related to the total. She can never
be
away from the total presence. As an individual, she is pervaded and
sustained by
the total. If she understands the role she has, the nature of ĪÚvara, the order
that
is ĪÚvara, then sshe is pervaded, sustained, blessed, he can say, by the
presence
of ĪÚvara, the total. This relationship is absolute because it is not variable.
A person who is basically a bhakta does not need to promote bhakti. That is
the
truth, but it takes jÕËnam, knowledge, to appreciate that, and that is why
BhagavËn says he is a jijÕËsu and not the more general bhakta. He is a
bhakta
who is not subject to spasms of bhakti. This bhakta is the basic person, the
one
who recognizes the relationship that is basic, that of the individual to the
total. It
is invariable, and remains there always, so that he has no doubt about what
role
he plays. A jijÕËsu-bhakta is not a seasonal bhakta. A jijÕËsu wants
BhagavËn
because he is available for owning, just for the asking. All that is here is
BhagavËn so gaining of BhagavËn, is knowing. Bhagavat-darÚanam is
knowing.
Seeing a particular form is mËnasika-ÌkÛaÙaÑ and is purely subjective. Even
if
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

BhagavËn gives such a darÚana as his karmaphala, it is still mËnasika-

ÌkÛaÙa.
Because the presence of ĪÚvara is always there, the gain of ĪÚvara is
knowing
ĪÚvara.
Such a person is unaffected by the roles. That is the bhakta. His bhakti is the
cushion, so the roles' problems are confined to the roles. This is not ordinary.
For that, you have to be a bhakta. That is the truth. Do not say you are
consciousness. It does not work. That is dissociation. Because you are an
individual, you have to resolve the issue with the presence of ĪÚvara.
Between
the bhakta who is aware of the presence of ĪÚvara and the role, there is
always a
self-aware distance, that is, a distance brought about by self-awareness. This
distance is purely self-identity, not losing self-identity while playing roles.
AVGSatsang Page # 19
Therefore, role-playing is not an issue. The whole life is role-playing and in
every role the bhakta is always present. This is a jijÕËsu-bhakta.
Madbhakto bhava, may you be my devotee. There are different kinds of
devotees. If one is a devotee because one needs the help of BhagavËn,
BhagavËn becomes an accomplice for various ends. There is nothing wrong
with
that, because we need grace, but we need to have knowledge of ĪÚvara,
which is
the gain of ĪÚvara. Therefore, madbhakto bhava means that one has to
become a
jijÕËsu. How?
MadyËjÌ bhava mËÑ namaskuru. For a jijÕËsu, any action enjoined by the
Veda,
a vaidika-karma, is also for gaining the knowledge of ĪÚvara. MadyËjÌ bhava,
means offer all your worship—whether smËrta-karmas or vaidika-karmas,
stuthi,
namaskËra, etc.— unto me Any ray of glory anywhere is ĪÚvara's
manifestation.
Thus be, matparËyaÙËÒ, one for whom I am the ultimate end to be
accomplished.
We have to say 'ultimate' because there are other ends. Through all other
ends,
you achieve the param, ultimate, end. MËmeva eÚyasi, certainly you will
reach
me. The various things that we do in life become yoga when that is kept in
view.
We need not change anything external; attitude changes, vision changes.
Then, the culmination of the various devotees—Ërta arthËrti jijÕËsuÒ—is a
fourth
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

devotee called a jÕËni, a fulfilled devotee. All are devotees. Lord Krishna
says,
“All are exalted [because they recognize me; they have Úraddha in puÙya-
pËpa,
dharma], but then, the jÕËni is myself alone.” 17 That is ĪÚvara's vision.

17 udhËrËs sarva evaite jÕËnÌtvËtmaiva me matam BG 7.18

Schiffrin (1994:115) points out that “social meanings of acts can be formulated in
terms of their interpersonal and interactional consequences, thus providing another
context in which utterance meaning is situated”. This applies to proverbs in
exchanges also, as can be seen in the following example:

A : I: sandarbhanga: ku:l drinks ti:sukurandi.

