Our topic for Spring 2018 will be Formal Frameworks for Semantics and Pragmatics. We’ll be investigating a range of questions in semantics and/or pragmatics which involve or are relevant to the choice between different kinds of overall structure for theories in these areas.
In most sessions, the members of the seminar will receive a week in advance, copies of recent work, or work in progress from a thinker at another university. After reading this work, students discuss it with one of the instructors on the day before the colloquium. Then at the Tuesday colloquium, the instructors give a summary review and raise criticisms or questions about the work. The author responds to these, and also to questions from the audience.
Meetings
The main seminar meetings are on Tuesday from 4-7, in the second floor seminar room of the Philosophy Department. Additionally, there will be a supplementary meeting open to all students participating in the seminar (whether enrolled or not) on Mondays from 4-5, in the same location in the fifth-floor seminar room.
This seminar is open to all interested parties.
There is a googlegroups mailing list for the class. If you want to receive announcements, please add yourself to that list. (To be able to access the mailing list’s web interface, you’ll need to log into Google’s systems using an identity Google recognizes, like a Gmail address, or a NYU email address because of how NYU’s authentication systems are connected to Google. But there’s no real need to see the mailing list’s web interface. You just need some email address to be added to list, then any messages we send to the list will get forwarded to all the email addresses then registered on the list. If you want us to add an address to the list that you can’t log into Google’s systems with, just send us a message with the address you want registered.)
Schedule and Papers
Papers will be posted here as they become available. Some may be password-protected; the password will be distributed in class.
- 23 Jan
- Introductory session (no meeting on Monday 22 Jan), Jim’s handoutSome people asked for more background reading. Here are two useful textbooks: Heim & Kratzer, then von Fintel & Heim. Here is a survey article about different treatments of pronoun anaphora. Here is a course page with links to more reading.
- 30 Jan
- Jim Pryor (NYU, web, mail), “De Jure Codesignation“
- 6 Feb
- Mandy Simons (CMU, web, mail), “Convention, Intention, and the Conversational Record” and (with Kevin Zollman) “Natural Conventions and the Semantics/Pragmatics Divide“(Mandy is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 5 Feb at 6:30.)
- 13 Feb
- Paul Pietroski (Rutgers, mail), “Semantic Typology and Composition” (minor updates posted on Friday 9 Feb at 1:06 AM).
- 20 Feb
- Karen Lewis (Columbia/Barnard, web, mail), “Anaphora and Negation” and “Discourse dynamics, pragmatics, and indefinites“
- 27 Feb
- Daniel Rothschild (UCL, web, mail), “A Trivalent Approach to Anaphora and Presupposition” and (with Matt Mandelkern) “Projection from Situations“(Daniel is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 26 Feb at 6:30.)
- 6 Mar
- John Hawthorne (USC, mail), (with Cian Dorr) Selections from If… : A Theory of Conditionals
- 13 Mar
- Spring Break
- 20 Mar
- Lucas Champollion (NYU, web, mail), (with Dylan Bumford and Robert Henderson) “Donkeys under discussion”
Lucas suggests that readers who are short on time might skip or skim section 6, which is exclusively devoted to discussion of previous work. - 27 Mar
- Matthew Mandelkern (Oxford, web, mail), “Bounded Modality“
- 3 Apr
- Paolo Santorio (UC-San Diego, web, mail), “Conditional Excluded Middle in Expressivist Semantics” (primary) and “Nonclassical counterfactuals” (secondary)
- 10 Apr
- Una Stojnić (Columbia, web, mail), “Discourse and Argument“
- 17 Apr
- Seth Yalcin (UC-Berkeley, web, mail), “Conditional Belief and Conditional Assertion” and “Notes on iffy knowledge“
- 24 Apr
- Stephen Schiffer (NYU, web, mail), “When Meaning Meets Vagueness (Accommodating Vagueness in Semantics and Metasemantics)” (revised 20 April)
- 1 May
- Maria Aloni (ILLC and Philosophy/Amsterdam, web, mail), “FC disjunction in state-based semantics“(Maria is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 30 Apr at 6:30.)
We’re a community of philosophers of language centered in New York City. We have a meeting each week at which a speaker presents a piece of their own work relating to the philosophy of language.
