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Beyond Meaning: A Journey Across Language, Perception and Experience

  • Provides a detailed and widely accessible presentation of both the technical and the philosophical foundations of formal semantics
  • Includes a unique interdisciplinary discussion around the issue of linguistic meaning, combining insights from linguistics, philosophy and neurocognition
  • Develops a new perspective on linguistic meaning, eliminating the traditional dichotomy between externalism and internalism in semantics

Part of the book series: Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology (PEPRPHPS, volume 25)

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Table of contents (36 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xvii
  2. Introduction

    • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
    Pages 1-3
  3. Meaning and Objects

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 5-5
    2. Beyond Sense

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 7-11
    3. Meaning and Language

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 13-20
    4. Meaning and Compositionality

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 21-24
    5. Meaning and Grammar

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 25-33
    6. Models and Formal Languages

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 35-42
    7. Meaning and Functions

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 43-55
    8. Meaning and Relations

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 57-67
    9. Meaning and Quantification

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 69-77
    10. Meaning and Description

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 79-82
    11. Meaning and Possibility

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 83-96
    12. Meaning and Necessity

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 97-103
    13. Meaning and Attitudes

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 105-113
    14. Natural Language Metaphysics

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 115-124
  4. Meaning and Subjects

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 125-125
    2. Beyond Form

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 127-128
    3. Meaning and World

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 129-136
    4. Meaning and Actions

      • Gaetano Fiorin, Denis Delfitto
      Pages 137-146

About this book

Natural languages – idioms such as English and Cantonese, Zulu and Amharic, Basque and Nicaraguan Sign Language – allow their speakers to convey meaning and transmit meaning to one another. But what is meaning exactly? What is this thing that words convey and speakers communicate? Few questions are as elusive as this. Yet, few features are as essential to who we are and what we do as human beings as the capacity to convey meaning through language. 


In this book, Gaetano Fiorin and Denis Delfitto disclose a notion of linguistic meaning that is structured around three distinct, yet interconnected dimensions: a linguistic dimension, relating meaning to the linguistic forms that convey it; a material dimension, relating meaning to the material and social conditions of its environment; and a psychological dimension, relating meaning to the cognitive lives of its users. 


By paying special attention to the puzzle surrounding first-person reference – the way speakers exploit language to refer to themselves – and by capitalizing on a number of recent findings in the cognitive sciences, Fiorin and Delfitto develop the original hypothesis that meaningful language shares the same underlying logical and metaphysical structure of sense perception, effectively acting as a system of classification and discrimination at the interface between cognitive agents and their ecologies.
 

Authors and Affiliations

  • Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Gaetano Fiorin

  • University of Verona, Verona, Italy

    Denis Delfitto

About the authors

Gaetano Fiorin is Assistant Professor of Linguistics and Logic at University College Utrecht and a researcher affiliated to the Utrecht institute of Linguistics (UiL-OTS). He graduated with a thesis on the semantic competence of children with developmental dyslexia. His research work spans from theoretical linguistics – particularly the semantics of the first-person and its implications for the syntax-semantics interface and the metaphysics of meaning – to experimental linguistics – particularly developmental dyslexia and multilingualism.

Denis Delfitto is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Verona. He graduated at the Scuola Normale in Pisa and had many research and teaching experiences in a number of American and European universities. His publications – in international scientific journals and peer-reviewed volumes – span from the syntax of reference and quantification in natural language – including issues of comparative syntax and semantics – to issues of language change and language impairment. His core interest is the investigation of the human capacity for language from a broad cognitive and philosophical perspective.

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access