This context according to cool drinks get

‘On this occasion, get cool drinks’.

B : Talliki chi:retle:duga:ni pinatalliki sa:rettaduta.

Mother to saree give cannot but aunt to saree gave.

‘He cannot give a saree to his mother but gave a saree to his aunt’.

[Sare is a gift of clothes, food stuffs, and other domestic items given on
special occasions such as marriage, birth ceremonies etc.]
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

B (Clerk’s) ‘Cousin’ (brother’s daughter) passed the examinations in

distinction and he breaks the news to his colleague A (the superintendent) in the
office.

As utterances b(a) and (d) are conventionally seen as face-threatening being

an imperative in the first instance and a censure in the second instance. But are
they really so in this context? No, they are not.

Let us see why it is so. A and B are friends and have a jovial and warm
relationship. They are also intimate. That is why A is permitted to intrude upon B’s
freedom of action (negative politeness and issue an order b(a) which is considered
without any offence. B’s utterance .. is a rejection of A’s order and is an enhanced
modification of A’s informal request and a promise to fulfill that modified order.
There are two possibilities here. It would threaten A’s positive politeness, if A
thinks that B is hedging. However, B is not hedging ; he is merely boasting via a
bigger promise. That is known from the background interpersonal relationship
between A and B. At the same time, A has missed his cool drinks and wants to
tease him on that account. So he light-heartedly jokes using the proverb as a
discourse strategy. This fact is confirmed by his laugh. The same proverb in a
different interpersonal setting, for example, in a cold relationship between A and B
may trigger a potential censure threatening B’s positive politeness. Thus, we have
seen that interpersonal relationships alter the social meaning. They also alter the
emergent sequence of discourse. For example, in a formal relationship, A would
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

not have used an imperative in the first instance and again would not have used the
proverb in the second instance in (b) – A would have opted for an indirect or polite
or no request and consequently concluded the exchange with an acknowledgement
or a support.

However, the identification of speech acts is problematic since the conditions

for two speech acts may be similar as in the case of, say, questions and requests
(cf. ibid 71) leading to alternative interpretations as exemplified in the case of :

‘Ywant a piece of candy?’ as a question, as a question, a request and an offer

(ibid 59-85) followed by ‘No’ as an answer, a compliance, and a refusal.
Nonetheless, not all texts yield to such multiple interpretations. In such cases, there
will be a cross-matching of the speech acts producing incoherence if multiple
interpretations are sought. The coherence will come out if only the intentionality of
the Speaker / Hearer is known from their psychological knowledge and not from the
textual representation. Such a phenomenon can be observed in a proverbial
exchange – as in the case of an (angry) elicitation and an (angry) exclamation both
in the interrogative structure – given below in (2) :

1. A : mi : ru ha : rsu raidiingki ra:le:de: ?

You horse riding to come not i.m.

2. B: buddiki Savurle : du ga:ni kottam lo:di : pam pedata : nannatta :….

Bottle to oil not (then) but cattle hut in light put wills aid that
‘There is no oil for the (small lamp) bottle but he said that he will put a (big
lamp) in the cattle hut (shed).

(1) A : puvvulu ti:se:ste:, vigraham andamga le:du.

‘(If you) remove(ing) the flowers, the idol is

unattractive’

B : avunu, undade:miti? Manishi ku:da: ante: alanka:ram

 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

tise:ste:
So will it not be ? Even a man (is) also like that, if the
decoration is removed.
Anni: pedite: bommakka, anni: tiste: timmakka.

(If you) put(ting) all Sister Doll, removing all Sister

Thimma.

