Philosophy of language

General data

Course ID:	3800-FJ22-M-OG
Erasmus code / ISCED:	08.1 Kod klasyfikacyjny przedmiotu składa się z trzech do pięciu cyfr, przy czym trzy pierwsze oznaczają klasyfikację dziedziny wg. Listy kodów dziedzin obowiązującej w programie Socrates/Erasmus, czwarta (dotąd na ogół 0) – ewentualne uszczegółowienie informacji o dyscyplinie, piąta – stopień zaawansowania przedmiotu ustalony na podstawie roku studiów, dla którego przedmiot jest przeznaczony. / (0223) Philosophy and ethics The ISCED (International Standard Classification of Education) code has been designed by UNESCO.
Course title:	Philosophy of language
Name in Polish:	Filozofia języka
Organizational unit:	Faculty of Philosophy
Course groups:	General university courses in the humanities
ECTS credit allocation (and other scores):	(not available) Basic information on ECTS credits allocation principles: the annual hourly workload of the student’s work required to achieve the expected learning outcomes for a given stage is 1500-1800h, corresponding to 60 ECTS; the student’s weekly hourly workload is 45 h; 1 ECTS point corresponds to 25-30 hours of student work needed to achieve the assumed learning outcomes; weekly student workload necessary to achieve the assumed learning outcomes allows to obtain 1.5 ECTS; work required to pass the course, which has been assigned 3 ECTS, constitutes 10% of the semester student load. view allocation of credits
Language:	Polish
Type of course:	elective monographs general courses
Mode:	Classroom
Short description:	This course explores the nature of meaning, reference and truth, and their bearing on the use of language in communication. It surveys main issues in syntax (compositionality principle, categorial grammar), semantics (meaning, reference, proper names and descriptions, internalism vs externalism) and pragmatics (implicatures, presuppositions, speech acts).
Full description:	The main objective of the course is critical analysis of main problems discussed in the philosophy of language. I. Meaning and reference 1. Theories of reference 1.1. proper names (descriptive, nondescriptive, hybrid, indexical, mental files theories; rigid designation, direct reference) 1.2. descriptions (definite and indefinite, attributive and referential) 1.3. semantic reference and speaker reference 1.4. indexical expressions 2. Theories of meaning 2.1. propositional 2.1.1. main theories of propositions; singular propositions 2.2. use theories 2.3. psychological theories (meaning as a communicative intention) 3. Semantic internalism vs. Semantic externalism (Twin Earth, arthrities) 4. Intentionality II. Logical syntax 1. Main goals of a theory of syntax: the compositionality principle 2. Ajdukiewicz and categorial grammar 3. The functoriality principle: Fregean sources of categorial grammar 4. Semantic categories and intentionality: Husserlian sources of categorial grammar 5. Geach and rich systems of categorial grammar 6. Categorial grammar, Montague grammar, generative grammar – main similarities and dissimilarities. III. Meaning and use; meaning in context 1. Speech acts 2. Implicatures 3. Contextualism vs. semantic minimalism a) context and its roles b) minimalism, contextualism, indexicalism, truth relativism c) implicatures, implicitures, explicatures
Bibliography:	Podręczniki Przewodnik po filozofii języka. Red. J. Odrowąż-Sypniewska WAM 2016. 10 wykładów z filozofii języka. B. Stanosz. Biblioteka Myśli Semiotycznej. Pragmatyka. S. C. Levinson. PWN. Philosophy of Language. A Contemporary Introduction. W. Lycan. Routledge. The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of Language. Red. M. Devitt i Richard Hanley. Blackwell. Oxford Companion to the Philosophy of Language. Red. E. Lepore i B. Smith Routledge Companion to the Philosophy of Language. Red. G. Russell i D. Fara. Zbiory artykułów Fragmenty filozofii analitycznej. Filozofia języka. Red. B. Stanosz. PWN. Logika i język. Red. J. Pelc. PWN. Philosophy of language. Red. A.P. Martinich. OUP. Readings in the Philosophy of Language. Red. P. Ludlow. MIT Press.
Learning outcomes:	Student knows various theories of meaning and reference for various kinds of expressions; knows main categorical grammars; knows what are speech acts, presuppositions and implicatures, knows the difference between semantic externalism and internalism; between contextualism and minimalism. Student is able to analyse natural language sentences; to distinguish referential and attributive uses of descriptions; to distinguish speaker reference from semantic reference; to explain what is intentionality; to identify presuppositions and implicatures of a given utterance.
Assessment methods and assessment criteria:	The course will end with a written exam, which will test the knowledge acquired by the students during lectures. It will be a test consisting of questions relating to all topics covered during the course. Permissible number of absences: 2 in a semester

This course is not currently offered.

Course descriptions are protected by copyright.
Copyright by University of Warsaw.