Abstract
According to inferential role semantics (IRS), for any given expression to possess a particular meaning one must be disposed to make or, alternatively, acknowledge as correct certain inferential transitions involving it. As Williamson points out, pejoratives such as ‘Boche’ seem to provide a counter-example to IRS. Many speakers are neither disposed to use such expressions nor consider it proper to do so. But it does not follow, as IRS appears to entail, that such speakers do not understand pejoratives or that they lack meaning. In this paper, I examine recent responses to this problem by Boghossian and Brandom and argue that their proposed construal of the kind of inferential rules governing a pejorative such as ‘Boche’ is to be ruled out on the grounds that it is non-conservative. I defend the appeal to conservatism in this instance against criticism and, in doing so, propose an alternative approach to pejoratives on behalf of IRS that resolves the problem Williamson poses.
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Notes
For a critical overview of the arguments in favour of IRS, see Lepore (1994). Importantly, one need not hold that every inferential relation an expression stands in is determinative of its meaning. On the contrary, in order to ensure constancy and communicability of meaning, there is reason to privilege certain inferential relations as constitutive of meaning and treat others as non-constitutive (see Fodor and Lepore 1992, 2002). How precisely one draws that distinction need not concern us here (see Boghossian 1994; Glock 2003: ch. 3; Horwich 1998: ch. 9).
Note however that Boghossian actually endorses a version of IRS (at least for certain expressions).
Note that this problem is made acute by the fact that most proponents (and opponents) of normativist versions of IRS do not distinguish the relevant norms that are supposedly determinative of meaning from other kinds of norms. And where they are differentiated, the norms are usually viewed as epistemic (this seems to be both Boghossian’s and Brandom’s view). Non-bigoted speakers, however, do not think that abiding by Boche-introduction and Boche-elimination is epistemically warranted. I shall return to these matters below.
As both Dummett (1981: 454) and Williamson (forthcoming) point out.
Despite at one time endorsing it (Boghossian 1997: 359). Boghossian tends to present matters in more truth-oriented terms than I do here – i.e. in terms of whether semantic rules are truth-preserving – but that is not important for present purposes.
The meanings of the primitive logical constants cannot be determined in this way (Boghossian 2003a: 247).
The qualification ‘in the first instance’ is supposed to leave open the possibility of deriving a conception of attitude-independent (objective) propriety from attitude-dependent (subjective) propriety. Brandom attempts just such a deduction in 1994: ch.8. For critical assessment, see Laurier (2005).
As discussed above, the non-conservative rules would clash with the established rules insofar as their addition would render the language inconsistent.
An alternative model of ‘conceptual progress’ would show it to involve the establishing of new inferential rules (and hence meanings), which are conservative but may nonetheless be similar in various respects to the old ones. The latter are superseded, not because speakers reject the relevant inferences (that could only betray misunderstanding), but rather because speakers no longer accept that the grounds specified originally for introducing the expression obtain. Progress would be achieved if the grounds that the new rules give for introducing the expression genuinely obtain, and if those new rules suitably enrich the expressive resources of the established vocabulary.
For further assessment of Brandom’s theory, see Whiting (forthcoming).
Enoch and Schechter (2006) also press this complaint.
Needless to say, there are other objections to conservatism (see, e.g., Peacocke 2004: 18ff) Addressing them is too great a task for this paper and I shall restrict attention to that which occurs in the present debate.
Again, the following proposal is not intended as an armchair contribution to linguistic theory. It is intended as a suggestion as to what rules could govern the use of racist terms, compatible with the requirement of conservatism.
Williamson (forthcoming) repeats this point when he writes, ‘If the inference rules for “Boche” constitute a conservative extension of a civilized system of rules for the “Boche”-free part of the language, then they do not explain what is offensive about’ its use.
On implicature, see Grice (1989: ch. 2). Obviously, this strategy depends on being able to offer an account of implicature in the terms available to IRS. This is evidently not the place to do so but there is no obvious reason to think it would prove impossible or especially difficult. The beginnings of such an account might proceed as follows. Where a claim is implicated by the claim made in uttering an expression, rejection of the former is compatible with acceptance of the latter. In contrast, where a claim is entailed by the claim made in uttering an expression, rejection of the former is incompatible with acceptance the latter (cf. the centrality that the notion of incompatible commitments plays in Brandom 1994). Specific implicatures can then be accounted for in terms of the inferences that the utterance of an expression invites as a result of either the dynamics of a given conversation or the way in which speakers have come customarily to use it and to respond to its use.
Hornsby (2001) points out that many derogatory words have neutral counterparts. Consider, for example, the pairs ‘Kike’ and ‘Jew,’ ‘faggot’ and ‘homosexual.’
Of course, statements of the form ‘So-and-so is Boche, but not cruel’ or ‘Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing against Boche…’ are familiar enough. But these would not be counter-examples to the suggestion. On the contrary, that we ordinarily find such utterances repugnant would be best explained by viewing the use of ‘Boche’ as conventionally implicating bigoted beliefs. What the racist is attempting to do on these occasions is unilaterally cancel the conventional implicature. Thus, racism is compounded by hypocrisy (cf. Williamson 2003: 263).
See n9.
For further remarks on the desirability and feasibility of a reductionist account of meaning, see Whiting (2006).
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Acknowledgements
Thanks to Andrew Jorgensen for discussion of these issues and for bringing them to my attention, to an anonymous referee for comments that greatly improved the paper, and to audiences at the universities of Antwerp, Granada and Reading for invaluable feedback on earlier versions of the material.
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Whiting, D.J. Conservatives and Racists: Inferential Role Semantics and Pejoratives. Philosophia 36, 375–388 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-007-9109-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-007-9109-1