[ Bommakka is women decorated like a doll;

Thimmakka is an ill-dressed country girl ]

2. Contextual Reconcretization of the Abstraction

3. Algorithmic- Heuristic - Automatic Processing of Cognition in

Derivation of Meaning

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________ [2000b]. “Proposition in Proverbs: A Semantic
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tion of Meaning in Proverbs

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tion of Meaning in Proverbs

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Sarah Mills on Gender and Politeness

In this chapter I aim to bring together new theoretical work on gender from feminist linguistics
with new theorising of linguistic politeness. (1) I aim to clear some theoretical space for thinking
about both the terms gender and politeness, and thus much of the paper is given over to a critique
of theorising on this subject. My argument is that we need a more flexible and complex model of
gender and politeness. Theorists in gender and language research cannot continue to discuss
gender simply in terms of the differential linguistic behaviour of males and females as groups;
we need to be able to analyse the various strategies which gendered, raced and classed women
and men adopt in particular circumstances and with particular goals and interests. (2) In terms of
the analysis of politeness, I would argue that we need several analytical changes: firstly, we need
to see politeness as occurring over longer-stretches of talk; secondly, it should be seen within the
context of a community of practice, rather than as simply as the product of individual speakers,
and finally, we need to be aware that there may be conflicts over the meanings of politeness. By
focusing on the analysis of an incident in which I was involved, in the final part of this essay, I
try to formulate the ways in which I think the theorising of gender and politeness might proceed,
and in particular I focus on the way that impoliteness is dealt with in interactional terms. A more
pragmatic focus on impoliteness enables us to view politeness less as an addition to a
conversation, something which is grafted on to individual speech acts in order to facilitate
interaction between speaker and hearer, (which is at least implicit in Brown and Levinson's 1978
model) but rather as something which emerges at a discourse level, over stretches of talk and
across communities of speakers and hearers. This, therefore, constitutes a discourse analysis of
politeness, rather than a linguistic analysis of politeness. Thus, rather than identifying the Face
Threatening Acts performed by individuals and the politeness repair work deemed necessary to
contain their force, as Brown and Levinson (1978) have done, I will be focusing instead on the
effect of impoliteness on groups and the way that gender plays a role in assumptions about who
can be impolite to whom, and who needs to repair the damage. I will suggest that, using
Relevance theory to examine the way that male and female interactants make sense of an event
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

in speech, we may be able to see gendered protocols at work. (Sperber and Wilson, 1986) In
viewing a range of different interactions we can analyse the different strategies adopted by
various women rather than attempting to make generalisations about the way that all women
respond to rudeness or are themselves impolite. (3) In this way, we can map out parameters for
strategic intervention to repair interaction and suggest ways in which they may be contextually
gendered, without making assumptions about the necessary pairing of language items with a
specific gender.

The above quote suggests that prototype structure theory serves as a descriptive
model for describing meaning on the level of performance. Prototype categories
have not only the functional advantage of offering “maximum information with the
least cognitive effort” (Rosch, p.28), but according to Geeraerts they also “maintain
themselves to changing circumstances and new expressive needs” (1988, p.223).
For instance, prototypical ‘vehicles’ of the early 19th Century (carriages) are not the
same as prototypical ‘vehicles’ of the early 21st Century (motor-cars). If, however,
the prototype of ‘vehicle’ has changed in the past hundred years, this does not
mean that the meaning of ‘vehicle’ has also changed. This consideration of
temporal changes creates an additional problem for prototype structures as
representations of real world categories.

In this context, however, Lehrer remarks that the same words are not used only
in their prototypical sense but that single words are frequently extended in meaning
for other peripheral events, processes or situations. She adds that this strategy can
be useful to account for an infinitive set of expressive needs by a finite lexicon.
Therefore, fuzzy boundary words are useful in the sense that they are applicable to
a wider variety of things, situations and events. Thus, lexical economy can be
achieved.

The experiments of both Labov and Rosch mentioned above, show that prototype
theory involves a psycholinguistic notion that aids human categorization.The related
features can be summarised as follows:

1. 1. A prototypical structure underlies every category.

2. 2. Prototype categories cannot be realised by means of a set of features,

since the various members may not share the same amount of such features.

3. 3. Prototype categories may be blurred at the edges.

