Workshop on Experimental Pragmatics

November 3, 2022

Venue: Carlos Santamaria Zentroa, room 2

Pragmatic processing and interpretation outputs

Mikhail Kissine (ULB)

9:30 - 11:00

Abstract:

Much of experimental research in pragmatics focuses on determining to which extent this or that pragmatic process involves Theory of Mind, with some researchers questioning whether all pragmatics is necessarily rooted in the ability to represent other people’s communicative intentions. Independently of one's favourite model, however, this research paradigm presupposes that pragmatic processes map on a typology of pragmatic outputs, such as implicature, metaphor, indirect speech act or irony. This way of thinking conflates the rational reconstruction of pragmatic processing as an inferential link between two syntactic strings (what is said and the putatively derived meaning) with the actual interpretation process. I will present experimental data that supports the alternative view, according to which pragmatic processes and the contextual resources on which they are based depend on contextual demands and individual characteristics, in a fashion orthogonal to typologies of pragmatic outputs.

Metaphor comprehension in (a)typical development

Nausicaa Pouscoulous (UCL)

11:15-12:45

Abstract:

Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have difficulties with figurative language. These have been linked to their impaired theory of mind. Yet, immature linguistic skills might affect non-literal understanding regardless of autistic symptomatology. If so, figurative language should be more compromised in autistic children with concurrent language impairments (ALI), than those with autism but normal language (ALN), as well as populations with known language impairments who are not on the autism spectrum, such as Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) and Down syndrome (DS). In fact, the scarcity of research on figurative language in DS calls for an investigation of metaphor in this population both for comparative purposes and in its own right.

I will present a series of studies with participants from children with DLD, ASD, DS, as well as typically developing children. In order to minimise cognitive demands and determine where the difficulties with metaphor comprehension arise (i.e., insufficient vocabulary knowledge, difficulty with context, or inability to make a pragmatic inference), we used an act-out reference assignment task, where children were shown pairs of minimally different toys and asked to choose the one matching the metaphorical description.

All groups achieved near ceiling performance on this task. Contrary to the literature showing that metaphor comprehension is significantly impaired in ASD, our results suggest that language ability may be the crucial factor in accounting for difficulties with metaphor comprehension, as suggested by Gernsbacher & Pripas-Kapit (2012)

Workshop. Friday May 13, 2022. 3 p.m. (Taller de Docencia. Carlos Santamaria Zentroa)

Knowledge and control

Joshua Shepherd (Carleton University)

Abstract:

Intentional action is, in some sense, non-accidental, and one common way action theorists have attempted to explain this is with reference to control. The idea, in short, is that intentional action implicates control, and control precludes accidentality. But in virtue of what, exactly, would exercising control over an action suffice to make it non-accidental in whatever sense is required for the action to be intentional? Some have recently argued that control is non-accidental in virtue of requiring knowledge. I will argue that knowledge-centered accounts of control do not work, and that it is rather control that explains the presence of knowledge in intentional action.

Thoughts about the Ethics of Use and Mention

Adam Sennet (UC Davis) 

Abstract:

Anderson and Lepore have used a puzzle about slurring language to argue that the general offensiveness of slurs is grounded in their form, not their meaning. If correct, this undermines a great deal of motivation for current views regarding the semantics of slurring language. The puzzle stems from the observation that the derogatory properties of slur term seem to be present even in indirect and quoted contexts. The paper will consider the other cases of quoted offensive language to consider the soundness of their argument and will try to offer some preliminary thoughts about the ethics of referring to rather than using, offensive language. 

Online Workshop. December 15-17, 2021

Information: https://latgroup.wixsite.com/home/critical-pragmatics-ten-years

Program:

December 15th, 
PLENARY LECTURE. Kepa Korta: "Top Ten Misconceptions on Critical Pragmatics
DISCUSSION". 
Ernesto Perini: "Korta and Perry's purest minimalism"
Leonard Clapp: "Vulcan is a hot mess: The dilemma of mythical names and
cococo-reference"

December 16th, Thursday
Stacie Friend: "Coco-reference and co-identification"
Michael Nelson: "Speaker intentions and semantics in a theory of communication"
Mirsolava Trajkovski: "Corazza and Korta’s mistaken view of Frege’s subject matter"
Stefano Predelli: "Utterance-bound parentheticals"

December 17th, Friday
Ana Clara Polakof: "Differentiating slurs from swearwords with critical pragmatics"
Genoveva Marti: "Multipropositionalism, the ‘de se’ and two-dimensionalism"
PLENARY LECTURE. John Perry: TBA

May 23rd and 24th, 2019
Venue: Carlos Santamaria Zentroa, Room A1. 

