Topics in semantics and pragmatics

Code
570640
Credits
5cr

Goals

This course is conceived as an introduction to some foundational topics on meaning and communication, as well as to the study of some recent developments and applications of some central notions in Semantics and Pragmatics.  

 

Course plan

Week 1 - Introduction

Week 2 - Conversational implicatures  

  • Grice, Paul (1975). “Logic and conversation”. In P. Grice (1989). Studies in the Way of Words. Harvard University Press.
  • Levinson, Stephen (2000) "Presumptive meanings. The Theory of Generalized Conversational Implicature". MIT Press. (Pages 11-42)

Week 3 - Presuppositions

  • Stalnaker, Robert (1973). Presuppositions. Journal of Philosophical Logic 2 (4): 447 - 457.

Week 4 - Conventional implicatures

  • Bach, Kent (1999). The Myth of Conventional Implicature. Linguistics and Philosophy, 22(4), 327–366.

Week 5 - Slurs

  • Jeshion, Robin (2013), Slurs and Stereotypes. Analytic Philosophy, 54: 314-329. https://doi.org/10.1111/phib.12021

Week 6 - Generic generalizations

  • Haslanger, Sally (2011). Ideology, Generics, and Common Ground. In Charlotte Witt (ed.), Feminist Metaphysics. Springer Verlag. pp. 179-207.

Week 7 - Generics and social cognition

  • Saul, Jennifer (2023) Are Generics Especially Pernicious? Inquiry, 66 (9). pp. 1689-1706. https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2017.1285995
  • Leslie, Sarah-Jane (2017). The Original Sin of Cognition: Fear Prejudice, and Generalization. Journal of Philosophy 114 (8):393-421.

Week 8 - Gender-fair language

  • Moulton, Janice (1981). The myth of the neutral ’man’. In Mary Vetterling-Braggin (ed.), Sexist Language: A Modern Philosophical Analysis. Littlefield, Adams. pp. 100-16.
  • Horn, Laurence and Steven Kleinedler (2000). Parasitic reference vs. R-based narrowing: Lexical pragmatics meets He-Man. Paper presented at annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, Chicago.

Week 9 - Speech acts

  • Austin, John (1961). Performative Utterances. In J. O. Urmson & G. J. Warnock (eds.), Philosophical Papers. Clarendon Press.
  • Searle, J. (1975). A Taxonomy of Illocutionary Acts. Language, Mind, and Knowledge, Minneapolis Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 7, 344-369.

Week 10 - Discursive injustice

  • Kukla, Rebecca (2014). Performative Force, Convention, and Discursive Injustice. Hypatia 29 (2): 440-457.
  • Bianchi, Claudia (2020). Discursive Injustice: The Role of Uptake. Topoi 40 (1): 181-190.

 

Assessment

Class participation (15%), class presentation (15%), a written essay (70%).

 

Bibliography

Austin, John (1961). Performative Utterances. In J. O. Urmson & G. J. Warnock (eds.), Philosophical Papers. Clarendon Press.

Bach, Kent (1999). The Myth of Conventional Implicature. Linguistics and Philosophy, 22(4), 327–366. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25001747

Bianchi, Claudia (2020). Discursive Injustice: The Role of Uptake. Topoi 40 (1):181-190.

von Fintel, Kai (2008). “What is presupposition accommodation, again?” Philosophical Perspectives 22 (1):137-170

Grice, Paul (1975). “Logic and conversation” (in Grice, P (1989))

Haslanger, Sally (2011). Ideology, Generics, and Common Ground. In Charlotte Witt (ed.), Feminist Metaphysics. Springer Verlag. pp. 179--207.

Horn, Lawrence and Steven Kleinedler (2000). Parasitic reference vs. R-based narrowing: Lexical pragmatics meets He-Man. Paper presented at annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, Chicago.

Jeshion, Robin (2013). “Slurs and stereotypes”. Analytic Philosophy, 54(3): 314–329

Karttunen, Lauri & Peters, Stanley. (1979). Conventional Implicature. Syntax and semantics. 11. 1-56.

Kukla, Rebecca (2014). Performative Force, Convention, and Discursive Injustice. Hypatia 29 (2):440-457.

Leslie, Sarah-Jane (2017). The Original Sin of Cognition: Fear Prejudice, and Generalization. Journal of Philosophy 114 (8):393-421.

Levinson, Stephen (2000). "Presumptive meaning. The theory of generalized conversational implicatures". MIT Press.

Moulton, Janice (1981). The myth of the neutral ’man’. In Mary Vetterling-Braggin (ed.), Sexist Language: A Modern Philosophical Analysis. Littlefield, Adams. pp. 100-16.

Potts, Christopher (2005) "The logic of conventional implicatures". Oxford University Press

Potts, Christopher (2015). Presupposition and implicature. In Shalom Lappin & Chris Fox (eds.), Handbook of Contemporary Semantic Theory. Wiley-Blackwell.

Saul, Jenny (2023) Are Generics Especially Pernicious? Inquiry, 66 (9). pp. 1689-1706. https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2017.1285995

Searle, John (1975). A Taxonomy of Illocutionary Acts. Language, Mind, and Knowledge, Minneapolis Studies in the Philosophy of Science, 7, 344-369.

Stalnaker, Robert (1973). Presuppositions. Journal of Philosophical Logic 2 (4):447 - 457.

Tonhauser, Judith, David Beaver, Craige Roberts and Mandy Simons (2013). Toward a Taxonomy of Projective Content. Language. 89. 66-109. 10.2307/23357722.