4. 4. Category membership can be realised in terms of gradience.i[2]

5. 5. Semantic structures of such categories often cluster and overlap in

meaning.
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

The above five features can be characterised as related in two dimensions,

according to Taylor, “prototypicality, as studied by Rosch, is intimately up with what
we might call the ‘two axes of categorisation” (1989, p.46). In Rosch’s terms the
horizontal dimension describes the internal structure of a category, while the
vertical dimension describes the intercategorial structure. The horizontal dimension
is concerned with descriptions such as why x is a cat and not a dog, but it does not
consider why in certain cases x is categorised as animal or mammal. The vertical
dimension, on the other hand, exhibits a threefold subdivision: basic levels,
superordinate levels and subordinate levels. The basic level is considered as the
most informative and can therefore be claimed as the most economical with
relation to cognitive processes. In fact, the basic level terms can be considered as of
privileged status reflected in everyday situations. For example, supposing there is
an apple on the kitchen table, it is likely that a person would ask another‘could you
please fetch the apple for me?’ but it would be unlikely that they would them to
pass ‘the Golden Delicious’ or ‘the piece of fruit’, ‘the Golden Delicious’ being in a
subordinate category and ‘the piece of fruit’ being in a superordinate category. This
explains the above statement that basic level objects, such as apples or dogs,
attract a privileged status because they belong to the most inclusive level at which,
according to Kleiber, “information-rich bundles of co-occurring perceptual and
functional attributes” are to be found (p.59); these are also common to all or most
of the category members. The following section considers the relation between
prototype structures and meaning.

It would not be appropriate to claim that the meaning of a given lexeme , such as
‘bird’, is expressed by the meaning of its prototype, such as sparrow or blackbird.
Instead, and according to Colman and Kay,

many words have as their meaning not a list of necessary and sufficient
conditions that a thing or event must satisfy to count as a member of a
category denoted by the word, but rather a psychological object or
process which we have called a PROTOTYPE. (p.43)

In relation to the above quote, Kleiber argues that the prototype should be regarded
as a cognitive representation, which is generally associated with a particular word
and serves as the reference point for categorisation. Therefore, the meaning of a
given word is not defined by a concrete prototype, but rather by the mental
representation of the prototype. This mental picture is not necessarily the
representation of a realistic example of a given category, but rather an abstract
entity that involves some combination of related typical features.

For this reason, Rosch states that human categorisation “should not be
considered the arbitrary product of historical accident or of whimsy but rather the
result of psychological principles of categorisation” (1978, p.27). This means that
 Deriva
tion of Meaning in Proverbs

human cognition is the primary element for any categorisation process (linguistic
categorisation included). Rosch argues that an object is assigned to a category
through comparison with its prototype object rather than a set of criterial features.
This prototype object consists of a mental entity in the human mind.
i[2] It is important to add to this point the assumptions made in a study by Barsalou (1987), who,
following that the graded structure of a category is not stable but varies across contexts, concluded that
invariant structural characteristics of categories are not represented by graded structures. This
instability in graded structure is triggered by the temporal representations of concepts of the same
category in the working memory domain, on different occasions. Accounting for these graded
structures as highly dynamic and an unstable phenomenon, he evaluated the proposal that the memory
stores such representations; certain associative strengths (between the category and its exemplars)
represent a category’s graded structure in long-term memory. Assessing the strength of these
associative relations, people assign higher typicality values to higher strengths. For an extended
discussion see Barsalou, 1987.
“Researchers have long been aware that linguistic communication, of which face-to-face
dialogue is merely one variety, is an irreducibly social phenomenon. Remarkably,
however, among authors dealing with theoretical questions in pragmatics, including
Austin, Searle and Grice, there is a consistent tendency to downplay, hide, or abstract
away from the institutionalized nature of most if not all speech acts, and from the
specifically social character of these institutions (cf. Bourdieu 1991, Briggs 1998). Searle
in particular tends to naturalize and decontextualize the conventions involved, as he has
the explicit aim of redescribing the philosophy of language as a subpart of the philosophy
of mind. In keeping with with this approach, he tries to reduce the social aspects of
language use to biological characteristics of the mind, and to relocate the social
conventions in a allegedly largely culture-independent domain of rules of language usage
that follow their own logic. In recent years, speech act theory has ceded much ground to
more descriptive approaches like conversation analysis, but on this specific point no
major revisions appear to have been made. My intention here is to exploit what lines of
empirical research could be opened up if we do take the social and institutionalized
dimension of linguistic communication seriously.” (Leezenberg, Michel (1995) Symbolic Power,
Illocutionary Force, and Impoliteness: A Critical Look at the Foundations of
Speech Act Theory)

