Le flou — la septième fonction du langage ?
Blurring as the Seventh Function of Language?

Summary/Abstract: Laurent Binet’s novel La Septième fonction du langage features a bizarre character who holds the secret of overcoming all obstacles and succeeding where ordinary communication fails. Does the power of language consist in exploiting the space of uncertain, imperfectly determined semantics to increase its effect? What linguistic mechanisms allow us to point beyond what is said? By limiting our reflections to the noetic aspect of language in literature, we will attempt to exemplify the processes that, beyond the blurring, expand the field of knowledge. Literature — the realm of language par excellence — can be a noetic laboratory. We will attempt to demonstrate some of the elements available to the “language” factory to suggest broadening perception and understanding. As for exemplification, we opt for the concise language of poetry.

• Details
• Contents