WHAT DID LANGER,SUSANNE REALLY MEAN

The social philosophy of meaning and emotions represented in the work of Susanne Langer was recognized by Talcott Parsons, but has yet to be incorporated into mainstream sociological theoritizations. Langer's w ork is as potentially important to contemporary microsociology, and th e sociology of emotions, as the work of Peirce, Mead, or Schutz. The i mpediment to appreciating her work resides in contemporary confusions regarding the nature of logic. Sociologists often subscribe to Wittgen stein's denial of the validity of formal logic in constructing theorie s of human behavior. Langer has been misunderstood because her theoret izations address more than discursive logics and meanings. The thrust of Langer's work is that logic and meaning exist on a nondiscursive le vel of emotions. Though her work is more than 50 years old, we are now in a position to appreciate it because we are now exploring and conce ptualizing the notion of social inferencing as existing beyond formal logic.