John Searle and his Critics

For more than three decades John Searle has been developing andelaborating a unified theory of language and mind. What has emergedis an impressive and detailed account of intentionality embracingboth mental states and linguistic behaviour. Though the developingtheory has been presented in a steady stream of books and articlesover the last thirty years, two items stand out as major landmarks:the publication of Speech Acts in 1969 and of Intentionality in1983. Both of these seminal books offer structural theories; thatis, they analyze the items within their domains (speech acts andmental states) as having a structure which allows for variationalong a number of parameters.

John Searle and His Critics proceeds from an analysis of theimportance and influence of these two works to an overallassessment of Searle's impact in the philosophy of language, ofmind, of social explanation, and of reference and intentionality.Each of the chapters has been newly commissioned from a leadingscholar in the relevant field and each section concludes with asummary and response from Searle himself.