With the above-mentioned syntactic and propositional structures of

proverbs, let us see how the quantity maxim is inter-related.

(1) A : a: gottam akkadinunchi tiyyave: ante: vinale:du.

B : ne: tiyyanu. Ante:

C : attaga:ru che:sina paniki a:rallu le:vani.

(2) A : i: ve:la e:ncheyyamanta:vu? [ check it.]

 B: e:vi:le:ni samsa:ra:niki muppeviti chandrakantalondave:

pellama: anna:tta.

(3) A : evandi mi:ru ha:rsu raidingki rale:de:?

B : buddiki savurle:duga:ni kottamlo: deepavedata:nna:tta.

Ekkada kudarle:dandi.

(4) A : puvvulu ti:se:ste:, vigraham andamga le:du.

‘(If you) remove(ing) the flowers, the idol is unattractive’

B : avunu, undade:miti? Manishi ku:da: ante: alanka:ram

tise:ste:
So will it not be ? Even a man (is) also like that, if the
decoration is removed.
Anni: pedite: bommakka, anni: tiste: timmakka.

(If you) put(ting) all Sister Doll, removing all Sister Thimma.

[ Bommakka is women decorated like a doll; Thimmakka is

an ill-dressed country girl ]

In this exchange, the proverbial base is worked out before the

proverb’s use (i.e. inductively). The proverb is used to establish

cultural approval for her support in P3 form. Generally, when the

proverbial base carries more information, P3 forms are used;

contrarily, when the information is shared, a P1 form is used (either

textually or contextually by background) (See examples (7), (1), (5)

and (10) in commenting our actions. However, a P1 form alone is used

in conveying information by implicature and in (3) and the following

example :

(5) A : Ardharatri ku:chunte: evade:na medattukunta:du.

“ In the midnight if you sit down someone will hold the neck

B : Sivuda:jna lende: chi;maina kuttadu.

“ Without Eswara’s will, not even an ant will bite “

In (3), B informs A indirectly via the proverb that he did not have

money even for his daily expenditure and so how can he spare money

for horse-riding – B has to spend roughly 60 rupees per one riding

sessionat concessional rates for CIEFL Horse Riding Club. In (10), B

assures A that nothing will happen (to her) even if there is no special

door to the Varandha – She wants to use it in the night for Urinals

since the toilet is far – since nothing will happen if God does not

ordain it.

In the case of (3), B achieves another objective by upholding the PP in

two ways : 1. He maximizes dispraise of himself to gain A’s

sympathetic appreciation of his problem and thus mitigate the threat

to A’s face – B failed to fulfil his promise to come for horse riding; 2.

But maximizing dispraise of himself is done via the indirect action of

the proverb which is less face-threatening than direct speech action

on a scale of politeness shown below in Fig.1. In this way he saves his

face. In addition, the proverb strengthens B’s claim to further make

the first goal more effective, thus hitting three birds at a shot !. This is

an interest case of PP.

MORE POLITE

Where both A’s and B’s face are simultaneously saved. In real life

situations as in the above example B did not make all these

calculations before he said it. It is automatized social behaviour just

like recognizing a tree by looking at it and naming it instantaneously;

the reaction is spontaneously cognized and uttered simultaneously.

This is possible from the experience of exposure to such

psycholinguistic activity. In cultivated speech such as writing or

prepared public orations, such reactions can, nonetheless, be planned.

