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[[Category:GA Basics]]
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[[Category:Generative Anthropology]]
[[Category:Generative Anthropology]]
The '''Originary [[Scene]] (or Originary [[Scene|Event]])''' describes a hypothetical historical event where language emerges in order to [[Deferral|defer]] violence via representation.


== Introduction ==
== Origin ==
The '''Originary [[Scene]]''' is the central concept of [[Generative Anthropology]]. This hypothetical historical event is the origin of the human and simultaneously the origin of language. Eric Gans, the founder of Generative Anthropology, articulated the first version of the Originary Scene in his 1981 book The Origin of Language. Gans referred to the Originary Scene as the "little bang" of human culture, analogous to the "big bang" of the Universe.
On the Originary Scene, intense [[Mimetic Desire|mimetic desire]] overrides the existing hominid pecking order, and the members of a not-yet-human group converge symmetrically on a central object of desire (likely a food object), collectively reaching out in a gesture of appropriation. One of the hominids, out of the [[Originary Terror|originary terror]] of incurring the aggression of the other members of the group, instinctually aborts his gesture of appropriation.      


== Freud, Girard, and Gans ==
The other hominids see this hesitation and are similarly compelled to imitate and deliberately repeat his [[Gesture of Aborted Appropriation|gesture of aborted appropriation]]. The mimetic acceleration towards the central object becomes a mimetic deceleration as the gesture of appropriation (a kind of "grabbing") is converted by the group one by one into a [[Gesture of Aborted Appropriation|gesture of aborted appropriation]] (a kind of "pointing"). This [[Gesture of Aborted Appropriation|gesture of aborted appropriation]], once issued and recognized by the group, becomes the first [[sign]].       
Eric Gans was one of the first PhD students of René Girard and the Originary Scene is modeled on Girard's Scapegoating Mechanism. Girard in turn modeled his mechanism on Freud's description the father murdered by his sons''.'' Gans recognized the shared core of these scenes that purport to describe the origin of the human social order as "the designation of the central figure by a [[sign]]".       


Generative Anthropology's Originary Scene, unlike that of Freud, Girard, and all other theories of the origin of language focuses on the paradoxical emergence of this first sign.  
For the first time, the serial animal pecking order has been transcended by the collective designation of the central object via a sign. A new kind of social order is born: a human community, organized around a shared central sign that each is able to refer to. The first sign is [[ostensive]] and it functions as a collective interdiction of the central object, deferring the [[Originary Violence|originary violence]] which otherwise could have ensued. The purpose of that first sign, like all signs after it, is the [[deferral]] of violence through representation.  


== Setting the Scene ==
After the succesful issuance of the sign, the object at the center does ultimately need to be consumed, and this happens in the [[sparagmos]] where the sign would be issued again as a reminder of the communities collective limits and would make the peaceful consumption of the object possible. Following the sparagmos, as the members of the community face each other over the remains of their victim/meal/deity, the sign would be issued once again, this time pointing to the remainders and mementos of the sacred being, marking the first [[ritual]].     
Tthe Originary Scene is an attempt to hypothesize how it is possible that a community of hominids ''without'' the capacity for representation can become capable of representation. GA resists the common but absurd position that pre-linguistic beings already had something like "ideas" they wanted to "express" because that would entail assuming in advance the very thing we want to explain. Instead, the Originary Scene is an attempt to articulate a minimal account of the origin of something radically new, a sign, from a community that does not yet have this ability.     


The Originary Scene shares the same starting point as Girard: human beings are the most mimetic species, and [[mimesis]] leads to rivalry and conflict. Language comes into being to defer violence only when our hominid ancestors became ''too mimetic'' and their existing animal mechanisms that withhold their potential violence are in jeopardy.  
== Characteristics ==
Eric Gans articulated the first version of the Originary Scene in his 1981 book ''The Origin of Languag''e where he referred to the scene as the "little bang" of human culture, analogous to the "big bang" of the Universe.    


== The Originary Scene ==
The issuer of the first [[Aborted Gesture of Appropriation|aborted gesture of appropriation]] didn't ''intend'' for it to become a sign, and yet it did. The hominid group didn't ''intend'' to create a community, and yet they created the first human community via the issuance of the sign. The [[center]] both compelled them to issue the sign and the center was created when the sign was issued. This is the [[paradox]] of signification that first emerges on the Originary Scene and is constitutive of the human.    
The Originary Scene begins when a group of proto-humans, possibly a hunting party, kill or come across an "appetitive object" like a deer or a similar source of food. This food object would become the [[center]] of their attention and the hungry hominids would encircle it and attempt to consume it as they had done many times before with their animal dominance hierarchy mediating the consumption.     
 
