Swearing

and the Expression

of the Emotions
 

Richard Hirsch



Chapter from the book Perspectives on Swearing

By Lars‐Gunnar Andersson and Richard Hirsch

Series: Swearing Reports, 2
ISSN: 0282‐4302

Department of Linguistics, University of Göteborg
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SlVEARING AND TIlE EXPRESSlON OF TIlE Jl.\1OTIQl'S

1. Introdue tion

Swearing is often defined as an expression of feelings and emotions.

It is, hm'lever, not fulIy clear 1.my we swear to express our feelings and
emotions. This paper will try to east some light on some aspeets of this
question. The first part of the paper 1<ill deal with the problem of what
emotions there are and how they can be charaeterized.

The characterization 1<ill be presented in tenns of a conceptual model.

11lis conceptual model gives us aninsight into the various dimensions. of an
emotion as a psyho-social phenomenon. The latter part of the paper.will
be devoted to a discussion of how the emotions are related to swearing.

Z.What emotions there are.

In this paper I will take it as given that emotions are phenomena that
exist in their own right. They can not be reduced to bodily sensations or
neuro-phsyiological events. They are instead velY eomplex psycho-social
conceptual phenomena. Our interest in this paper will therefore be primari-
ly aimed at looking at tHe emotions in this sense and only secondaril'y in
vie'. . ing the emotions as some sort of somatic states.

Throughout the history of western cuHure there have been literally

hundreds of attempts at listing and characterizing the emotions. Among
the most early attempts is that of the stoie Zeno who reckor.ed with four
classes of I irrationai and unnatural rnovements in the soul' -namely,
1) Grief, 2) Fear, 3) Desire or eraving, and 4) Pleasure. CDiogenes
Laertius, Book 11:217)

Each of these classes contained a number of species.

Grief or pain, defined as an irrationai mental contraction had as species -

pitY, envy, j ealousy , rivalry, hcaviness, annoyance, distress, anguish",
distraction.

Pear, defined as the expectation of evil had as species - terror, nervous

shrinking, shame, consternation, pani~mental agony.
r

62

Desire or craving, defined as irrationaI appetency had as species - \. . ant,

hatl'ed, contentiousness, anger, love, \1Tath, resentment.

Pleasure, defined as an irrational elation at the acquiring of what seerns to

be choice"orthy had as species - ravishment, malevolent joy, de light ,
transport.

Zeno, also reckoned with a nwnber of emQtional sta tes that wel'e good, i e
rationai and natural.

~, defined as rationai elation with the species - delight, mirth, cheerful-

ness.

Caution, defined as rational avoiclance with the species - reverence, modesty.

Wishing, defined as rationai desire with the species - wellwishing, bene-

volence, friendliness, respect and affection.

We see here that Zeno takes aJather negative view of what "e today nomally
call the emotions. This is probably a result of his aims of disciplining the
~oul in order to gain the status of 'a wise man'. However the case may be, one

important point of interest to us is evident in this very ear1y attempt at

saying what emotions are and how many and of "hat kinds.

We notic'e that Zena lists a munber of species under the different class
concepts. These are related in same sense to the general class con,cept. In.
,."hat \."ays the species are related to the general concept is) however, not
specified. There are probably many points of criticism that can be addressed
at this classification, for instance, whether Shrune really belongs under
Fear or constitutes a general class concept on a par with Fear. The main
point to be made here, however, is that there seem to be large groups of
related concepts that pertain to the emotions. Specifying "hich groups
there are and hOl'f the concepts in the groups are related to each other
has been the major goal of the m.ny propos als for classifications of the
emotions.

In the mare modern discussion these general group s are usual1y spaken
of in tems of family resemblances (W PAlston, 1968) or in tenns of seman-
tic fields (Hirsch, 1980). In this paper I will refer to sucl>. groups as
 63

conceptual complex\}s. Sueh ?- conceptual complex is not always given' a

simple labeI, for instance,Zeno's grief or pain, and desire or craving.
Just hmv wc should best labeI these kOmplexes so as to avoid cQnfusion
but at the same time being economical and effective is a problem we will
address when we come to the maTe modern classifications.

