An Introduction to the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge Introductions to Philosophy) [Paperback]

"'This is a knowledgeable and very useful addition to contemporary introductions to the philosophy of language, somewhere in difficulty between Lycan's 2008 and Taylor's (1998) worthy texts. It is the right size for a 15-week semester course, at one chapter a week (students like to use what they buy) ...this book will give any motivated student a good survey of the subject."
--Robert Harnish, University of Arizona, Philosphy in Review

In this textbook, Michael Morris offers a critical introduction to the central issues of the philosophy of language. Each chapter focusses on one or two texts which have had a seminal influence on work in the subject, and uses these as a way of approaching both the central topics and the various traditions of dealing with them. Texts include classic writings by Frege, Russell, Kripke, Quine, Davidson, Austin, Grice and Wittgenstein. Theoretical jargon is kept to a minimum and is fully explained whenever it is introduced. The range of topics covered includes sense and reference, definite descriptions, proper names, natural-kind terms, de re and de dicto necessity, propositional attitudes, truth-theoretical approaches to meaning, radical interpretation, indeterminacy of translation, speech acts, intentional theories of meaning, and scepticism about meaning. The book will be invaluable to students and to all readers who are interested in the nature of linguistic meaning.

This critical introduction to the philosophy of language focusses on one or two texts which have had a seminal influence on work in the subject, and uses these as a way of approaching both the central topics and the various traditions of dealing with them.

Michael Morris is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sussex. He is author of The Good and the True (1992) and numerous articles.