Publication Cover
Inquiry
An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy
Latest Articles
3,568
Views
3
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Research Article

Literal and metaphorical meaning: in search of a lost distinction

ORCID Icon & ORCID Icon
Received 11 Aug 2022, Accepted 22 Sep 2022, Published online: 06 Oct 2022

References

  • Allott, N., and M. Textor. 2017. “Lexical Modulation without Concepts.” Dialectica 71: 399–424.
  • Bezuidenhout, A. 2001. “Metaphor and What Is Said: A Defense of a Direct Expression View of Metaphor.” In Figurative Language, edited by P. A. French and H. K. Wettstein, 156–186. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Black, M. 1977. “More About Metaphor.” Dialectica 31: 431–457.
  • Bowdle, B. F., and D. Gentner. 2005. “The Career of Metaphor.” Psychological Review 112 (1): 193–216. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.112.1.193.
  • Camp, E. 2012. “Sarcasm, Pretense, and the Semantics/Pragmatics Distinction.” Noûs 46 (4): 587–634.
  • Camp, E. 2020. “Imaginative Frames for Scientific Inquiry: Metaphors, Telling Facts, and Just-so Stories.” In The Scientific Imagination: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives, edited by A. Levy and P. Godfrey-Smith, 304–336. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Carnap, R. 1947. Meaning and Necessity: A Study in Semantics and Modal Logic. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
  • Carston, R. 1997. “Enrichment and Loosening: Complementary Processes in Deriving the Proposition Expressed.” Linguistische Berichte 8: 103–127.
  • Carston, R. 2002. Thoughts and Utterances: The Pragmatics of Explicit Communication. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Carston, R. 2010. “XIII-Metaphor: Ad Hoc Concepts, Literal Meaning and Mental Images.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 110 (3): 295–321.
  • Carston, R., and G. Powell. 2006. “Relevance Theory: New Directions and Developments.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Language, edited by E. LePore and B. C. Smith, 341–360. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Carston, R., and C. Wearing. 2011. “Metaphor, Hyperbole and Simile: A Pragmatic Approach.” Language and Cognition 3 (2): 283–312.
  • Chalmers, D. 2008. “Foreword.” In Supersizing the Mind: Embodiment, Action, and Cognitive Extension, edited by A. Clark, ix–xvi. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Chomsky, N. 1992. “Explaining Language Use.” Philosophical Topics 20: 205–231.
  • Chomsky, N. 1995. The Minimalist Program. Cambridge: MIT Press.
  • Clark, E. V., and H. H. Clark. 1979. “When Nouns Surface as Verbs.” Language 55 (4): 767–811.
  • Clark, H. H., and R. Gerrig. 1984. “On the Pretense Theory of Irony.” Journal of Experimental Psychology 113: 121–126.
  • Cohen, L. J. 1993. “The Semantics of Metaphor.” In Metaphor and Thought, edited by A. Ortony, 58–70. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Collins, J. 2017. “The Copredication Argument.” Inquiry 60 (7): 675–702.
  • Colyvan, M. 2010. “There Is No Easy Road to Nominalism.” Mind 119 (474): 285–306.
  • Evans, G. 1973. “The Causal Theory of Names.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes 47: 187–225.
  • Evans, G. 1982. The Varieties of Reference. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Falkum, I. L., M. Recasens, and E. V. Clark. 2017. “‘The Moustache Sits Down First’: On the Acquisition of Metonymy.” Journal of Child Language 44 (1): 87–119. doi:10.1017/S0305000915000720.
  • Falkum, I. L., and A. Vicente. 2015. “Polysemy: Current Perspectives and Approaches.” Lingua 157: 1–16. doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2015.02.002.
  • Fodor, J. A. 1981. “The Present Status of the Innateness Controversy.” In RePresentations: Philosophical Essays on the Foundations of Cognitive Science, 257–316. Cambridge: MIT Press.
  • Fodor, J. A. 1987. Psychosemantics: The Problem of Meaning in the Philosophy of Mind. Cambridge: MIT Press.
  • Fodor, J. A. 1998. Concepts: Where Cognitive Science Went Wrong. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  • Fodor, J. A. 2007. “Where Is My Mind? Review of Supersizing the Mind: Embodiment, Action and Cognitive Extension by Andy Clark.” London Review of Books 29 (10): 9–10.
  • Fodor, J. A., M. F. Garrett, E. C. T. Walker, and C. H. Parkes. 1980. “Against Definitions.” Cognition 8 (3): 263–367.
  • Foraker, S., and G. L. Murphy. 2012. “Polysemy in Sentence Comprehension: Effects of Meaning Dominance.” Journal of Memory & Language 67 (4): 407–425. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2012.07.010.