Another ploblem that arises upon an inspecti,on of Zena I s classification

is the fact that the tenns that are used for labeling the emotion concepts
are not strictly scientific. Rather, they are everyday tenns that'-are lised
in a wide range of contexts and senses. They are part of what might be call-
ed a conunon sense folk theory of the emotions. Many of the treatises onl
the emotions consist of atternpts at regimenting this tenninology to make"
it serviceable for philosophy and psychology.

Aristotle in his 'Art of Rhetoric ' gives the follewing definition.ofl

emotions.

'The emotions are all those affections ''lhich cause men to change
their opinion in regard to their judgements, and are accompanied
by plasure and pain. Each of them must be divided under tnree
heads; for instance, in ragard to anger, the dispositian of:
mind which makes men angry, the persons with whorn they are nngry
and occasions which give rise to anger.' CAristotle, 1975:7.3)

In his 'Nicomachean Ethics 1 i he makes an attempt to define 'ho,'1 and with

whorn and for what reasens and how long one Dught to be angry, or within
what limits a person does this rightly or wrongly.' (Aristotle, 1976: 162)

In the 'Art of Rhetoric'his purpose is to instruct the ",Duld be orator in

the art of manipulating the listeners' emotions. There he deals with twelve
different emotions:
Anger, Mildness,Love, Hate, Fear, Confidence, Shame, Benevolence,
Pity, Indignation, Envy and Emulation.
Describing, as he says in the definition, the dispositions of the mind,
the objects and the occasions which give rise to the respective -emotions.
Although there is SOffie attempt to relate the emotions to the more basic
states of pleasure and pain, it is not systematically carried out.

The systematic attempt at reducing the emotions to plcasure and pain was
left to Spinoza. In his 'Ethics t Spinoza gives an account of the emotions
where they are placed in relation to nature (or being) according to his
geometrical method.
 64

Spinoza ~s interested in showing that the emotions can be redlzced to same

crnnbination of Pleasure, Pain and Desire in contrast to the Cartesian doc-
trine that there are five primary passion Gladness, Sadness, Love, }~tred

and Desire. Spmoza 1 s catalouge of emotions in the 'Ethics I is probably

the most inelusive one to be fOlmd in the philosophieal aeeounts. There he
defines and characterizes at least thirty-nine different emotions 1.mich
fall under the heading human servitude and eight more that fall under the
~1-eadinghlUIlan
freedom. However, because the emotions are object oriented
there is in principle no lunit to the number of emotions according to
Spinoza.
'There are as many specie:s of plea~ure,. pain,desire and consequE!ntlx: any
emotion which is composed of these, such as wavering of the mind, or
which is derived from the5e, such aS love, fear, hope,hateetc, as there
are species of objeets bywhich>we are affeeted.' (Prop.LVI, Part 3)
'The emotions can be compounded one with another in so many ways,
and so··. many variations can arise from these combinations, that it
were impossible to express them by any number.' (Spinoza, 1979:,127)
This is surely the most extreme position to be found an~;here as to the
number of emotions. Spinoza himself retreats from this position to deal
with those forty-seven emotions whieh he deams to be of primary interest.
His aCcOlUlt is abned at giving a coneeptual analysis. of the emotions. He
therefore negleets 'theexternaI modifieations of the body hhieh are obser-
vable in emotions such as tremar, pallor) sobbin~, and laughter, because
they refer to the body without any relation to the mind'. (p.127)

Al though sueh a striet dichotolT)' between mind 'and body is most likely
unfruitful, a very interesting point in Spinoza's account of the emotions
which was already present in some degree in Aristotle's aeeount is the im-
plicatiönal relationships: between the emotion cencepts. For instance, Hope
implies Fear and Fear implies Hope, Bashfulness implies Fear, Derision im-
plies Hate, Anger implies Hate, etc. Suehi'11plieational relations between
the emotion concepts are very lmportant for the construction of the concep-
tual eomplexes that we will diseuss later. There seerns to be a kind of
implicational care in the complex which is implied by the other _concept~
but which does not necessarily imply the others. The noxt comprehensiv~
account of the 'passions of the soul' and which has exercised great influ-
ence on most philisophical and ps)~hological accounts of the emotions is
faund in David Hume's 'Treatise on Human Nature, Part II':

