LINGUIST List 12.1125

Tue Apr 24 2001

Books: Philosophy of Language

Editor for this issue: Naomi Ogasawara <naomilinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Jud Wolfskill, Philosophy of Lang: Complex Demonstratives by J.C. King

For more information please visit
http://mitpress.mit.edu/promotions/books/KINLHS01

Complex Demonstratives
A Quantificational Account
Jeffrey C. King


Since the late 1970s, the orthodox view of complex 'that' phrases
(e.g., 'that woman eating a granola bar') has been that they are
contextually sensitive devices of direct reference. In Complex
Demonstratives, Jeffrey King challenges that orthodoxy, showing that
quantificational accounts not only are as effective as direct
reference accounts but also handle a wider range of data.

After providing arguments against direct reference accounts of 'that'
phrases and developing a quantificational theory of them, King looks
at the interaction of 'that' phrases with modal operators, negation,
and verbs of propositional attitude. He argues for evidence of scope
interaction between 'that' phrases and other scoped elements. King
also addresses semantic properties of 'that' and other determiners,
and the possibility of extending the semantics of 'that' phrases to
'that' as a syntactically simple demonstrative. Finally, he argues
against what he calls ambiguity approaches, theories that hold that
the various uses of 'that' phrases cannot be treated by a single
semantical theory.


Jeffrey C. King is Professor and Chair of the Philosophy Department at
the University of California, Davis.

5 3/8 x 8, 214 pp., 1 illus., 
paper ISBN 0-262-61169-4, cloth ISBN 0-262-11263-9

Contemporary Philosophical Monographs
A Bradford Book

Jud Wolfskill						617.253.2079 phone
Associate Publicist					617.253.1709 fax
MIT Press						wolfskilmit.edu
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Cambridge, MA 02142