  • Frisson, S. 2009. “Semantic Underspecification in Language Processing.” Language and Linguistics Compass 3 (1): 111–127.
  • Frisson, S. 2015. “About Bound and Scary Books: The Processing of Book Polysemies.” Lingua 157: 17–35.
  • Frisson, S., and M. J. Pickering. 1999. “The Processing of Metonymy: Evidence from Eye Movements.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 25 (6): 1366–1383. doi:10.1037/0278-7393.25.6.1366.
  • Giora, R. 2008. “Is Metaphor Unique?” In The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought, edited by R. W. Gibbs Jr., 143–160. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Glanzberg, M. 2008. “Metaphor and Lexical Semantics.” The Baltic International Yearbook of Cognition, Logic and Communication 3: 1–47.
  • Gross, S. 2021. “Linguistic Judgments as Evidence.” In A Companion to Chomsky, edited by N. Allott, T. Lohndal, and G. Rey, 544–556. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell.
  • Happé, F. 1993. “Communicative Competence and Theory of Mind in Autism: A Test of Relevance Theory.” Cognition 48 (2): 101–119. doi:10.1016/0010-0277(93)90026-R.
  • King, D., and D. Gentner. 2022. “Verb Metaphoric Extension Under Semantic Strain.” Cognitive Science 46 (5): e13141. doi:10.1111/cogs.13141.
  • Klein, D. E., and G. L. Murphy. 2001. “The Representation of Polysemous Words.” Journal of Memory and Language 45 (2): 259–282. doi:10.1006/jmla.2001.2779.
  • Klein, D. E., and G. L. Murphy. 2002. “Paper Has Been My Ruin: Conceptual Relations of Polysemous Senses.” Journal of Memory and Language 47 (4): 548–570.
  • Klepousniotou, E., D. Titone, and C. Romero. 2008. “Making Sense of Word Senses: The Comprehension of Polysemy Depends on Sense Overlap.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 34 (6): 1534–1543. doi:10.1037/a0013012.
  • Köder, F., and I. L. Falkum. 2020. “Children’s Metonymy Comprehension: Evidence from Eye-Tracking and Picture Selection.” Journal of Pragmatics 156: 191–205. doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2019.07.007.
  • Köder, F., and I. L. Falkum. 2021. “Irony and Perspective-Taking in Children: The Roles of Norm Violations and Tone of Voice.” Frontiers in Psychology 12: 624604. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.624604.
  • Lewison, K. 2015. “Metaphors and Legal Reasoning.” The Chancery Bar Association Lecture 2015. https://www.chba.org.uk/for-members/library/annual-lectures/metaphor-legal-reasoning.
  • Liu, M. 2022. “Mental Imagery and Polysemy Processing.” Journal of Consciousness Studies 29 (5): 176–189.
  • McNally, L., and A. Spalek. 2019. “‘Figurative’ Uses of Verbs and Grammar.” Unpublished MS.
  • McNally, L., and A. A. Spalek. 2022. “Grammatically Relevant Aspects of Meaning and Verbal Polysemy.” Linguistics. Advance online publication. doi:10.1515/ling-2020-0167.
  • Noveck, I. A. 2018. Experimental Pragmatics: The Making of a Cognitive Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Nunberg, G. 1995. “Transfers of Meaning.” Journal of Semantics 12 (2): 109–132.
  • Ortony, A. 1993. “Metaphor, Language, and Thought.” In Metaphor and Thought. 2nd ed., edited by A Ortony, 1–16. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Pietroski, P. 2003. “Small Verbs, Complex Events: Analyticity Without Synonymy.” In Chomsky and His Critics, edited by L. M. Antony and N. Hornstein, 179–214. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
  • Pouscoulous, N. 2011. “Metaphor: For Adults Only?” Belgian Journal of Linguistics 25 (1): 51–79. doi:10.1075/bjl.25.04pou.
  • Pouscoulous, N. 2013. “Early Pragmatics with Words.” In Beyond Words: Content, Context, and Inference, edited by F. Liedtke and C. Schulze, 121–144. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton, Walter De Gruyter GmbH.
  • Pouscoulous, N., and M. Tomasello. 2020. “Early Birds: Metaphor Understanding in 3-Year-Olds.” Journal of Pragmatics 156: 160–167. doi:10.1016/j.pragma.2019.05.021.
  • Putnam, H. 1962. “It Ain’t Necessarily So.” The Journal of Philosophy 59: 658–671.