The emotions for Burne are a tYDe of imoression. He distinQUishes betwcen

 65

original and secondary impressions) original impressions or impr~ssions

of sensations 1Jern,g those that I 'without any antecedent perception. arise

in the soul. from the constitution oftheobodY. from the aniJml spirits.
or from the aniJml spirits. or from the application of obiects to the
externalorgans. I l Secondary. or reflective impressions are 5uch as
proceed from some of these original ones, either immediately. or. DY the
interposition of its idea.' (HUme, 1952:3)

The passions are secondary impressions. These can be furthe~ divided inte
two kinds - the calm and the violent. The calm consist of 'the sense of
beall.tyand defonnity in action, composition,and external object" _. something;.
like I good taste' in an aesthetic Sense. This is usual1y confused: with'
reasoning, says Hume. THe violent passions,are 'the passions of lov.e· ande
hatred, grief and joy, pride and humility', (HUme, 1952:4)

Hume is concerned to explain the 'violent emotions or passions" their nature,

origin, causes , and ,effects'. 111ese he divides further inta direct'. and in-
direct passions. The direct passions are derived 'immediately from good
or evil'. The indirect passions'proceed from the same principles, but by
the conjunction of other qualites'. To the direct passions he reckons desire,
aversion, grief, joy, hope, fear, despair, and security. To the indirect
passions he reckons pride, humility, ambition, vanity, love, hatred, envy,
pity, malice, generosity, 'with their dependents'. (Hume,1952:4)

Hume seems to be clear that there is a distinction to be made between

the cause of a passion and the object of a passion. For instance, a suit
of ciothes which lo_n can be the cause of my pride but the object of my
pride is myself. Hume is, however, not convinced of the intensionali ty of
the emotions to the degree that Spinoza was. The emotion does not necessa-
rily depend on its object for its quaIity. ' When I am angry, I am actually
possessed with the passion, and in that emotion have no more referenee to
any object, than when I am thirsty, or sick, or more than five feet high'.
(Treatise II, 3.3)

The intensionality of the emotions is a central point in Sartre's

phenomenological study of the emotions - 'Sketch for a theory of the
Fmotions' which is one of the latest philosophical treatments of the
emotions. There he argues against William James' thesis that'the states: of
consciousness called joy, anger and so forth are nothing but the .conscious-
ness of physiological m:mifestations - or if you will, their projection
 66

intD consciousness I . (Sartre, 1962: 33) Rather , Sartre c1aims that emotions
are something e1se - namely, 'a certain relation -between Dur psychic being
and the ,,"orId I . This relation is not chaotic but has I an organized and
deseribable strueture.' (Sartre, 1962:34) The emotions that are dealt with
in SartreTs treatise are those ,~hich Hume refers to as the violent passions.
Sartre's account of the emotions will play a major Tole in Dur attempt to
explain why we swear to express OUT. emotions.

Although eertain psychologists have held that there are only three basic
emotions- namely, fear, rage, and love eJ
B Watson), the latest attempt
in the psyehologieal literature at elassifying the emotions reckons with
ten emotions. 'fhis is the so-called Differential Emotions Theory of CarToll
B. Izard (Izard,1977)

The ten fundamental emotions are the foUm;ing:

1. Interest-excitement
2. Enjoyment-joy
3. Surprise-startle
4. Distress-anguish
5. Anger-rage
6. Disgust-revulsion
7. Contempt-scorn .
8 Fear-terror
8. Shame/shyness-humiliation
10. Guilt-remorse (Izard,1977:47)

We see that Izard has diffieulty puttinga one-term label on the emotions,
two tenns are given for each fundamental emotion. This is to represent the
fact that each emotion varies in intensity, the first tenn being the 10wer
level of intensity and the second term the higher. We see that Zeno and
Izard are both wrestling with the problem of plaeing diserete names on
something that is in real ity a continuwn. As usual our everyday words have
a tendency to fail us \'men it comes to a direct confrontatian \1ith real ity .
Although the emotionaI spectrums,,~ms to fall into rather distinet centers
of foeus, there are lots of problems of drawing the lines between them.
~lhere,for instance, does excitement end and enjoyment take over? These
problems of distinguishing the various coneeptual complexes from each other
are mirrored by the probl~ms that we have in trying to identify which
emotion a subject is expresslllg. Putting a label on a specifie expression
 71

We have then the following dimensions in our conceptual model of· the emotions·
1) Object, 2) Cause, 3)Goal, ")~Disposition to Action, 5) Bodily Manifestation,
6) Reasons, 7) Beliefs and S) Implications. We must give values for all of
these components for a complete characterization of any of the emotions.

