PHIL 5300

How is it possible for this string of marks to ask you a question? What is it for a word to have a meaning? Is the meaning of a word an idea that you associate with it? Is it the objects in the world that it picks out? Is it an abstract "object" of some kind? What is the relationship between language and the world? Between words and sentences? Between what I mean and what I say? Between saying and acting? Between what I say and what you understand? Between meaning and linguistic use? Between meaning and behaviour? Between meaning and truth? Between the literal and the metaphorical? Is there any fact of the matter about what a linguistic expression means? Is there any such thing as linguistic meaning at all? This introduction to some major themes in the Philosophy of Language will explore answers to such questions as these, focusing on the work of such figures as Locke, Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, Carnap, Quine, Chomsky, Austin, Langton, Saul, Searle, Hesse and Davidson.