Seneca Belief on Banishing the Passions essays

Seneca Belief on Banishing the Passions essays I do not believe that one can completely banish their emotions. What one can do is control their emotions. I do believe that this is a sound principal for daily living. This can be done through the practice of philosophy. I conclude that emotions should not be banished, but rather controlled. This essay will deal with a quotation from Senecas letter XXXVIII On Allegiance to Virtue. (Seneca, Reader: 68) It will endeavor to explain this quote dealing with five of the main passions which Seneca wishes to banish. Quotation from Senecas letter XXXVIII, on Allegiance to Virtue In Senecas letter XXXVIII On Allegiance to Virtue, (Seneca, Reader: 68) Seneca writes: The passions, which are heavy task masters.....can be banished from you by wisdom, which is the only real freedom. .... If you would have all things under your control, put yourself under the control of reason.(Seneca, Reader: 70) In order to understand this statement, it is essential to break it down into smaller components. In the first sentence, Seneca speaks of the passions, (Seneca, Reader: 70) which according to Seneca are strong feelings of anger, lust, love, ambition and fear. Seneca states that the passions are heavy task masters. By this, Seneca means that the passions have you in their control; they control you as opposed to you controlling them. It takes much energy to release your self from the tight grip of love, lust, fear, anger and ambition. He says that the passions can be banished. (Seneca, Reader: 70) He does not want to kick the passions out, but rather banish them completely. Get rid of them altogether. Seneca says that the way to banish these passions is by wisdom (Seneca, Reader: 70). Wisdom according to Seneca is the source of knowledge that gives us control. It is the complete understandi...

Descriptivism in Linguistics

Descriptivism in Linguistics Descriptivism is a nonjudgmental approach to language that focuses on how it is actually spoken and written. Also called  linguistic descriptivism.  Contrast with prescriptivism.   In the article Beyond and Between the Three Circles,  linguist Christian Mair has observed that the study of human languages in the spirit of linguistic descriptivism has been one of the great democratic enterprises of the past two centuries of scholarship in the humanities. . . . In the twentieth century, structuralist descriptivism and sociolinguistics have . . .  taught us to respect the structural complexity, communicative adequacy and creative-expressive potential of all the worlds languages, including socially stigmatized working-class and ethnic speech (World Englishes: New Theoretical and Methodological Considerations, 2016). Views on Prescriptivism and Descriptivism Excepting only in certain educational contexts, modern linguists utterly reject prescriptivism, and their investigations are based instead on descriptivism. In a descriptivist approach, we try to describe the facts of linguistic behavior exactly as we find them, and we refrain from making value judgments about the speech of native speakers. . . .Descriptivism is a central tenet of what we regard as a scientific approach to the study of language: the very first requirement in any scientific investigation is to get the facts right.(R.L. Trask, Key Concepts in Language and Linguistics. Routledge, 1999) The Realm of Descriptivism When we observe a linguistic phenomenon, such as the ones we observe on the Web, and report on what we see (i.e., the ways people use language and the way they interact), we are usually within the realm of  linguistic descriptivism.  For instance, if we take inventory  of the specific linguistic features of the discourse of a given speech community (e.g., gamers, sports enthusiasts, technology majors), we are within the realm of descriptivism.  A speech community, as Gumperz  (1968:381) points out, is any human aggregate characterized by regular and frequent interaction by means of a shared body of verbal signs and set off from similar aggregates by significant differences in language usage. Descriptivism involves observing and analyzing,  without passing too much judgment, the habits and practices within speech communities, focusing on language users and uses without attempting  to get them to modify their language according to standards external to the language itself .  Descriptive linguistics aims to understand the ways  people use language in the world, given all of the forces that influence such use. Prescriptivism lies at the other end of this continuum and is usually associated with stipulating rules and norms for language use.(Patricia Friedrich and Eduardo H. Diniz de Figueiredo, Introduction: Language, Englishes, and Technology in Perspective.  The Sociolinguistics of Digital Englishes.  Routledge, 2016) On Speaking With Authority About Language Even the most descriptive of linguists have not shied away from describing theirs as the only acceptable approach to grammar nor from ridiculing and condemning the prescriptivist statements of others.To a great extent, this is a story of a contest about who speaks authoritatively about the character of language and the methods for analyzing and describing it. The story reflects a continuing struggle to gain the exclusive right to speak authoritatively about language. The details reveal that prescriptivism remains entrenched in ostensibly descriptive as well as admittedly prescriptive approaches. For one thing, despite a professed commitment to descriptivism, professional linguists sometimes espouse prescriptivist positions, though not often about particular items of style or grammar.(Edward Finegan, Usage. The Cambridge History of the English Language: English in North America, ed. J. Algeo. Cambridge University  Press, 2001) Descriptivism vs. Prescriptivism [D]escriptivism is like common law, which works on precedent and accumulates slowly over time. Prescriptivism is an authoritarian version of code law, which says precedent be damned: if the rule book says this is the law, thats that.(Robert Lane Greene, You Are What You Speak. Delacorte, 2011)At more rarefied levels, prescriptivism  has become a four-letter word, with scholars arguing that it is neither desirable nor feasible to attempt to intervene in the natural  life of language. A deliberate renunciation of prescriptivism is more like atheism than agnosticism: a conscious nonbelief is, itself, a belief, and a refusal to intervene is essentially prescriptivism in reverse. In any event, in their rush away from prescriptivism, linguists may have abdicated a useful role as arbiters and many have left much of the field open to those stylized as language shamans by Dwight Bollinger, one of the few linguists who was willing to write about the public life of language.  Bolinger rig htly criticized  the obvious crank elements, but he also understood the desire, however ill-informed, for authoritative standards.(John Edwards,  Sociolinguistics: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press,  2013) Pronunciation: de-SKRIP-ti-viz-em