ABSTRACT
Symbolization is a universal human process. But we still need to understand much more about it, especially in its comparative aspects, in different societies, different classes, different religions. Pervasive in communication, grounded in the very use of language, symbolization is part of the living stuff of social relationships. Western literature is shot through with references which recall to us questions of existence and identity in symbol terms. In an essay on The Poet, Emerson wrote of the universality of the symbolic language: 'things admit of being used as symbols because nature is a symbol' (but so is culture) - Ve are symbols and inhabit symbols'. In Sartor Resartiis Carlyle held that in a symbol there is both concealment and revelation. Oriental writings show analogous views. What is it in such statements that some of us find so attractive? Is it truth or illusion about human personality? And if these are not questions for anthropologists to answer, can we at least comment meaningfully upon the forms of such statements, the conditions of their utterance, and their social effects?
