"God is No Respecter of Persons"

Dear Linguists, Fiction-ers, Transromantics
and Colleagues Across the Curriculum.

(Courses w/o Border series, cont.)

Phonics: Phonology:

Phoneme - an archetypal "idea" of a sound:
not the sound itself

Phone - a stereotypical representation
(manifestation, embodiment) of the "idea"
of the sound--notthe idea itself.

Allo-phone - all the regional and local
variations on the stereotype the way
you say tomato and I say tomahtoe &
we probably won't go to war because
IT's merely a difference that don't make a
DIFFERENCE.

This hierarchical three-level
(archetype, stereotype, allo-type)
distinction may be one of the most useful
patterns in the course:

Here it refers to the mapping of sound,
but it also works for morphemes and morphs
(meaning) as well as "memes" & "themes":
--ideas and their representations, and then
the variations on their representations:
fashions & style, versions and varieties.

Muslims are irritated when a Teddy Bear
is called Muhammed. Xtians are irritated
when a crucifix is stuck in a beaker of urine.
Southerners are irritated when the
Confederate Flag is dis-allowed.

Allo-variations on the SAME IDEA: the
sacredness of our various representations of
what-can-not-be-represented.

Our Archetypes are reduced to Stereotypes--
which is ok because we agree on the stereotype.
But then the stereotypes get fiddled with,
messed with. This is always demoralizing,
threatening differences that make a difference
and not just those that don't

Do you see the problem here? It's ubiquity?

“ God is no Respecter of Persons” (Romans 2"11)

Consider: the word “person” literally means a
“sounding thru”—not any substantial THING at all.

Can’t touch a “per-son” because a person is the
sound sounding thru. In Greek theater, which was
a religious ritual aimed at provoking Catharsis
(a momentary purging of Fear and Pity,) the actors
(literally “hypocrites” or “role-players”) wore large
representative masques, each with a small megaphone
at the mouth, so their sound (sonic)could be heard
through (per) out the amphitheater.



The mask and megaphone was called a “per-son”
— personic. "Persona" and "person" derive from
this literal description and context.

I like that etymology. A person is no thing but
a sounding-thru. You might recall hakespeare ’s MacBeth

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

You might find the SOUND of that (or the MEANING)
negative. I could argue that it’s wonderfully descriptive
& neither negative nor positive—or rather: positive
because it unveils our naturally “thing-y” (noun-y) bias
and reveals how-it-is we are all bags of breaking wind,
yes? Trans-formers articulating breath into rat-a-tattoos
of articulated sonar & consonantal ratios signifying things
from no things, each one of us a natural born idios (unique
personal private idiot) telling our tales on a social stage
where “the play’s the thing!”

Need we argue? Of course. Look around.
Check IT out. Or what's a college for?