The Unspeakable as an Expression of an Aspectual Overflow

Abstract

 1 Este artículo retoma parte de las conclusiones a las que llegué en mi disertación de maestría. 

Based on the theoretical framework of Tensive Grammar, as developed by Claude Zilberberg, we aim to demonstrate that the general notion of unspeakable can be defined, in semiotic terms, as the expressive correlate of a “sense surplus” generated by an aspectual overflow ―tensive operation of paradigmatic expansion that, by establishing new limits in a given universe of discourse as the result of an event, transforms the pre-established limits into thresholds (degrees) in a scale marked by instability. The content of an aspectual overflow will be defined, in terms of intensity, by immeasurability; in terms of extent, by the lack of precedents; and in terms of junction, by a radical concession, that is, by the inconceivable nature of the experience. These will therefore be the three semantic-aspectual parameters conveyed by the notion of unspeakable through the vast array of discursive resources that can be employed to manifest it.