Now, that we know the relationship between a proverb and its base,

we can find out its quality. The proverb upholds the quality maxim if

the proverbial proposition and the proverbial base proposition

complement each other to instantiate a pro-cat relationship; else, the

quality maxim fails. In other words, the proverb’s quality hinges in the

pro-cat relationship. If it is established correctly, it means that he did

not say 1) What is believed to be false (quality maxim 1); and 2.that

for which he lacked adequate evidence (quality maxim 2). It is

important here to note that the quality maxim hinges on his

instantiation of the pro-cat relationship and not on his morality of

telling the truth or a lie. However, whether he is telling the truth or not

is guessed from a background knowledge of the proverb user. Hence,

if B can really afford horse riding – as known from B’s personal wealth

– A will derive the implicature that he is telling lies.

Having discussed the quantity and quality’s maxims, let us examine

the relation maxim from their perspective.

(6) Relation Maxim Revisited

By knowing whether the quality maxim is upheld or not, we will know

whether the relation is established or not. For example, in (9), the

proverb has the following three meanings :

1. Putting all (decorations), (it is) sister Doll; removing

(decorations) (it is) Sister Thimma : (Referential Meaning)

2. When decorated an object looks beautiful; when

undecorated it looks not beautiful : prototypical meaning.

3. Yes, the idol is not beautiful since it is undecorated. The

prototypical meaning of the proverb when mapped onto the

context fits its proposition – It will be explained later on that

 there is an adhyasa in the context to appear as the proverb

and vice versa – Hence, the relevance of the proverb is

established in terms of its correspondence. This

correspondence is (made) further relevant by its cultural

praxis indication (for approval). Thus, relationship is

established via quality.

In the case of (3), the proverb is further made relevant by an

appeal to PP also. (7) PP and proverbs, sometimes, proverbs are
used to uphold that mainly PP via the proverb. In such cases,
proverbs strongly uphold, or front the PP. Proverbs are made
relevant then mainly by PP. For example in (11), the proverb is
relevant by fronting the PP blatantly.
(6) A : a: swichchi konchem nokkave: ra:dha.

B : kukkani pilchi piyyi nakinchukune:kante:

eththukunte:nayam.

“ Instead of calling the dog to lick the shit, it is better to lift it

(for throwing out)

[ A is asking C to press the correct switch of the fan which she

was not able to do and B (her mother) was angry at her ]

Here the proverb clearly violates the modesty maxim and the

sympathy maxim. By using the proverb, she implicates that C is like a

dog which in a different interpersonal context can spark off a row as in

the following example.

 (7) A : bayatunnappudu panilo:ki rakandi.

“ when you are in menses, don’t come for work “

B : cheppe:vi sriranga ni:tulu du:re:vi dommara gudiselu.

“ Those being told are Srirangam morals, those being got

into dommar huts “

Here A is an old housewife and B is her middle-aged Cook. She is

traditional and particular about keeping off from domestic work those

in menses for cleanliness. Such practice is cultural and it is being

abandoned by many now-a-days. B’s reply violates PP at the

approbation and agreement maxim levels. It is so because of the age

difference; social status difference; and the offensive meaning

attached to the phrase “dommara huts”. The use of the proverb

sparked off a row between them.

Proverbs are used to enhance face also. For example :

(8) A : A:yana goppa vidvansudu. A:yana mundara che:tulu

kattuku nilapadalsinde.

‘ He is a great scholar. We should stand near him crossing arms

‘ B : e:do: hanumanthuni mundara kuppigantulla:ga.

“ Something like hopping in front of Hanuman “

In (13), A is highly learned and saintly person revered by many. He

uses the proverb to enhance his face by humbling himself. This is a

contrastive proverb and all such proverbs are double - edged : They

cut down somebody’s size and at the same time enlarge another

person’s stature. Thus, in showing the other person as great, the

approbation maxim is upheld; and in humbling oneself, the modesty

maxim is upheld. In all these cases, PP plays its role in the choice and

use of proverbs.