28 January
Luca Incurvati (ILLC/Amsterdam)
4 February
Dan Hoek (NYU)
11 February
Peter Klecha (Swarthmore)
25 February
Ginger Schultheis (NYU/Chicago) and
David Boylan (Rutgers)
4 March
Chris Tancredi (Keio University, Tokyo)
11 March
TBD
25 March
Yael Sharvit (UCLA)
1 April
Thony Gillies (Rutgers)
8 April
Yale Weiss (CUNY)
15 April
Friederike Moltmann (CNRS)
22 April
Amir Anvari (Institut Jean Nicod, ENS)
29 April
David Balcarras (MIT)
6 May
Nadine Theiler (ILLC, Amsterdam)
13 May
Valentine Hacquard (Maryland)
Our topic for Spring 2018 will be Formal Frameworks for Semantics and Pragmatics. We’ll be investigating a range of questions in semantics and/or pragmatics which involve or are relevant to the choice between different kinds of overall structure for theories in these areas.
In most sessions, the members of the seminar will receive a week in advance, copies of recent work, or work in progress from a thinker at another university. After reading this work, students discuss it with one of the instructors on the day before the colloquium. Then at the Tuesday colloquium, the instructors give a summary review and raise criticisms or questions about the work. The author responds to these, and also to questions from the audience.
Meetings
The main seminar meetings are on Tuesday from 4-7, in the second floor seminar room of the Philosophy Department. Additionally, there will be a supplementary meeting open to all students participating in the seminar (whether enrolled or not) on Mondays from 4-5, in the same location in the fifth-floor seminar room.
This seminar is open to all interested parties.
There is a googlegroups mailing list for the class. If you want to receive announcements, please add yourself to that list. (To be able to access the mailing list’s web interface, you’ll need to log into Google’s systems using an identity Google recognizes, like a Gmail address, or a NYU email address because of how NYU’s authentication systems are connected to Google. But there’s no real need to see the mailing list’s web interface. You just need some email address to be added to list, then any messages we send to the list will get forwarded to all the email addresses then registered on the list. If you want us to add an address to the list that you can’t log into Google’s systems with, just send us a message with the address you want registered.)
Schedule and Papers
Papers will be posted here as they become available. Some may be password-protected; the password will be distributed in class.
- 23 Jan
- Introductory session (no meeting on Monday 22 Jan), Jim’s handoutSome people asked for more background reading. Here are two useful textbooks: Heim & Kratzer, then von Fintel & Heim. Here is a survey article about different treatments of pronoun anaphora. Here is a course page with links to more reading.
- 30 Jan
- Jim Pryor (NYU, web, mail), “De Jure Codesignation“
- 6 Feb
- Mandy Simons (CMU, web, mail), “Convention, Intention, and the Conversational Record” and (with Kevin Zollman) “Natural Conventions and the Semantics/Pragmatics Divide“(Mandy is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 5 Feb at 6:30.)
- 13 Feb
- Paul Pietroski (Rutgers, mail), “Semantic Typology and Composition” (minor updates posted on Friday 9 Feb at 1:06 AM).
- 20 Feb
- Karen Lewis (Columbia/Barnard, web, mail), “Anaphora and Negation” and “Discourse dynamics, pragmatics, and indefinites“
- 27 Feb
- Daniel Rothschild (UCL, web, mail), “A Trivalent Approach to Anaphora and Presupposition” and (with Matt Mandelkern) “Projection from Situations“(Daniel is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 26 Feb at 6:30.)
- 6 Mar
- John Hawthorne (USC, mail), (with Cian Dorr) Selections from If… : A Theory of Conditionals
- 13 Mar
- Spring Break
- 20 Mar
- Lucas Champollion (NYU, web, mail), (with Dylan Bumford and Robert Henderson) “Donkeys under discussion”
Lucas suggests that readers who are short on time might skip or skim section 6, which is exclusively devoted to discussion of previous work. - 27 Mar
- Matthew Mandelkern (Oxford, web, mail), “Bounded Modality“
- 3 Apr
- Paolo Santorio (UC-San Diego, web, mail), “Conditional Excluded Middle in Expressivist Semantics” (primary) and “Nonclassical counterfactuals” (secondary)
- 10 Apr
- Una Stojnić (Columbia, web, mail), “Discourse and Argument“
- 17 Apr
- Seth Yalcin (UC-Berkeley, web, mail), “Conditional Belief and Conditional Assertion” and “Notes on iffy knowledge“
- 24 Apr
- Stephen Schiffer (NYU, web, mail), “When Meaning Meets Vagueness (Accommodating Vagueness in Semantics and Metasemantics)” (revised 20 April)
- 1 May
- Maria Aloni (ILLC and Philosophy/Amsterdam, web, mail), “FC disjunction in state-based semantics“(Maria is also speaking in the NYPL on Monday 30 Apr at 6:30.)
