Phil 306 : Philosophy of Language (Spring 2015)
Class Times: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11.30am-1pm
Location: McDonnell Hall 361
Instructor: Professor Gillian Russell
Office hours: Thursdays 2-3pm or by appointment
Office: 209 Wilson Hall
grussell – at – artsci – dot – wustl – dot – edu
Teaching Assistant: Tyler Paytas
Office Hours: Tuesdays 3.30-5.30pm
Location of office hours: The Cave (in the basement of Wilson Hall)
Email: tylerpaytas – at – wustl – dot – edu
Course Website: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~grussell/Phil306S15.html
This is an upper-level undergraduate course in the philosophy of language. There will be three main sections. The first introduces a number of classic, central topics in the area, including e.g. names, descriptions, implicature and externalism as well as many of the tools necessary for later parts of the course. The second section looks at applications of philosophy of language in the political sphere, such as treatments of slurs, propaganda, and the treatment of pornography as free speech. The last section focuses on artificial formal languages, for example, the kind one uses in logic.
Our subject is heavily influenced by work in logic, and to an increasing extent, by the work of theoretical linguists. Previous courses in these areas may help you, though they are not required.
One of the more difficult aspects of the course will be the reading, which consists largely in longish, original articles written as research papers for other philosophers (rather than as introductory texts aimed at students.) I recommend that you take a look at Jim Pryor’s article “How to read a philosophy paper” – he gives some good advice on approaching this kind of reading.
Many of the readings for the course can be found in the course reader: Philosophy of Language, edited by Martinich and Sosa. Some of the assigned readings are not included in this collection, but those will be linked from this webpage, or posted on the ares site for the course. (You can access ares here: http://ares.wustl.edu/ares/)
Readings and Topics
Readings marked with an ‘(MS)’ can be found in Martinich and Sosa’s Philosophy of Language.
Tuesday 13th January
Introduction to the subject. No preassigned reading.
Part 1: Names and Descriptions
Thursday 15th January – Frege’s Philosophy of Language
Reading: “The Thought: A Logical Inquiry” – G. Frege (MS)
Tuesday 20th January – Frege’s Puzzle
Reading:”On Sense and Reference” – G. Frege (MS)
Thursday 22nd January – Russell’s Theory of Descriptions
Reading: “On Denoting” – B. Russell (MS)
Tuesday 27th January – Descriptions and Existence
“On What There Is” – W.V.O. Quine (on jstor) http://www.jstor.org/stable/20123117
Thursday 29th January – Strawson’s Response to Russell
Reading: “On Referring” – P.F. Strawson (MS)
Paper 1 is due today
Tuesday 3rd February – The Referential/Attributive Distinction
Reading: “Reference and Definite Descriptions” – Keith Donnellan (MS)
Thursday 5th February – Implicature
Reading: “Logic and Conversation” – H.P.Grice (MS)
Tuesday 10th February – Names
Reading: Extract from Naming and Necessity – S. Kripke (MS)
Thursday 12th February
Second class on Naming and Necessity, no additional reading.
Tuesday 17th February – Semantic Externalism
Reading: “Meaning and Reference” – H. Putnam (on J-stor: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0022-362X%2819731108%2970%3A19%3C699%3AMAR%3E2.0.CO%3B2-1)
This one is also in the reader (MS).
Thursday 19th February – Context
Reading: “Assertion” – R. Stalnaker (MS)
Tuesday 24th February
Review class for midterm
Thursday 26th February
MIDTERM EXAM
Part II – Language and Politics
Tuesday 3rd March
Reading: “Politics and the English Language” – G. Orwell, http://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_polit/
Optional additional reading: Geoff Pullum’s criticisms: http://chronicle.com/blogs/linguafranca/2013/04/04/elimination-of-the-fittest/
Thursday 5th March
Reading: “Subordinating Speech” – I. Maitra (to be placed on ares)
Tuesday 10th March
Spring Break
Thursday 12th March
Spring Break
Tuesday 17th March
Reading: “Slurs and Stereotypes” – R. Jeshion (on ares)
Thursday 19th March – Speech Acts
Reading: “What did you call me? Slurs as Prohibited Words” – L. Anderson and E. Lepore
Paper 2 is due today (Now due Thursday April 2nd.)
Tuesday 24th March
Reading: “Performative Utterances” – J.L. Austin (MS)
Thursday 26th March – Pornography and Free Speech
Reading: “Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts” – R. Langton, http://web.mit.edu/langton/www/pubs/SpeechActs.pdf
Tuesday 31st March
Reading: “Language as a Mechanism of Control” from Why Propaganda Matters – J. Stanley (ares)
Part 3 – Formal Languages
Thursday 2nd April
Thursday 2nd April
Revised deadline: Paper 2 is due today
Reading: Excerpt from Frege’s “Begriffsschrift” (on ares)
Readings from here on were updated on 4/6/2015
Tuesday 7th April –
No class
Thursday 9th April
“Language as a Mechanism of Control” from Why Propaganda Matters – J. Stanley (ares)
Tuesday 14th April – Formal languages
Reading: Excerpt from Frege’s “Begriffsschrift” (on ares)
Thursday 16th April
Excerpt from Formal Languages in Logic – C. D. Novaes (on ares)
Tuesday 21st April
Selections from Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations (on ares)
Thursday 23rd April – Final Paper due
Top secret special final class – no reading required. Final paper due today.
Assessment
Assessment is by way of two very short papers, one midterm exam, and a longer term paper. Your grade will be weighted as follows:
| First short paper | 300 words max | 10% | 29th January |
| Midterm Exam | – | 30% | 25th February |
| Second short paper | 300 words max | 20% | |
| Term Paper | 1500 words max | 40% | 23rd April |
I will provide prompts for each of the papers. If you like, you may also develop your own paper topic (except in the exam) but if you’d like to do this I strongly recommend discussing it with Tyler or me first (you might either come to our office hours, or send us an outline by email.)
I prefer papers to be double-spaced, with page numbers. Please clip or staple the pages together. Your name should be placed on the final page only. Papers can be turned in by placing them in the appropriate drawer in the “turn in” filing cabinet in the philosophy department by 3.30pm on the day on which they are due. (The office closes at 4pm and we discourage students from knocking on the door at 4pm when the staff are trying to go home.)
I’m willing to look at drafts of papers, on the condition that the draft is emailed to me at least one week prior to the paper deadline. This is to give me time to read it carefully and write you comments, and then give you enough time to rewrite the paper ahead of the deadline.
Plagiarism
Any cases of suspected plagiarism, or other problems with academic integrity, will be reported to the Dean in his role as head of the academic integrity committee.
Pass/Fail Option
Students taking the course pass/fail will need an overall grade of C- for a pass.
Gillian Russell 