All words at every level of prose and poetry and all devices of language and speech derive their meaning from figure / ground relation. (Marshall McLuhan)

All words at every level of prose and poetry and all devices of language and speech derive their meaning from figure / ground relation.

Marshall McLuhan

Related topics

figure ground language level meaning poetry prose relation speech words devices

Related quotes

I like to play with someone who can cover a lot of ground and someone with whom you can discuss the language at a reasonable level; otherwise it gets a bit frustrating. View quote
Andy Summers
Within speech, words are subject to a kind of relation that is independent of the first and based on their linkage: these are syntagmatic relations, of which I have spoken. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Body language is a very powerful tool. We had body language before we had speech, and apparently, 80% of what you understand in a conversation is read through the body, not the words. View quote
Deborah Bull
Words are always getting conventionalized to some secondary meaning. It is one of the works of poetry to take the truants in custody and bring them back to their right senses. View quote
William Butler Yeats
Poetry demands a different material than prose. It uses another facet of the same fact ... the spontaneous conformation of language as it is heard. View quote
William Carlos Williams