We’re a community of philosophers of language centered in New York City. We have a meeting each week at which a speaker presents a piece of their own work relating to the philosophy of language.
28 January
Luca Incurvati (ILLC/Amsterdam)
4 February
Dan Hoek (NYU)
11 February
Peter Klecha (Swarthmore)
25 February
Ginger Schultheis (NYU/Chicago) and
David Boylan (Rutgers)
4 March
Chris Tancredi (Keio University, Tokyo)
11 March
TBD
25 March
Yael Sharvit (UCLA)
1 April
Thony Gillies (Rutgers)
8 April
Yale Weiss (CUNY)
15 April
Friederike Moltmann (CNRS)
22 April
Amir Anvari (Institut Jean Nicod, ENS)
29 April
David Balcarras (MIT)
6 May
Nadine Theiler (ILLC, Amsterdam)
13 May
Valentine Hacquard (Maryland)
Conference Schedule
Friday May 10
- 1pm: Rachel Goodman (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee)
Introductory Overview1:30pm: Jake Quilty-Dunn (University of Oxford)
On Elisabeth Camp’s “Putting Thoughts to Work”4:30pm: John Kulvicki (Darmouth College)
On Jacob Beck’s “Perception is Analog”
Saturday May 11
- 1pm: Jacob Beck (York University)
On Jake Quilty-Dunn’s “Perceptual Pluralism”4pm: Elisabeth Camp (Rutgers University)
On John Kulvicki’s “Modeling the Meanings of Pictures”
The Five Essential Readings for the Conference
The conference is predicated on the assumption that everyone in attendance will have read all five of these essays:
- John Haugeland, Representational Genera
- Elisabeth Camp, Putting Thoughts to Work
- Jacob Beck, Perception Is Analog
- Jake Quilty-Dunn, Perceptual Pluralism
- John Kulvicki, Modeling The Meanings of Pictures (excerpt)
Some Helpful Background Readings
Here are ten additional readings that help to fill in some of the background to the topics that will be discussed at the conference. Those new to these topics might start with the Kulvicki, Camp, and Giardino and Greenberg readings, and then move on to the others.
- John Kulvicki, Images in Mind
- Elisabeth Camp, Thinking With Maps
- Valeria Giardino and Gabriel Greenberg, Introduction: Varieties of Iconicity
- John Haugeland, Analog and Analog
- Fred Dretske, Sensation and Perception
- Jerry Fodor, Preconceptual Representation
- Michael Rescorla, Cognitive Maps and the Language of Thought
- Tyler Burge, Origins of Perception
- Tyler Burge, Steps Towards Origins of Propositional Thought
- Jacob Beck, The Generality Constraint and the Structure of Thought
- Whit Schonbein, Varieties of Analog and Digital Representation
If you have any questions about the conference, please contact Zed Adams at zed@newschool.edu.
We’re a community of philosophers of language centered in New York City. We have a meeting each week at which a speaker presents a piece of their own work relating to the philosophy of language.
28 January
Luca Incurvati (ILLC/Amsterdam)
4 February
Dan Hoek (NYU)
11 February
Peter Klecha (Swarthmore)
25 February
Ginger Schultheis (NYU/Chicago) and
David Boylan (Rutgers)
4 March
Chris Tancredi (Keio University, Tokyo)
11 March
TBD
25 March
Yael Sharvit (UCLA)
1 April
Thony Gillies (Rutgers)
8 April
Yale Weiss (CUNY)
15 April
Friederike Moltmann (CNRS)
22 April
Amir Anvari (Institut Jean Nicod, ENS)
29 April
David Balcarras (MIT)
6 May
Nadine Theiler (ILLC, Amsterdam)
13 May
Valentine Hacquard (Maryland)
We’re a community of philosophers of language centered in New York City. We have a meeting each week at which a speaker presents a piece of their own work relating to the philosophy of language.
