Philosophy of Language

Now in its fourth edition, Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction

introduces students to the main issues and theories in twenty-first-century philosophy of language, focusing specifically on linguistic phenomena. Author William G. Lycan structures the book's thirteen chapters into four general parts.

Part I, Reference and referring

includes topics such as Russell's Theory of Descriptions (and its failings), Donnellan's distinction, problems of anaphora, the Description Theory of proper names, Searle's Cluster Theory, and the Causal-Historical Theory.

Part II, Theories of meaning

surveys the competing theories of linguistic meaning and compares their various advantages and liabilities.

Part III, Pragmatics and speech acts

introduces the basic concepts of linguistic pragmatics and includes an introduction to the Relevance approach to pragmatics.

Part IV, The expressive and the figurative

examines various forms of expressive language, as well as what metaphorical meaning is and how most listeners readily grasp it.

Features of Philosophy of Language include

chapter overviews and summaries, clear supportive examples, study questions, annotated lists of further reading, a glossary.

Key updates to the fourth edition

a new section on the predicativist theory of proper names, an expanded section on inferentialist theories of meaning, a new section on dynamic (“update”) theories of meaning, a separate section on varieties of presupposition, an all-new section on “applied” philosophy of language, listing eleven recent areas of research, up-to-date coverage of new literature, further reading lists, and the bibliography.