For the purposes of this study ,;e will reckon ,;ith the following primary
emotionai complexes.
1. Anger
2. Joy
3. Surpl'':'se
4. Fear
5. Disgust
6. Grief
For the sake of economy these complexes will be referred to by thelr most
general categoT)' label.

These complexes seem to constitute a set of emotions found in all of the

characterizations and, listings of the emotions looked at earlier. .. They alsa
have the least amount of overlap conceptually, although there could be a
mllnber of implication relations bet,;een them. By this it is meant that Joy
and Anger can be implicationally related given the proper circumstances,but
they are not strictly conceptually related to each other in the ""il' that
mirth and joy or hatred and anger are. (see Hirsch 19S0a+19S0bl

We no,; tum to a general characterization of the relationship between the

emotions and swearing.

5. Why do we Sliear to express Dur emotions?

Ashley ~Iontagt'e (Montague,1942) claims that swearing arises from a feeling

of frustration. S,."earing is for him as innate as the expression of anger.
As we 'vill see belmi, there are more emotions than anger that can be related
to swearing. There are also many types of slvearmg that are not directly·
expressions of emotions hut based on social nonns and values·. These types
of s,<earing will be dealt with else""ere.

Several authors have pointed to a connection between emotions and magic.

Sartre defines emotion. as a slip of the consciousness inta a magical attitude
(Sartre, 1962:91). NalinoHski describes in detail the affinitythat magic
has with an emotionai outburst (Malinowski, 1954: 79ff). Building on what
~-----------------

72

these authors say about magic and.the emotions, Olle version of the relations-
ship between the emotions and sl<earing will be proposed.

Emotions arise in the confrontation of the human will with a problematic

world. A healthy hwnan will aims at rnaintaining a state of well-being and
security. Howcver, the world often endangers this aim, our loved oneS become
iII, Dur hOlises and possessibns aTe destroyed by natural catastrophes. In
such situations of crisis the will acts to became a cause. In rnany situa-
tions our knowledge of the causal-detenninistic nature of the world help ilS

to act on the \\-'OTId and rcscue our wel1-being and security.

In certain situations, however) the world presents itself to us as too

oven<helmingly dangerous or as suddenly lacking all causal-detelministic tex-
ture. In such situations, the human will stillacts to became a cause. This
time, however, not by taking appropriate action based 00 knowledge of causal-
detennmistic relatiooships, but rather by the utterance of words and the
making of gestures, i e symbolic action. In this symbolic action powers
that lie outside this world of causality and determinism are called upon
or invoked to assist or stand by the Hill.

This is h~at might be called the most prototypical or primordial case of

swearing. Crying out "Oh,God!" upan seeing your wife's clothes catch fire
from a candie, is an attempt to invoke the divine as an aid and cornfort ID
Dur crisis. The same applies to shouting "God dam it!" upon witnessing the
visi ting team make the l<inning goal in the last seconds of play.

This invoking or petitioning of the divine 1'iill to intenrene in the world

on behalf of the human will is not to be taken lightly. For this reason
swearing and the uttering of oaths and curses are subject to heavy restric-
tians and seriolls sanctions in nearly all social communities.

Other types of. swearing, i e those where we east abuse on others or make
pronouncements upon them, such as ,1'You son-of-a-bitch U , or IIGo to hell!",
also find their origin here. In our impotent rage we make these utterances
as a sort of pIain-clothes sorCel'er in an act of black rnagic where the
object of aur rage is to became that ,,",ich we call it or be projected inta
abomination. Crying"Shit!" in reactian to a repulsive or repugnant situation
is following the principle of 'fighting fire with fire'. This sympathetic
principle where ane evil force is combated with another is a dominant
element in ~gic.
 73

Sl'learing in relation to the expressian of' joy is a bit more complicated.

