Linguistic Propositions and the Literariness of Speech

This article studies the question of “meaning” in literary texts. First, I havepresented a definition for linguistic proposition. There is no proposition in language that does not have a linguistic definition; however,literature is replete with propositions without any acceptable referents. Under three circumstances the linguistic definition of a text is rendered null: (1) unconsciousness that is whenthe text indicates that the propositions were produced under an unconscious state; (2) anti-referentiality when the linguistic definition of a text is denied because itrefers to a referent that is inconsistent with our everyday experience; and (3) incongruity between the proposition and its producer, which happens when there is discrepancy between the linguistic definition of the propositions and our already-established assumptions about its producer. In conclusion, this article categorizes the propositions of a text in three categories:

Propositions with acceptable linguistic definition that refers to a known referent;
Propositions in which the secondary meaning is the speaker’s primary intended meaning and under this meaning they have external referents as well;
Propositions that—no matter what generated their semantic ambiguity—are without any acceptable linguistic definition and that are not congruent with our known world and resist comprehension.