维尔比从宗教到哲学、人类学的转向,众所周知是受哲学家和人类学家F. M. 穆勒的影响,虽然她的研究走向了另外一个方向。在与穆勒交流的过程中,维尔比发展了他性逻辑学,转向了无限,即无限符号过程和批评创造性。在文章《精神衍变有中断吗?》、《精神进化中的悖论》、《民俗学的重要意义》中,她批判了处于重要地位的民族中心主义,质疑官方对神话、宗教、迷信、仪式和祭仪的解释。1900年,维尔比在牛津遇见了F. C. 席勒并开始与之通信。席勒以提倡“人类实用主义”和语言可塑性原则而闻名。对维尔比来说,语言是可塑的、灵活的、表达含混的。维尔比和荷兰精神病学家凡·伊登的通信主要围绕表意学的问题而展开。通过凡·伊登维尔比结识了荷兰哲学家G. J. 鲍兰德。她与凡·伊登和鲍兰德的交流很好地证明了荷兰表意学运动和维尔比之间的关系。和不同领域不同阶层重要人物的对话交流是维尔比的习惯。她对知识的追求使得她能够探究不同的研究领域,如宗教、哲学、数学、阐释学、翻译理论、符号学、语义学、教育学、社会学、科学和人类学等等。查尔斯·皮尔斯充分证明了她的天赋,他们之间的通信因I. C. 列宾和查尔斯·哈德威克的出版而闻名。皮尔斯评论过她的《何为意义?》,把它与罗素的《数学原则》相提并论,认为这两本书都是“真正重要的逻辑学著作”。在“表意学”一文中,维尔比说,表意学作为意义的科学或关于意味的研究“考虑到它作为思想方法的实践方面,它涉及包括逻辑活动在内的思想活动的各种形式”[7]。1903年3月18号的一封信中,瓦伊拉蒂追溯了约翰·洛克的思想传统并建议维尔比用“记号符号学”代替“表意学”这一说法。维尔比辩解说,和皮尔斯的观点不同,表意学不是逻辑学的分支;也非瓦伊拉蒂所指的记号符号学,但它却是记号符号学的“实用性延伸”:
In Dialogue with the Other: A Brief Analysis of Victoria Welby’s Significs
Abstract:This essay employs the logic of otherness as the key concept to approach Welby in relation to her life and research in the framework of significs. Her unconventional childhood, her network of relations and her response to the religious crisis of her age help shape a vision of the world which is characterized by its dialogic and polyphonic nature. For Welby, “woman” is the guardian of the logic of “differences” or “distinctions” that must interrelate dialogically. Her mother-sense recovers the connection with the body and the relationship between signs and values. Welby presents significs as a method of triadism for creating interconnections and encouraging dialogue among different voices, relating “plasticity” to pragmatic, ethic and esthetic sense. Susan Petrilli’s “semioethic” is a new development of Welby’s significs.
[1] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. p919
[2] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p137
[3] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p13-p14
[4] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p12
[5] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p154
[6] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p162
[7] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p167
[8] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p6
[9] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p125-126
[10] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p39
[11] Welby, Victoria (1983). What is Meaning? Studies in the Development of Significance. London: Macmillan & Co., with an Introductory essay by G. Mannoury and a Preface by Achim Eschbach. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins (orig. ed. 1903). p1
[12] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p4
[13] Peirce, Charles Sanders (1931-1958). Collected Papers. Cambridge (Mass): The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.p176
[14] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p259
[15] Schmitz, H. Walter (1985). Victoria Lady Welby’s Significs: The Origin of the Signific Movement, ix-ccxxxv. In Victoria Lady Welby, Significs and Language, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. p14
[16] Petrillli, Susan and Augusto Ponzio (2005) Semiotics Unbound: Interpretive Route Through the Open Network of Signs. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.p8-10
[17] Welby, Victoria (1983). What is Meaning? Studies in the Development of Significance. London: Macmillan & Co., with an Introductory essay by G. Mannoury and a Preface by Achim Eschbach. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins (orig. ed. 1903).p38
[18] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p250-p251
[19] Welby, Victoria (1983). What is Meaning? Studies in the Development of Significance. London: Macmillan & Co., with an Introductory essay by G. Mannoury and a Preface by Achim Eschbach. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins (orig. ed. 1903). p34
[20] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p112
[21] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p110-111
[22] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p28
[23] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p147
[24] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p298
[25] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p573
[26] Welby, Victoria (1985b). Significato, metafora, interpretazione. Intro., trans., and ed. by S. Petrilli. Bari: Adriatica.p248-262
[27] Welby, Victoria (1985a). Significs and Language (The Articulate Form of our Expressive and Interpretative Resources). Ed. and intro. By H. W. Schmitz. In Foundations of Semiotics, Vol. 5. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Includes V. Welby 1911b. Partial It. Trans. In V. Welby, 1985b, 189-229.
[28] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p584
[29] Cust, Mrs. Henry (i.e. Emmeline Mary Elizabeth, alias Nina) (ed.) (1929) Echoes of Larger Life: A Selection from the Early Correspondence of Victoria Lady Welby. London: Jonathan Cape. p196
[30] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p615
[31] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p91
[32] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p159
[33] Peirce, Charles Sanders (1931-1958). Collected Papers. Cambridge (Mass): The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.p379
[34] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p91
[35] Schmitz, H. Walter (1985). Victoria Lady Welby’s Significs: The Origin of the Signific Movement, ix-ccxxxv. In Victoria Lady Welby, Significs and Language, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. p7
[36] Hardwick, Charles (ed.) (1977). Semiotics and Significs: The Correspondence between Charles S. Peirce and Victoria Welby. Bloomington/London: Indiana University Press. p23
[37] Schmitz, H. Walter (1985). Victoria Lady Welby’s Significs: The Origin of the Signific Movement, ix-ccxxxv. In Victoria Lady Welby, Significs and Language, Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.p34
[38] Petrillli, Susan and Augusto Ponzio (2005) Semiotics Unbound: Interpretive Route Through the Open Network of Signs. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.p535
[39] Petrillli, Susan and Augusto Ponzio (2005) Semiotics Unbound: Interpretive Route Through the Open Network of Signs. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.p549
[40] Petrillli, Susan (2009). Sigifying and Understanding: Reading the Works of Victoria Welby and the Signific Movement. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.p3