Joy might, at Hrst thought, be seen as an exception to this way of viewing
the ·emotions. Joy might be thought to be the emotion which we experience
,;hen the world is unproblematic. Ile would like to claim that a being that
posses sed a will which never. was in conflict with the world would experi-
enee no emotion at all. The contradiction then, of emotions where the will
is thwarted, such as anger, iear, grief, disgust,. is not joy but no
emotion at all. Joy can be seen as a contrary to these emotions. Jhe emotion
of joy presupposes a problematic world and is the reaction of the person
,;hos e will has succeeded in the face of dangers and disappointments.
Swearing in relation to an expres'sion of joy is not invoked to assist the
will but is si~lar to an act. of reverent praise to powers that have pre-
sumably been of assistence.

In the ca se of surprise, goals are achieved as if by magic against the

subjects ,,'Orst expectations. Here the world appears magical to the subject
and prompts hL~ to respond magically.

The thesis here then, is that ,;hen the human will is confrontedwith a ,,'OrId
which is impossible to deal with in nonnal ways, we approach the world in
a magical attitude where we take symbolic action uttering curses, ,oaths,
etc. and making ges tures that are aimed at introducmg the will as a cause
in the world.

Under the influence of the strong emotions, those Hume called the violent
passions, the subject attempts to achieve his goal not by ordinary means
of cause and effect, but by extraordinary means of magical spelis,
incantations, and curses.

(i. Types of consciousness and types of sweariEg

The preceeding discussion presumes a certain view on the relationship bet-'

ween what might be called mind or consciousness and language. This section
\vill be devoted to presenting a rough sketch of this Viel'l. Because practi-
cally nothing has been written in the psycholinguistic literature about the
relationship between language and emotion since WUndt, the discussion will
of necessity be more suggestive than definitive.

111ere appear to be very few basic general c1asses of types of conscious-

 74

ness (fanns of consciousness, modes of consciousnes.s, or states of mind).

These have been characterized by differen-t"authors in tenns of such general
distinctions as Ftlhlen (feeling), Vorstellen (imagining, conceptualizing)
and Denken (thinking) (Wundt 1900) or Feelings and Thought where feelings
include emotions and sensations and thoughts include conceptions and judge-
ments (James 1950:221-223), or more recently Mfect, Imagery, and Con-
sciousness (Tomkins, 1963). Most modem introductory textbooks to psychology
still seem to follow these broad distinctions (see Lindsay & Nonnan, 1977).

For the purposes of this study these will be labeled in the following manner.

Class l types of consciol,lsness characterized as primarily concerned with

sensations, drives, emotions and attitudes.

Class II types of consciousness characterized -as primarily concerned Jvith

imagining, remembering, conceiving, conceptualizing.

Clas s III types of consciousness primarily concerned with drmving conclu-

sions, deliberating, reasoning.

These classes are not disjunctive but rather elements of,the different
classes are found in all classes. This means that there is P!obably no pure
type of consciousness belonging to any of the classes. All types of consci-
ousness contain an admixture of other types. We have, therefore, for instan-
ce, attitudes to conceptualizations and emotions involved in reasoning to
some degree and vice versa. There is, however, from a developmental point of
view, an assumption that the Class I types of consciousness appear in pri-
marly concrete specific situations where there is some immediate "knmdedge-,
of-acquaintance!l of the object (or objects) that comprise the content of
the consiousness. This is the type of consciousness we adapt "\-;rhen confronted '-.
with a real ripe juicy apple on a wann surrnner day, as opposed to the type
that we adopt when asked to tell the difference between apples and pears.

Phylogenetically, the development from lower to higher stages of brain deve-

lopment, from what MacLean (1980) refers to as a development from reptil ian
to neomammalian, has presrunably been positively correlated 1vith the various
classes of consciousness. This means that the lower stages of brain develop-
ment, both phylogenetically and ontogenetically, are characterized by pre-
dominately Class I types of consciousness. The higher stages of brain deve-
loprnent are characterized by predominately Clas s II and III types of con-
 75

sciousness. Predominately, is perhaps saying too much, rathe.T, higher

levels of brain development give rise to the pössibility of predominately
class II and III types of consciousness.

