ABSTRACT Emmanuel Levinas’s work seemingly places a great emphasis on language leading some commentators towards a Kantian reading of him where moral consideration would be based on the moral patient’s capacity for reason with language functioning as a proxy for this. Although this reading is possible, a closer look at Levinas’s descriptions of language reveal that its defining characteristic is not reason but the capacity to express beyond any thematized contents we would give to the Other. This expressivity (which Levinas calls face) would confront me with their singularity, infinity, and interiority tying me to them in a relation of responsibility. And the “content” of such an expression is a vulnerability and exposure tied to their mortality which continually entreats me though I cannot take it away. It is by means of this bare expression of an exposure to death as the core of language that it will become possible for non-human mortal beings to have what Levinas calls language. This possibility, although not explicitly addressed by Levinas, is at least left open by his account of Bobby the dog as well as his agnosticism over a snake’s face.

中文翻译：

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表达性漏洞：语言和非人类

摘要 Emmanuel Levinas 的作品似乎非常强调语言，这导致一些评论家对他进行康德式解读，其中道德考虑将基于道德患者的理性能力，而语言则作为这一点的代理。尽管这种解读是可能的，但仔细观察列维纳斯对语言的描述会发现，它的定义特征不是理性，而是超越我们给予他者的任何主题化内容的表达能力。这种表现力（列维纳斯称之为面子）会让我面对他们的独特性、无限性和内在性，将我与他们以一种责任关系联系起来。这种表达的“内容”是与他们的死亡相关的脆弱性和暴露，尽管我无法将其消除，但它不断地恳求我。正是通过这种暴露于死亡作为语言核心的赤裸裸的表达，非人类的凡人才有可能拥有列维纳斯所说的语言。尽管列维纳斯没有明确指出这种可能性，但至少他对狗鲍比的描述以及他对蛇脸的不可知论是开放的。