Ordinarily, like all higher primates, the Alpha would eat first, then pass the remainder to the Beta, and so on down this serial "queued" hierarchy. However, our hypothesis entails that the mimetic capacities of these hominids had progressed such that their normal serial pecking order would have become untenable. All of the hominids, given their highly mimetic capacity as they model one another increasingly precisely, would have each begun to  approach the object simultaneously instead of one by one. This new kind of mimetically enhanced symmetry would generate a mimetic acceleration towards the object from all sides as they encircled it. At this point, the group is no longer dealing with simply animal appetite, but desire, a new social phenomenon, where each one wants the object more because their mimetic model also desires the object. The animal dominance hierarchies that kept appetitive violence at bay begin to buckle under the weight of the hominids mimetic desires.     
 
The Alpha, normally the first to appropriate the food object, would now be facing not just the Beta, a single individual rival, but the entire mimetic group as a whole. He would not be able to contest the entire group, and the situation would become seemingly apocalyptic as they all rush for the object without resort to the old dominance hierarchy that has now been transcended by their [[Mimetic Desire|mimetic desire]].   
 
Each of the hominids would be getting closer to the central object and reaching out their hands in what Gans calls a "gesture of appropriation".  Like the hands of children at a party for reaching for the last peace of cake, one of the hominids hesitates, and their a gesture of appropriation becomes a [[Gesture of Aborted Appropriation|gesture of aborted appropriation]]. Something like a "grabbing" becomes something like a "pointing" and the other hominids recognize this hesitation. First one, then two, then each hominid in the group imitates this new [[Aborted Gesture of Appropriation|aborted gesture of appropriation]] which once repeated by everyone in the group becomes the first sign. 
 
It would only have to have been momentary, but this sign would have to had to have been enough to begin a mimetic deceleration. By issuing the sign the hominids resist, at least for the moment, appropriating the object and the sign is able to defer their violence.   
 
For the first time, the hierarchical and serial animal pecking order has been transcended and a new kind of order is born: a social order, with a center, and a human community capable of using signs. The first sign is [[ostensive]], and it signifies the sharing of joint attention of everyone on the scene with the object at the center. The first sign, like all signs after it, defers violence through representation. 
 
The object at the center does need to be consumed, and the community put its new sign to work to ensure that this consumption is done in a communal and non-violent (or, sufficiently non-violent so that the [[Mimetic Crisis|mimetic crisis]] is not re-activated) manner. In the [[sparagmos]], the tension generated by the prior restraint is released, and so this danger does present itself as the community attacks the meal in this unprecedented manner. [[Resentment]] at the object itself, for imposing restraint and refusing itself, intensifies the devouring of the body. The only thing preventing each member from overreaching his bounds and turning on his fellows is the sign itself, which we can imagine working within the sparagmos as a kind of reminder of the collective limits making this peaceful consumption possible. Following the sparagmos, as the members of the community face each other over the remains of their victim/meal/deity, the sign would be issued once again, this time pointing to the remainders and mementos of the sacred being, marking the first [[ritual]]. 


=== References ===
=== References ===

Latest revision as of 18:31, 9 April 2023

The Originary Scene (or Originary Event) describes a hypothetical historical event where language emerges in order to defer violence via representation.

Origin

On the Originary Scene, intense mimetic desire overrides the existing hominid pecking order, and the members of a not-yet-human group converge symmetrically on a central object of desire (likely a food object), collectively reaching out in a gesture of appropriation. One of the hominids, out of the originary terror of incurring the aggression of the other members of the group, instinctually aborts his gesture of appropriation.

The other hominids see this hesitation and are similarly compelled to imitate and deliberately repeat his gesture of aborted appropriation. The mimetic acceleration towards the central object becomes a mimetic deceleration as the gesture of appropriation (a kind of "grabbing") is converted by the group one by one into a gesture of aborted appropriation (a kind of "pointing"). This gesture of aborted appropriation, once issued and recognized by the group, becomes the first sign.

For the first time, the serial animal pecking order has been transcended by the collective designation of the central object via a sign. A new kind of social order is born: a human community, organized around a shared central sign that each is able to refer to. The first sign is ostensive and it functions as a collective interdiction of the central object, deferring the originary violence which otherwise could have ensued. The purpose of that first sign, like all signs after it, is the deferral of violence through representation.

After the succesful issuance of the sign, the object at the center does ultimately need to be consumed, and this happens in the sparagmos where the sign would be issued again as a reminder of the communities collective limits and would make the peaceful consumption of the object possible. Following the sparagmos, as the members of the community face each other over the remains of their victim/meal/deity, the sign would be issued once again, this time pointing to the remainders and mementos of the sacred being, marking the first ritual.

Characteristics

Eric Gans articulated the first version of the Originary Scene in his 1981 book The Origin of Language where he referred to the scene as the "little bang" of human culture, analogous to the "big bang" of the Universe.

The issuer of the first aborted gesture of appropriation didn't intend for it to become a sign, and yet it did. The hominid group didn't intend to create a community, and yet they created the first human community via the issuance of the sign. The center both compelled them to issue the sign and the center was created when the sign was issued. This is the paradox of signification that first emerges on the Originary Scene and is constitutive of the human.

References

Gans, E. L., Katz, A. L. (2019). The Origin of Language: A New Edition

Katz, A. (2020). Anthropomorphics.

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