The Ideologem as a New Entity of Consciousness and as a Basis for Individuation (the case of the Bakhtin circle)

The interest of the contribution by Valentin Volochinov-one of the authors of the ``Circle of Mr. Bakhtin''- to the current linguistic discussions about identitemes in language and discourse consists, first, in the fact that it proposes an ``emotional'' definition of communication and of linguistic community (in particular in terms of ``appraisal'' or ``assessment''). Second, Volochinov proposes an ``ethnopsychological'' definition; and finally, he sketches an original conception of the identity function of language, a conception fixed by the curious concept of ``ideologem''. According to Volochinov, a minimal unit of identity has an aesthetic nature. In connection with aesthetic debates at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, such a unit appears as an ``impression-expression'' entity. It is a property of verbal consciousness, defined as an expressive consciousness and designated by the term ``ideological sign'' or ``ideologem''. It is a subjective or individual component as a sublimation of the collective. It is a sign of the adherence of an individual consciousness to a point of view, an ``assessment'' or an ``attitude'' of the individual, a language or community.