1. The Idea of Language The Idea of Silence
Giorgio Agamben

2. Giorgio Agamben

3. Giorgio Agamben Biography --Italian philosopher --was born in 1942
--mainly interested in Linguistics, Philology, Philosophy, and recently Politics
--influenced by Walter Benjamin, Martin Heidegger and Ludwig Wittgenstein

4. Influences of Other Scholars On Agamben
--Martin Heidegger (Agamben attended Heidegger’s seminars on Hegel and Heraclitus) --Walter Benjamin (Agamben considered Benjamin’s thought as an antidote to Heidegger’s influence on him).

5. Influences of Other Scholars On Agamben
--In 1981, Agamben discovered several important lost manuscripts by Benjamin in the archives of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. --Agamben translated some of Benjamin’s works into Italian and served as editor of Italian edition of Benjamin’s collected works)

6. Famous Works of Agamben
--Homo Sacer (Kutsal İnsan),2001, Ayrıntı Yayınları --Remnants of Auschwitz (Auschwitz’den Artakalanlar), Bağımsız Kitaplar --State of Exception (İstisna Hali), 2006, Otonom Yayıncılık --The Idea of Prose (Nesir Fikri), 2008, Metis

7. Style
--Agamben; -- uses an idiosyncratic language --loves using paradoxes and contradictions in his works --always gives references to philosophy, for this reason one can not understand his texts without further research

8. “The Idea Of Language”
--Frequently used terms/concepts in the article: (revelation, presupposition, Word of God, Anselm’s ontological argument, Wittgenstein’s image of fly imprisoned in the glass, mediator role of language (language is immediate) etc.)

9. “The Idea Of Language” Language – Revelation
--While language can be thought as a presupposition (reference) for the revelation, the same thing can not be said for the language itself.
(revelation can be explained through language but language can not be explained other than itself).

10. “The Idea Of Language”
Simply termed Anselm’s Ontological Argument: --According to Anselm, uttering God is a way of implying or accepting its existence. --If we think something (being) in our mind, then it can find a place for itself in reality. We automatically accept its existence.

11. “The Idea Of Language”
When this concept of “presupposition” is adjusted to language, it can be said that language has nothing other than itself to presuppose itself. (self-referentiality of the language)

12. “The Idea Of Language”
However, Anselm’s Ontological Argument was objected by many scholars both during his life-time and later. For example, Gaunilo, a monk and contemporary of Anselm's, objected Anselm by saying that “one can not prove something by just thinking it in his mind”.

13. “The Idea Of Language”
Gaunilo: “One can not understand the meaning of a statement by just hearing or understanding it as an event of language”.

14. “The Idea Of Language”
However; These were the approaches mainly used in the past, but contemporary approaches set a limit for explaining the presupposition of the language. “For the first time, what preceding generations called God, Being, Spirit, Unconscious appear to us as what they are: names for language.”

15. “The Idea Of Language”
--Contemporary approaches had the divine veils on language removed. (“We now look without veils upon language.”)

16. “The Idea Of Language”
Later in the article, Based on the Wittgenstein’s fly image, Agamben deals with the limits covering the language. One must see and expose the limits of language

17. “The Idea Of Language”
Presupposition of language is opposed: -If every human word always presupposed another word, if the presuppositional power of language knew no limits, then there would truly be no possible experience of the limits of language.

18. “The Idea Of Language”
The meaning kept secret beyond seeing the limits of language is adressed. Furthermore, the limits of a language in terms of homonyms, polysemy etc. are analyzed.

19. “The Idea Of Language”
--Agamben asserts that language, which mediates all things for human beings, should be freed of every presupposition including self-supposition.

20. “The Idea Of Language” The result:
A language neither should be fully filled with polysemy, homonyms etc. nor it should be refined from all of these.

21. “The Idea Of Language”
Thus, the idea of language can be reached. Pure philosophical presentation should not solely analyze the ideas about language or the world, instead it should analyze the Idea of Language (the ideal way for language).

22. “The Idea Of Language”
--Here, the writer gives references to Plato’s Ideas and Things,

23. “The Idea Of Language”
References: --Kula, Onur Bilge. Dil Felsefesi Edebiyat Kuramı. İstanbul: Türkiye İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, web: < >

24. “The Idea Of Silence”
In this article the writer tries to explain the Idea of Silence with the help of a fable. According to the Fable, Athenians beated the person who wanted to be a philosopher. If the person endured the beating in a patient and silent manner, then he could gain the right to be philosopher.

25. “The Idea Of Silence”
However, in a case a person who endured the beating in a silent and patient manner got proud of himself by saying the following: “Well, worthy am I, then, to be called a philosopher!”

26. “The Idea Of Silence”
-Then he was answered: “You would have been if you had but kept quiet”

27. “The Idea Of Silence”
Based on this Fable Agamben asserts that there is a close relationship between silence and philosophy. On one hand Silence makes the Philosophy a without-name thing, on the other hand it gives the platform for the philosophy to gain a name.

28. Giorgio Agamben