The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences

Chapter 4: “Speaking” applies the framework and concepts established by Chapter 3 to discourse about language and grammar in the Classical Age. The study of language was called “general grammar” at the time, which highlights the value placed in the mechanical functions of language. The chapter is divided into seven parts.

In part one (“Criticism and Commentary”), Foucault examines the discourse around Classical Age language usage. Criticism—the act of critiquing a thing to understand and explore its purpose—replaced 16th-century commentary, the act of writing comments and addendums upon previous information while not interrogating the past information. The criticism of language was categorized in four parts: Criticism of words themselves; of rhetoric and modes of discourses; of tropes; and of relation (how criticism functions).

In part two (“General Grammar”), Foucault looks at the discipline of general grammar. General grammar was created in the Classical Age as a way of ordering and taxonomizing language and ways of thinking about language. The goal of general grammar was to make language perfectly understood and therefore perfectly capable of being used analytically and logically.

In part three (“The Theory of the Verb”), Foucault looks at the value placed on verbs by general grammarians. Verbs create discourse because they generate action within a sentence. General grammarians then believed that verbs were the root of language. The verb “to be” was considered to be at the root of all verbs. The intent that the verb carried was called a proposition. The category of the verb became the anchor for the taxonomy of general grammar.

In part four (“Articulation”), Foucault addresses the other aspects of speech that articulate the verb. The general grammarians considered the noun and verb to be “absolute significants” (110), meaning that the other aspects of speech do not exist except in relation to a verb or noun. However, because everything within a taxonomy must exist before being taxonomized, general grammarians then had to theorize that everything which was not a verb was actually an adjective. Words had to nominate or create propositions.

In part five (“Designation”), Foucault looks at how words designate. General grammarians traced designation back to gesticulation: pointing, clapping, etc. General grammarians placed the origin of language in human gestures and needs, which then gave language universal root. This universal root allowed the production of etymology, or the categorization of words by their changing roots. This created the basis for taxonomizing words in their entirety through a universal system.

In part six (“Derivation”), Foucault explores how meanings of words can change. For the Classical Age episteme, this process relied on the abstraction of alphabetic writing. Abstracting sounds into the various letters that make up an alphabet means they can be endlessly re-arranged and taxonomized. As a result, they can produce an infinite amount of small shifts in meaning over time.

In part seven (“The Quadrilateral of Language”), Foucault unites the separate parts of the chapter. Proposition, articulation, designation, and derivation all form the vertices of a square. Lines connect each point to one another, and it is through the interaction between these functions that Classical Age ideas about language are made. Names were placed at the heart of discourse and language; even verbs were names for propositions. The value placed on names and nouns put etymology and root meanings at the heart of general grammar, which allowed the Classical Age to organize all language in a prescriptive and scientific manner.