Sept 9
Donka Farkas (Santa Cruz)
Sept 16
John Maackay (U Wisconsin–Madison)
Sept 23
Andrew Bacon (USC)
Sept 30
Eleonore Neufeld (USC)
Oct 7
Eli Alshanetsky (Temple)
Oct 21
Gabe Dupre (UCLA)
Oct 28
Dorit Bar-On (UConn)
Nov 4
Sam Berstler (Princeton)
Nov 11
Robert Henderson (Arizona)
Nov 18
Sam Cumming (UCLA)
Nov 25
Harvey Lederman (Princeton)
Dec 2
Sarah Fisher (Reading)
Dec 9
Michael Glanzberg (Northwestern)
8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
9 – 9:15 a.m. | Opening remarks: Shiloh Whitney, Conference Director |
Session 1 – Organic Affectivity and Animality Moderator: Emilia Angelova, Concordia University |
|
9:15 – 10 a.m. | Hermanni Yli-Tepsa, University of Jyväskylä: “How to feel like our eyes: tracing the theme of instinctive affectivity in Phenomenology of Perception” |
10 – 10:45 a.m. | Sarah DiMaggio, Vanderbilt University: “Flesh and Blood: Reimagining Kinship” |
10:45 – 11 a.m. | Break |
Session 2 – Passivity Moderator: Philip Walsh, Fordham University |
|
11 – 11:45 a.m. | David Morris, Concordia University: “The Transcendentality of Passivity: Affective Being and the Contingency of Phenomenology as Institution” |
11:45 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. | Rajiv Kaushik, Brock University “Merleau-Ponty on Passivity and the Limit of Philosophical Critique” |
12:30 – 2 p.m. | Lunch Break |
Session 3 – Theorizing Emotion 1: Outside-in, Inside-Outside Moderator: Duane H. Davis, University of North Carolina at Asheville |
|
2 – 2:45 p.m. | Ed Casey, Stonybrook University: “Bringing Edge to Bear: Vindicating Merleau-Ponty’s Nascent Ideas on Emotion” |
2:45 – 3:30 p.m. | Ondřej Švec, Charles University Prague: “Acting out one’s emotion” |
3:30 – 3:45 p.m. | Break |
Session 4 – Theorizing Emotion 2: Intersubjective Dimensions Moderator: April Flakne, New College of Florida |
|
3:45 – 4:30 p.m. | Jan Halák, Palacky University Olomouc: “On the diacritical value of expression with regard to emotion” |
4:30 – 5:15 p.m. | Corinne Lajoie, Penn State University: “The equilibrium of sense: Levels of embodiment and the (dis)orientations of love” Winner of the M. C. Dillon Award for best graduate essay |
5:15 – 5:45 p.m. | Snack Break (light refreshments provided) |
Thursday Keynote Introduction: Shiloh Whitney, Fordham University |
|
5:45 – 7:15 p.m. | Alia Al-Saji, McGill University “The Affective Flesh of Colonial Duration” |
8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
Session 5 – Affective Pathologies and Empathy Moderator: Lisa Käll, Stockholm University |
|
9 – 9:45 a.m. | Ståle Finke, Norwegian University of Science and Technology Trondheim: “Structuring Affective Pathology: Merleau-Ponty and Psychoanalysis” |
9:45 – 10:30 a.m. | Catherine Fullarton, Emory University: “Empathy, Perspective, Parallax” |
10:30 – 10:45 a.m. | Break |
Session 6 – Eating and Breathing Moderator: Ann Murphy, University of New Mexico |
|
10:45 – 11:30 a.m. | Whitney Ronshagen, Emory University: “Visceral Relations: On Eating, Affect, and Sharing the World” |
11:30 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. | Amie Leigh Zimmer, University of Oregon: “Rethinking Chronic Breathlessness Beyond Symptom and Syndrome” |
12:15 – 2 p.m. | Lunch Break (and graduate student Mentoring Session in Lowenstein 810) |
Session 7 – Critical Phenomenologies 1: Work and Freedom Moderator: Whitney Howell, La Salle University |