~bving from Class I to .Classes II and III means that the degree of cognition
involved is becoming greater. This does not mean, hmvever, that there is no
cognition in Class I or that there is no emotive element in Class III.

The whole brain is most likely involved in all of the different types of
consciousness 8:t Ieast above any very rudimentary level of arousal - "it
appears that for the brain to 'understand' the surrounding world, to per-
ceive its meaning and to take action in difficult tasks the cerebral cortex
must be activated not only locally but also totally." (Lassen, Ingvar &
Skinh~j 1978: 59)

As concerns language, there seems to be a correlation bet\<een Class I types

of consciousness and highly expressive and/or evocative language. This means
that psychic experiences such as pain, hunger, thirst, cold, heat, sexual
deprivation, etc arepositivelycorrelated with highly expressive and/or evo-
cative language. At the most inarticulate levels of language (Linguistic
expressions), we find these types of consciousness related to screams, crys,
groans, moans, etc tagether with certain reflex body movements. At a slight-
ly higher level of articulation 'Ile find such cries and screams accompanied
by gestures \vhich together with gestures function as vocatives and impera-
tives and some sort of indicatives. (Lamendella, 1977:196)

Later we find expressions that in some way. are intimately related with that
which they signify. Sofie of these could be strictly onomatopoetic, while
others are more generally sound-symbolic identifications of a synesthetic
nature where an experience of the thing·signified is transfered from a
visual, olfactica1, oral, or tacti1e sensory impression to an acoustic
image. Because, for instance, something is stinking or repulsive to the
taste, the words that refer to this thing are also taken to be stinking or
repulsive themse1ves. They are, as it \'lere, gui1ty by association of the
same sins as the things they refer to.

Some of our basic so-ca11ed figures of speech qre a1so involved in this
primitive type of symbolism, e.g. metaphor, metonymy, and synekdoche. A
case in point would be that because the sexual act has certain aggressive
aspects the word that refers to the sexual act can also be used metaphori-
 76

cally to describe -an act of aggression.

II'hatever the explanation might be in the fil1al analysis, the main point to
be noted is that the Telationship between the symbol and its signification
is not conceived of as contingent but ratheT as of a causal, necessary or
essentiaI nature.

At the highest levels of linguistic articulation within the Class I types of

consciousness ''le find oaths, curses, and spelIs. In their most primitive
state these aTe probably highly sound-symbolic, at least to the speakel'. It
is here that swearing expressions as expressions of the emotions start their
career.

Within this class I types of consciousness the symbol is intimately related

with an expression of the will and the emotion of the speakel' • The symbol is
alsoidentified with what it stands fOT. The expressionsTelated to this
class will, therefore, have a rnuch greater world-creating or 1\'örld-changing
power than expTessions related to the Clas s II and Clas s III types of con-
sciousness.

This identification of the word with the thing symbolized is typica1 fOT a
10\'1 degree of linguistic awareness. There are rnany examples of this pheno-
menan. Particularly fine, is a passage from the novel "Things falling apart"
by Chinua Achebe. ilA snake was never called by.its name at night, because
it would hear. It was called astring." CAchebe, 1958:9) "Snake" here is
understood to be a sort of proper name for the animal ,.mich ",hen mentioned
functions as a vocative. For this reason its "true" name is not used,
instead it is given a nickname or pseudonym.

The developmental perspective being pr9posed here gives· rise to an interes-

ting hypothesis concerning the most powerful swearing expressions. These
will be historical1y quite old and are connected with primarily clas s I
types of consiousness. They.be10ng to a phylogenetically and ontogenetically
primordialIeveI of langnage development. At this stage of developrnent there
is no c1ear distinction between symbol and thing signified. Which means that
the expTessions are taken for the things themse1ves. The referents aTe them-
selves basic body functions such as defecation, excreting, and copulation;
which are biologically primary, and Telated to very pTimitive levels of
bmin development. This "ould explain whythese expTessions are so powerfuL
It "ould also explain why they are so easy to 1eam and haTd to fOTget
 77

