The Semantics/Pragmatics Distinction

Semantic theory in linguistics cannot retain its traditional purity, free of pragmatic contextual considerations. Agreement with the preceding claim, generally shared by this volume's contributors, provides the setting for a presentation of various provocative approaches toward a precise definition of pragmatics along with a reconciliation of pragmatics with semantics.

Here is a collection of leading-edge work that examines the semantics/pragmatics dispute in terms of phenomena such as indexicals, proper names, conventional and conversational implicatures, procedural meaning, and semantic underdetermination. Examples show how these phenomena reach from the linguistic realm to the fields of psychology, philosophy, literature, and anthropology.

Claudia Bianchi is Researcher at the University S. Raffaele, Milan, Italy.

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12/1/2004