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2 – 2:45 p.m. | Talia Welsh, University of Tennessee Chattanooga: “Toward a Critical Phenomenology of Work and Its Discontents” |
2:45 – 3:30 p.m. | Laura McMahon, Eastern Michigan University: “The ‘Great Phantom’: Merleau-Ponty on Habitus, Freedom, and Political Transformation” |
3:30 – 3:45 p.m. | Break |
Session 8 – Critical Phenomenologies 2: The “I Can” Moderator: Cheryl Emerson, SUNY Buffalo |
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3:45 – 4:30 p.m. | Kym Maclaren, Ryerson University: “Criminalization and the Self-Constituting Dynamics of Distrust” |
4:30 – 5:15 p.m. | Joel Reynolds, University of Massachusetts Lowell and Lauren Guilmette, Elon University: “Rethinking the Ableism of Affect Theory with Merleau-Ponty” |
5:15 – 5:45 p.m. | Snack Break (light refreshments provided) |
Friday Keynote Introduction: Shiloh Whitney, Fordham University |
|
5:45 – 7:15 p.m. | Matthew Ratcliffe, York University “Towards a Phenomenology of Grief: Insights from Merleau-Ponty” |
8:30 – 9 a.m. | Registration and coffee |
Session 9 – Feeling Beyond Humanism Moderator: Wayne Froman, George Mason University |
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9 – 9:45 a.m. | Marie-Eve, Morin, University of Alberta. “Merleau-Ponty’s ‘cautious anthropomorphism’” |
9:45 – 10:30 a.m. | Jay Worthy, University of Alberta: “Feelings of Adversity: Towards a Critical Humanism” |
10:30 – 10:45 a.m. | Break |
Session 10 – Art and Affect Moderator: Stephen Watson, Notre Dame |
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10:45 – 11:30 a.m. | Veronique Foti, Pennsylvania State University. “Body, Animality, and Cosmos in the Art of Kiki Smith” |
11:30 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. | Rebecca Longtin, State University of New York New Paltz: “From Stone to Flesh: Affect and the Poetic Ambiguity of the Body” |
12:15 – 2:15 p.m. | Lunch Break (and Business Lunch at Rosa Mexicano, 61 Columbus Ave) |
Session 11 – Voice and Silence Moderator: Gail Weiss, George Washington University |
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2:15 – 3 p.m. | Susan, Bredlau, Emory University. “Losing One’s Voice: Merleau-Ponty and the Lived Space of Conversation” |
3 – 3:45 p.m. | Martina, Ferrari, University of Oregon. “The Laboring of Deep Silence: ‘Conceptless Opening(s),’ the Suspension of the Familiar, and the Dismemberment of the Ego” |
3:45 – 4 p.m. | Break |
Session 12 – Affectivity and Language Moderator: Galen Johnson, University of Rhode Island |
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4 – 4:45 p.m. | Silvana de Souza Ramos, University of São Paulo. “Merleau-Ponty and the Prose of Dora’s World” |
4:45 – 5:30 p.m. | Katie Emery Brown, University of California Berkeley. “Queer Silence in Merleau-Ponty’s Gesture” |
Banquet | |
7 – 10 p.m. | At Salam, 104 W 13th St. |
We’re a community of philosophers of language centered in New York City. We have a meeting each week at which a speaker presents a piece of their own work relating to the philosophy of language.
Sept 9
Donka Farkas (Santa Cruz)
Sept 16
John Maackay (U Wisconsin–Madison)
Sept 23
Andrew Bacon (USC)
Sept 30
Eleonore Neufeld (USC)
Oct 7
Eli Alshanetsky (Temple)
Oct 21
Gabe Dupre (UCLA)
Oct 28
Dorit Bar-On (UConn)
Nov 4
Sam Berstler (Princeton)
Nov 11
Robert Henderson (Arizona)
Nov 18
Sam Cumming (UCLA)
Nov 25
Harvey Lederman (Princeton)
Dec 2
Sarah Fisher (Reading)
Dec 9
Michael Glanzberg (Northwestern)