(or resistent to damage in brain injuries). (See Lamenqel1a 1977)

These linguistic symbols are intimately related with a type of consiousness

which is principally non-reflective. They enter the mind of the individual
at a level where there is, in a sense, no healthy critical perspective, or
distance between the self and the "orId. When used against us they strike
where Dur defenses are the weakest. To defend ourselves we have to caunter
with the same and hopefully more. In reply to an expIetive or abusive
swearing eXpression it just will not·be appropriate to say it isn't tlue.
If called, for instance, "AssholeI" by someone one could caUllter with
"Takes one to call one" or maybe even better IlShithead!",

The reasoning above Ieads to the following hypothesis concerning types of

swearing behaviour. Whereas stated before swearing expressions with high
emotionai value are less likely to be effected by aphasia, swearing as a
"''ayof speaking, Le. Sl'l'ear words used as adjectives, verbs, nouns, adverbs,
in other words, as nonnal parts-of-speech, wil1, according to this hypothe-
sis, suffer the same fate as other expressions within these classes or at
j ,

Ieast not have any privileged survival status in relation to other-.'. .ords or
expressions effected by the aphasia.

Continuing in the presentation of the relationship between classes of con-

sciousness and language, we find Class II types Of consciousness ( - those
concelJled primarily with imagining, conceiving, etc) related with descrip-
tians of scenes, events, chains of events, etc in sentences, texts, and
discourses. These do not necessarily have to be factual accounts, but can
be of a metaphorical, allegorical or mythological nature.

The class III types of consciousness are related in tum to language expres-
sions such as debates, theories, and praofs.

It should perhaps be reiterated that this view on the reIationship between

types of consiousness and language does not claim that certain speech
events are purely expressive and/or evocative and that others are purely
cognitive. Everything is a matter of degree. Class I types of consciousness
are correlated with predominately expressive and/or evocative language,
while Class II and III are correlated with more cognitive language, Class
III being related with the highest degree of cognitive language.

This viel' does, however, claim that the predominately Class III types of
 78

consciousness are rather late developments in the history of the species and
the individ1.l3.1. Al 5.0 , judgillg from experience in everyday life, it 5eems
that even after the species or individual has developed Class III types of
consciousness, that they are something which are employed Qnly rather in-
frequently.

It 5eems that a subject!s type of consciousness is relative to a situation

and the subjects social circwnstances. For instance, when a subject experi-
ences a situation as frustrating to his vital needs and interests he -will
tend to assume a Clas s I type of consciousness. In a state of strong emotion,
5uch as angor, the subject takes recourse to his strongest symbols. Given
the indenti ty of a symbol and referent wi thin this type of consciousness, he
1rill call upan the most odious and horrible symbols to, in a sense, throw
in the face of whomever or \'lhatever provoked his anger.

Therefore, in answer to the question in the heading of section five, we

swear to express our 'emotions because there is an inherent relationship
between emotionaI experiences, Glass I types of consciousness, and powerfully
expressive and evocative language, the most powerful of these being our
swearing expressions. 111ese expressions are mare powerful than say inarticu-
late screams or shouts, because they make reference to taboo objects and
actions. They engage J as i t were, mare of the social and psychological
dimensions of the speaker and listener by containing a referential element
- especially a reference to objects or actions associated with pm'ler and
danger "ithin their shared culture.

By ''iay of summary, therefore under the sway of one of the primary emotions
the speaker adopts a Class I type of consciousness in "hich the s"caring is
meant to be magieal. In other circumstances and in other clas ses of consci-
ousness the swearing CDuld be meant as serious but non-magical or even as
non-serious, non-literal, and non-magical.

It can therefore be claimed that when we encounter a speaker or group under

the s\<lay of a predorninately Class I type of consciousness, that in a case
of name-calling such as llYou, ShitheadJl', If the speaker can, in a sense,
make the name stick (perhaps by the threat of brute force), then the person
who the name-calling is directed to"ard in a very literal sense suffers a
loss of prestige or self-respect. The "ords have the po"er of changing the
"orid rather than describing it, at least that part of the world comprised
of by human relations.
 81

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