Meaningful Expression
Meaningful Expression
This chapter is the second of two that relate self-expression to speaker meaning. On an appropriate construal of overtness, overt self-expression is a form of speaker meaning. Further, in some cases that form of self-expression makes a state of oneself, such as an affective state, literally perceptible, and the claim that emotions can be literally perceived in others is articulated and defended against objections. The view of emotions as governed in part by automatic processes is explained and motivated in light of recent research in the psychology and neuroscience of affect, and the implications of this view for the voluntary/involuntary distinction are considered. A notion of implicature that is neither conventional nor conversational is also explained, and some expressive behavior is argued to fall into this category. Finally, alternative conceptions of self-expression (from K. Bach and R. Harnish, W. Davis, and A. Kemmerling) are discussed, and the present approach is argued to be superior to each of them.
Keywords: speaker meaning, non-natural meaning, natural meaning, overtness, W. Davis, K. Bach, R. Harnish, A. Kemmerling, implicature, automaticitytheory of mind
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