PROGRAM

Thursday, May 23rd

Adam Sennett (UC, Davis) -  joint work with Tyrus Fisher. "Sobel sequences as a test case for static vs. dynamic Semantics. "

María de Ponte (ILCLI-UPV/EHU). "Prior and the essential indexicals."

Friday, May 24th

Eros Corazza (Ikerbasque, ILCLI-UPV/EHU). "Revisiting Millianism."

Stephen Neale (CUNY). "Means, means, means."

Videos of the talks: https://latgroup.wixsite.com/home/post/workshop-on-language-and-communication

June 14th-15th, 2018
Venue: Carlos Santamaria Zentroa

Program:

Thursday, June 14th

Jędrzej Piotr Grodniewicz (LOGOS (U. de Barcelona)). "Linguistic understanding as a cognitive process." (Comments: Larraitz Zubeldia (ILCLI. EHU/UPV))

Eros Corazza (Ikerbasque, ILCLI. EHU/UPV). "Frege on identity and co-reference." (Comments: Manolo Martínez (LOGOS. U. de Barcelona))

Friday, June 15th 

Yolanda García (ILCLI. EHU/UPV). "Wrong targets and innocents victims of irony." (Comments: Mar Alloza (LOGOS. U. de Barcelona))

Michele Palmira (LOGOS. U. de Barcelona). "Singular propositions, inflationary and deflationary approaches". (Comments: Ekain Garmendia (ILCLI. EHU/UPV)).

2-3 October, 2014.

Videos of the talks: https://latgroup.wixsite.com/home/post/reference-and-the-elusive-self-workshop-on-john-perry-s-most-recent-work

John Perry's contributions to philosophy are abundant and far-reaching. His writings, ranging from the philosophy of language and mind to metaphysics and epistemology, have had a remarkable impact not only in philosophy but also on other disciplines, such as logic, linguistics, psychology and artificial intelligence. He is the author of over 130 articles and 10 books, including, Situations and Attitudes (with Jon Barwise) (1983, reprinted with a new introduction, 1999), The Problem of the Essential Indexical and Other Essays (1993, enlarged edition 2000), Knowledge, Possibility and Consciousness (2001), Reference and Reflexivity (2001; 2nd extended edition 2012),Identity, Personal Identity and the Self (2002) and Critical Pragmatics. An Inquiry into Reference and Communication (with Kepa Korta) (2011).

At this workshop, Perry (Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of the Basque Country, 2002) will present his most recent take on a topic he has approached from various angles: the self. His insights will be intensely discussed lead by the comments of six distinguished scholars:

Participants

Eros Corazza
Dagfinn Føllesdall
Stacie Friend
Genoveva Martí
François Recanati
Isidora Stojanovic

European Network of Philosophy of Language & Mind Workshop (PLM)

September 30- October 1, 2014. Donostia.

Participants:

Eros Corazza (ILCLI)  with comments by Rachel Sterken (CSMN, Oslo)

Jonas Akerman (CLLAM, Stockholm) with comments by Barry Smith (CeLL, London)

Gregory Bochner (Jean Nicod, Paris) with comments by Peter Pagin (CLLAM, Stockholm) 

Jessica Pepp (CSMN, Oslo) wit comments by Pedro Santos (LanGog, Lisbon)

Teresa Marques (LanGog, Lisbon) with comments by Paul Dekkler (ILLC, Amsterdam)

Simon Prosser (Arché, St. Andrews) with comments by Michael Murez (Jean Nicod, Paris)

Markus Kneer (Jean-Nicod, Paris) with comments by Gemma Celestino (LOGOS, Barcelona)

Johannes Marti (ILLC, Amsterdam) with comments by Corine Besson (CeLL, London)

Manuel García Carpintero (LOGOS, Barcelona) with comments by Herman Cappelen (Arché, St Andrews)