Abstract
Robyn Carston and I, along with many others, share a general methodological position which I call ‘Truth-Conditional Pragmatics’ (TCP). TCP is the view that the effects of context on truth-conditional content need not be traceable to the linguistic material in the uttered sentence. Some effects of context on truth-conditional content come from the linguistic material (for example, from context-sensitive words or morphemes which trigger the search for contextual values), but others result from ‘top-down’ pragmatic processes that take place not because the linguistic material demands it, but because the utterance’s content is not faithfully or wholly encoded in the sentence spoken, the meaning of which requires adjustment or elaboration in order to determine an admissible content for the utterance.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bach, K. (1987) Thought and Reference. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Bach, K. (1994) ‘Conversational Impliciture’. Mind and Language 9: 124–62.
Bach, K. (2000) ‘Quantification, Qualification and Context’. Mind and Language 15: 262–83.
Carruthers, P. (1996) Language, Thought, and Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Carston, R. (2002) Thoughts and Utterances: The Pragmatics of Explicit Communication. Oxford: Blackwell.
Chierchia, G. (1999) ‘Linguistics and Language’. In R. Wilson and F. Keil (eds), The MIT Encyclopedia of the Cognitive Sciences. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. xci–cix.
Chierchia, G. (2004) ‘Scalar Implicatures, Polarity Phenomena, and the Syntax/ Pragmatics Interface’. In A. Beletti (ed.), Structures and Beyond. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 39–103.
Chierchia, G. and McConnell-Ginet, S. (1990) Meaning and Grammar. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press/Bradford Books.
Chomsky, N. (1976) ‘Conditions on Rules of Grammar’. Linguistic Analysis 2: 303–51.
van Deemter, K. and Peters, S. (eds) (1996) Semantic Ambiguity and Underspecification. Stanford: CSLI Publications.
Fodor, J. (2001) ‘Language, Thought and Compositionality’. Mind and Language 16: 1–15.
Fox, D. (2005) ‘Implicature Calculation, Pragmatics or Syntax?’ Class handout, École Normale Supérieure.
Fox, D. and Hackl, M. (2006) ‘The Universal Density of Measurement’. Linguistics and Philosophy 29: 537–86.
Hornstein, N. (1995) Logical Form: From GB to Minimalism. Oxford: Blackwell.
Jackendoff, R. (1983) Semantics and Cognition. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Jackendoff, R. (1990) Semantic Structures. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Jackendoff, R. (1993) ‘The Combinatorial Structure of Thought: The Family of Causative Concepts’. In E. Reuland and W. Abraham (eds), Knowledge and Language II: Lexical and Conceptual Structure. Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp. 31–49.
Jackendoff, R. (1997) The Architecture of the Language Faculty. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Jackendoff, R. (2002) Foundations of Language: Brain, Meaning, Grammar, Evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Jacobson, P. (2005) ‘Variable-Free Semantics: The Case of Quantifier Domain Restrictions’. Handout, Institut Jean-Nicod, Paris.
Katz, J. (1972) Semantic Theory. New York: Harper and Row.
Katz, J. (1977) Propositional Structure and Illocutionary Force. New York: Crowell.
Kempson, R. (1993) ‘Input Systems, Anaphora, Ellipsis and Operator Binding’. In E. Reuland and W. Abraham (eds), Knowledge and Language II: Lexical and Conceptual Structure. Dordrecht: Kluwer, pp. 51–78.
King, J. and Stanley, J. (2005) ‘Semantics, Pragmatics, and the Role of Semantic Content’. In Z. Szabó (ed.), Semantics versus Pragmatics. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 111–64.
Ludlow, P. (1999) Semantics, Tense, and Time. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Martí, L. (2006) ‘Unarticulated Constituents Revisited’. Linguistics and Philosophy 29: 135–66.
May, R. (1985) Logical Form. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Neale, S. (2000) ‘On being Explicit: Comments on Stanley and Szabó, and on Bach’. Mind and Language 15: 284–94.
Pagin, P. (2005) ‘Compositionality and Context’. In G. Preyer and G. Peter (eds), Contextualism in Philosophy: Knowledge, Meaning and Truth. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 303–48.
Predelli, S. (2005) Contexts: Meaning, Truth, and the Use of Language. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Recanati, F. (2002) ‘Unarticulated Constituents’. Linguistics and Philosophy 25: 299–345.
Recanati, F. (2004) Literal Meaning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sperber, D. and Wilson, D. (1986) Relevance: Communication and Cognition. Oxford: Blackwell.
Stanley, J. (2000) ‘Context and Logical Form’. Linguistics and Philosophy 23: 391–434.
Stanley, J. (2005) ‘Semantics in Context’. In G. Preyer and G. Peter (eds), Contextualism in Philosophy: Knowledge, Meaning and Truth. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 221–53.
Stern, J. (2000) Metaphor in Context. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Stern, J. (2006) ‘Metaphor, Literal, and Literalism’. Mind and Language 21: 243–79.
Szabó, Z. (2000) Problems of Compositionality. New York: Garland.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2010 François Recanati
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Recanati, F. (2010). Pragmatics and Logical Form. In: Soria, B., Romero, E. (eds) Explicit Communication. Palgrave Studies in Pragmatics, Language and Cognition. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230292352_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230292352_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-36099-4
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-29235-2
eBook Packages: Palgrave Language & Linguistics CollectionEducation (R0)