> Hi Everyone:
>
> The book makes a distinction between objects, social objects, and symbols.
> How are these concepts related, and how can they be exclusive of
> one another. Is there such a thing as a "pure" object? A "pure" symbol?
>
This question started me thinking about Baudrillards attempts at tracing
a path from "the real" to "hyper reality". While I have the same
problem as posed by Paul Leslie at the Mid South conference in figuring
out just "when" the real was for Baudrillard it seems to me that "pure
objects" are those that have yet to be either invented or discovered and
therefor have no meaning imparted upon them. Once they have been
"discovered" humans label them and start attributing
meaning to them. However, as Berger and Luckman point
out, the objects then stand the chance of being reified in human
thought. In this sense they can become purely symbolic, or in Baudrillards
terms floating signifiers. Floating free to be used for what ever
purpose suits an individual at the time with no ties to an absolute reality.
> What happens during the transformation of an object into a symbol?
> Is the meaning of a social object in it's symbolic use value or in it's
> objective value? Can these things be opposed?
>
For humans it would appear to me that the meaning of an object is in its
symbolic use value. Since it is through human construction that
objects take on meanings, and human construction occurs through
symbolic interaction, it is the symbolic meaning that has the most value for
humans. My question is this: Would Durkheim feel differently? Since
a social fact is that which is general over all of society whilst having
an existence of its own independent of its individual manifestations the
meaning then of a social fact would come, then, from its objective value
-right?
> Symbolic interaction is based on the assumption that
> we orient ourselves towards others on the basis of their status as objects.
> Can we also orient ourselves towards others according to their
> symbolic status?
>
Veblens _Theory of the Leisure Class_ would seem to say yes.
> Hope this helps.
Timothy B. Gongaware
TG125990@oak.cats.ohiou.edu