Philosophical Investigations 9:1]anuary 1986 ISSN 0191-053612.50 Convention: Variations on a Theme Richard Shusterman, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev In a recent paper entitled "Convention: A Theme in Phil- osophy", Hilary Putnam maintains that "a deep examination of the notion of convention is one of the great contributions of analytic philosophy" and that "two great analytic philosophers have reached the conclusion that convention is a relatively superficial thing. It rests upon facts about us that are Natural and not Conventional. " 1 • Putnam, who shares this low estimate of conven- tion, claims the later Wittgenstein as one of the two analytic greats to reject the importance of convention, the other being Quine. I find these views of Putnam rather questionable and misleading, especially misleading given Putnam's own deserved status as one of today's foremost analytic philosophers. 2 Certainly Wittgenstein, with his central notion of language- games and his emphasis on shared social usage and practices rather than natural essences, could easily be characterised as underlining the pervasive importance of the conventional rather than the natural. In the Investigations he maintains that all language "is founded on convention" 3 ; and in The Blue Book, rather than regarding conventions as relatively superficial, Wittgenstein describes them as most fundamental, the bedrock not only of language but also of the understanding and knowledge that 1. H. Putnam, "Convention: A Theme in Philosophy", New Literary History, 13 (1981), pp. 1-14; quotations from pp. 1,5. 2. It might be argued that we should not take Putnam's pronouncements seriously and as made in earnest, since they appear in a journal primarily dedicated to the theory and philosophy of literature rather than to "straight" philosophy. But even if many philosophers lower or relax their standards when they philosophize in aesthetic and literary contexts, indeed particularly since they do, we should hold them responsible for their philosophical assertions and not let these go unchallenged when wrong or misleading. 3. L. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations (Oxford:Blackwell, 1968), para. 355. 36