Language And Solitude: Wittgenstein, Malinowski... May 2026

Shifted toward " language games " where meaning is determined by social use. Gellner argues this merely "transplanted" the problem, making truth subservient to local custom. Malinowski’s Ethnographic Solution

Gellner argues that both men were shaped by a specific historical crisis: the tension between a fading, traditional multicultural empire and the rise of modern, individualistic universalism. This environment forced a choice between two "solitudes": Language and Solitude: Wittgenstein, Malinowski...

Wittgenstein’s career is often divided into two phases that Gellner views as extreme responses to this dilemma: Shifted toward " language games " where meaning