POLITENESS PRINCIPLE AND PROVERBS

Proverbs are divided into literary, colloquial (including slang), and

vulgar proverbs according to the standard of language used with their

appropriateness conditions in different types of situations which are

broadly divided into formal, informal and intimate (Bhuvaneswar

1999). Based on this observation, proverbs can be polite or impolite if

there is an appropriate matching or mismatching of the language of

the proverb with the situation, impolite features can be identified as

follows:-

A.1. According to the lexical items, vulgar words (especially

genital organ and four letter words) are always considered impolite in

civil behaviour; 2. After four letter words, other taboo words such as

‘muddi’ (anus), ‘munda’ (widow, also prostitute), etc. are also impolite

in civic behaviour; 3. after them, metaphorical implicatures involving

reference to animals such as donkey, dog, and pig which are held in
low esteem are less polite; 4. sexual words, not necessarily vulgar but

low on politeness scale, are also considered impolite – ‘ranku’ (illicit

sexual relation), ‘lanzatanam’ (immortality) etc. come into this

category.

B.1 According to themes, all sex-related proverbs are impolite in

civic consideration; 2. Themes which invoke comparison with lowly

held practices are also considered impolite, especially, caste-based or

occupation-based comparisons. However, these features lose their

impoliteness in a friendly or intimate interpersonal situations. For

example, a vulgar proverb (with four letter words) will produce a

humorous and warm atmosphere in intimate situations while it can be

very impolite in formal situations. In a similar way, a proverb such as

“A braying donkey, coming, has spoiled a grazing donkey “ will be

very impolite if used to comment on an elderly or superior person’s

action. That is power (P) and distance (D) play an important role in

neutralizing impoliteness (See Brown and Levinson 1987 : 15ff)

Let us take a few examples to show how lexis and theme affect

politeness in proverbs. As the lexical items become increasingly

crude, the politeness also becomes less and less as in the following

case.

(9) A:
 ‘ has (played) (shown) teased ‘

B:

“ has shown the anus “

C:

“ has shown the crotch “

[ ‘anus’ is impolite, but ‘crotch’ is “taboo” ]

When the prepositional content in a proverb is changed from topics

considered acceptable in a civic behaviour to less and less socially

valued practices, the politeness value also falls down as in the

following case.

(10) a)

‘ he cannot give a saree to his mother but he said he would give a

saree to his aunt ‘

b)

‘ A women unable to jump to a Utti said that she would jump to

heaven ‘
 c)

‘ There is no oil for the lamp-bottle, but he said that he

would put a lamp in the cattle shed ‘

d)

‘ (there is) No food for the evening, but he said he would do horse

riding ‘

e)

‘ Not a morsel (he has) to swallow but he wants sampangi

oil to moustache ‘

In the above examples, (e) is more damaging than (a) since the social

practice in (a) is at a higher level in terms of expenditure than (d).

Buying a saree is more expenditure than getting a morsel of food to

eat and so also giving a saree than buying ‘sampangi’ oil. In a similar

way, not having oil for the lamp is at a higher level than not getting

food to eat in the evening which is higher than not getting a morsel of

food to eat at all. (Bhuvaneshwar (1999).

In (14), the cost to the hearer (ef. Leech 1985 : 123ff) becomes more

and more as the language becomes ruder and ruder while in (15), it is

so as the proposition describes a practice which is lesser and lesser in

its social value. Surprisingly, (14 (a) has __________ “teasing or joking”

which is non-metaphorical while [14 (b) (c)] have metaphors in place

of ‘teasing’. However, 14(b) and (c) are more impolite in spite of being

more indirect. This is so because of the inhibitive ranking of vulgar

words as more impolite them direct speech acts without vulgar words.

In the case of (15), the prototypical practices in propositions are

hierarchically ranked according to their social value and carry the

stamp of cultural authority. Hence, they are stronger than other

normal utterance indirect speech acts. As a result they are more face

enhancing or threatening (eg. As in Fig.1)

So far we have discussed the pragma-linguistic functions of proverbs

in terms of the quantity, quality, relation and manner maxims of CP

and PP. Now let us discuss the socio-pragmatics of proverbs.