  • Quilty-Dunn, J. 2020. “Polysemy and Thought: Toward a Generative Theory of Concepts.” Mind & Language 36: 158–185.
  • Quine, W. V. 1981. Theories and Things. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
  • Ramchand, G. 2014. “On Structural Meaning vs Conceptual Meaning in Verb Semantics.” Linguistic Analysis 39 (1): 207–244.
  • Recanati, F. 2004. Literal Meaning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Reimer, M., and E. Camp. 2006. “Metaphor.” In The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Language, edited by E. LePore and B. C. Smith, 845–863. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Rey, G. 2022a. “The Analytic/Synthetic Distinction.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/analytic-synthetic/.
  • Rey, G. 2022b. “Analyticity and Chomskyan Linguistics.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/analytic-synthetic/analyticity-chomsky.html.
  • Rodd, J. M. 2020. “Settling into Semantic Space: An Ambiguity-Focused Account of Word-Meaning Access.” Perspectives on Psychological Science 15 (2): 411–427.
  • Rumelhart, D. E. 1993. “Some Problems with the Notion of Literal Meanings.” In Metaphor and Thought. 2nd ed., edited by A. Ortony, 71–82. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Sainsbury, R. M. 2005. Reference Without Referents. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  • Schroeter, L., and F. Schroeter. 2016. “Semantic Deference vs Semantic Coordination.” American Philosophical Quarterly 53: 193–210.
  • Searle, J. R. 1980. “The Background of Meaning.” In Speech Act Theory and Pragmatics, edited by J. R. Searle, F. Kiefer, and M. Bierwisch, 221–232. Dordrecht: Springer.
  • Searle, J. R. 1983. Intentionality: An Essay in the Philosophy of Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Searle, J. 1993. “Metaphor.” In Metaphor and Thought. 2nd ed., edited by A. Ortony, 83–111. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Spalek, A. A. 2015. “Spanish Change of State Verbs in Composition with Atypical Theme Arguments: Clarifying the Meaning Shifts.” Lingua 157: 36–53.
  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 1981. “Irony and the Use-Mention Distinction.” In Radical Pragmatics, edited by P. Cole, 295–318. New York: Academic Press.
  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 1986. Relevance: Communication and Cognition. 2nd ed. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 1998. “The Mapping Between the Mental and the Public Lexicon.” In Language and Thought: Interdisciplinary Themes, edited by P. Carruthers and J. Boucher, 184–200. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 2002. “Pragmatics, Modularity and Mind-Reading.” Mind and Language 17 (1–2): 3–23.
  • Sperber, D., and D. Wilson. 2008. “A Deflationary Account of Metaphors.” In The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought, edited by R. W. Gibbs, Jr., 84–108. New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • Stern, J. 2006. “Metaphor, Literal, Literalism.” Mind & Language 21 (3): 243–279.
  • Tiersma, P. M. 2001. “A Message in a Bottle: Text, Autonomy, and Statutory Interpretation.” Tulane Law Review 76: 431–482.
  • Traugott, E. C. 2017. “Semantic Change.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Linguistics. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.013.323.
  • Vicente, A. 2019. “Chomskyan Arguments Against Truth-Conditional Semantics Based on Variability and Co-Predication.” Erkenntnis 86: 919–940.
  • Walton, K. L. 1990. Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the Foundations of the Representational Arts. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
  • Walton, K. L. 1993. “Metaphor and Prop Oriented Make-Believe.” European Journal of Philosophy 1 (1): 39–57.
  • White, R. 2001. “Literal Meaning and ‘Figurative Meaning’.” Theoria 67 (1): 24–59.
  • Williamson, T. 2007. The Philosophy of Philosophy. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Wilson, D. 2006. “The Pragmatics of Verbal Irony: Echo or Pretence?” Lingua 116 (10): 1722–1743. doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2006.05.001.
  • Wilson, D. 2009. “Irony and Metarepresentation.” UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 21: 183–226.
  • Wilson, D., and R. Carston. 2006. “Metaphor, Relevance and the ‘Emergent Property’ Issue.” Mind & Language 21 (3): 404–433.
  • Wilson, D., and R. Carston. 2007. “A Unitary Approach to Lexical Pragmatics: Relevance, Inference and Ad Hoc Concepts.” In Pragmatics, edited by N. Burton-Roberts, 230–259. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Wilson, D., and D. Sperber. 1992. “On Verbal Irony.” Lingua 87 (1/2): 53–76.
  • Wilson, D., and D. Sperber. 2002. “Truthfulness and Relevance.” Mind 111 (443): 583–632.
  • Yablo, S. 1998. “Does Ontology Rest on a Mistake?” Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 72 (1): 229–261.