Significs (Dutch: significa) is a linguistic and philosophical term introduced by Victoria, Lady Welby in the 1890s. It was later adopted by the Dutch Significs Group (or movement) of thinkers around Frederik van Eeden, which included L. E. J. Brouwer, founder of intuitionistic logic, and further developed by Gerrit Mannoury and others.
Overview Significs, intended to be a theory of signs, was developed by Lady Welby in quite close connection with the work of Charles Sanders Peirce, her correspondent. There is no scholarly consensus on its precise placing as an influence on later developments: on the ground now occupied by semantics, semiotics and semiology, it is closer to semiology than to the two others. While significs is a possible precursor of later semiology, the extent of the connection between the two remains a matter of debate. At a personal level Lady Welby did have some effect, particularly on C. K. Ogden. A mediating figure, she has not until quite recently been given great attention.
Significs topics The following sections are taken directly from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article written by Lady Welby.
Definition The term "Significs" may be defined as the science of meaning or the study of significance, provided sufficient recognition is given to its practical aspect as a method of mind, one which is involved in all forms of mental activity, including that of logic. In Baldwin's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology (1901–1905) the following definition is given: 1. Significs implies a careful distinction between
(a) sense or signification, (b) meaning or intention and (c) significance or ideal worth. It will be seen that the reference of the first is mainly verbal (or rather sensual), of the second volitional, and of the third moral (e.g. we speak of some event ' the significance of which cannot be overrated, and it would be impossible in such a case to substitute the ' sense ' or the ' meaning ' of such event, without serious loss). Significs treats of the relation of the sign in the widest sense to each of these. 2. A proposed method of mental training aiming at the concentration of intellectual activities on that which is implicitly assumed to constitute the primary and ultimate value of every form of study, i.e. what is at present indifferently called its meaning or sense, its import or significance.... Significs as a science would centralise and co-ordinate, interpret, inter-relate and concentrate the efforts to bring out meanings in every form, and in so doing to classify the various applications of the signifying property clearly and distinctly." Since this dictionary was published, however, the subject has undergone further consideration and some development, which necessitate modifications in the definition given. It is clear that stress needs to be laid upon the application of the principles and method involved, not merely, though notably, to language, but to all other types of human function. There is need to insist on the rectification of mental attitude and increase of interpretative power which must follow on the adoption of the significal view-point and method, throughout all stages and forms of mental training, and in the demands and contingencies of life.
Scope In so far as it deals with linguistic forms, Significs includes "Semantics," a branch of study which was formally introduced and expounded in 1897 by Michel Breal, the distinguished French philologist, in his Essai de semantique. In 1900 this book was translated into English by Emmeline Cust, the daughter of Lady Welby, with a preface by Professor Postgate. M. Breal gives no more precise definition than the following: "Extraire de la linguistique ce qui en ressort comme aliment pour la réflexion et - je ne crains pas de l'ajouter - comme règle pour notre propre langage, puisque chacun de nous collabore pour sa part a l'évolution de la parole humaine, voila ce qui mérite d'être mis en lumière, voila ce qui j'ai essayé de faire en ce volume." In the Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology Semantics is defined as "the doctrine of historical word-meanings; the systematic discussion of the history and development of changes in the meanings of words." It may thus be regarded as a reform and extension of the etymological method, which applies to contemporary as well as to traditional or historical derivation. As human interests grow in constantly specialized directions, the vocabulary thus enriched is unthinkingly borrowed and reborrowed on many sides, at first in definite quotation, but soon in unconscious or deliberate adoption. Semantics may thus, for present purposes, be described as the application of Significs within strictly philological limits; but it does not include the study and classification of the "Meaning" terms themselves, nor the attainment of a clear recognition of their radical importance as rendering, well or ill, the expressive value not only of sound and script but also of all fact or occurrence which demands and may arouse profitable attention.
Objectives The first duty of the Significian is, therefore, to deprecate the demand for mere linguistic reform, which is indispensable on its own proper ground, but cannot be considered as the satisfaction of a radical need such as that now suggested. To be content with mere reform of articulate expression would be fatal to the prospect of a significantly adequate language; one characterized by a development only to be compared to that of the life and mind of which it is or should be naturally the delicate, flexible, fitting, creative, as also controlling and ordering, Expression. The classified use of the terms of expression-value suggests three main levels or classes of that value - those of Sense, Meaning and Significance.
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