Hedged Assertion

Surprisingly little has been written about hedged assertion. Linguists often focus on semantic or syntactic theorizing about, for example, grammatical evidentials or epistemic modals, but pay far less attention to what hedging does at the level of action. By contrast, philosophers have focused extensively on normative issues regarding what epistemic position is required for proper assertion, yet they have almost exclusively considered unqualified declaratives. This essay considers the linguistic and normative issues side-by-side. We aim to bring some order and clarity to thinking about hedging, so as to illuminate aspects of interest to both linguists and philosophers. In particular, we consider three broad questions. 1) The structural question: when one hedges, what is the speaker’s commitment weakened from? 2) The functional question: what is the best way to understand how a hedge weakens? And 3) the taxonomic question: are hedged assertions genuine assertions, another speech act, or what

Representing knowledge

A speaker's use of a declarative sentence in a context has two effects: it expresses a proposition and represents the speaker as knowing that proposition. This essay is about how to explain the second effect. The standard explanation is act-based. A speaker is represented as knowing because their use of the declarative in a context tokens the act-type of assertion and assertions represent knowledge in what's asserted. I propose a semantic explanation on which declaratives covertly host a "know"-parenthetical. A speaker is thereby represented as knowing the proposition expressed because that is the semantic contribution of the parenthetical. I call this view parentheticalism and defend that it better explains knowledge representation than alternatives. As a consequence of outperforming assertoric explanations, parentheticalism opens the door to eliminating the act-type of assertion from linguistic theorizing

Testimony and grammatical evidentials

Unlike other sources of evidence like perception and memory, testimony is intimately related to natural language. That intimacy cannot be overlooked. In this chapter, I show how cross-linguistic considerations are relevant to the epistemology of testimony. I make my case with declaratives containing grammaticalized evidentials. My discussion has a negative and a positive part. For the negative part, it is argued that some definitions of testimony are mistaken because they do not apply to testimony offered by a declarative containing an evidential. The positive component discusses a new puzzle noted by McCready (2015) that evidentials raise about the justificatory status of testimony-based beliefs

The linguistic basis for propositions

Propositions are traditionally regarded as performing vital roles in theories of natural language, logic, and cognition. This chapter offers an opinionated survey of recent literature to assess whether they are still needed to perform three linguistic roles: be the meaning of a declarative sentence in a context, be what is designated by certain linguistic expressions, and be the content of illocutionary acts. After considering many of the relevant choice-points, I suggest that there remains a linguistic basis for propositions, but not for some of the traditional reasons

Exposed Roots

“Exposed Roots” is a collection of seven interconnected short stories following a farming family, told through the perspective of middle daughter Anna. The stories reflect the shifting uncertainties of their narrator, weaving the past and present together and, on occasion, blurring the lines of reality. Characters include a grandfather single-mindedly dedicated to his farm, an aunt whose resentment drives her from her family, a father who simultaneously wants his children to have their own lives but also stay within the family business, and a mother and grandmother who have come to this family farm as “outsiders.” The farm is not an idealistic, pastoral location; it is a place of hardship and uncertainty, where nature works for, or against, success as much as the people do. The farm represents either a solace or a cage for each family member, and at times both for Anna. My essay, “Stunting Growth: The Narrator’s Liminality in ‘Exposed Roots’” explores Anna’s position through the lens of liminality, as she is caught between family members, between her responsibilities and desires, and between childhood and adulthood. Anna’s role is as both narrator and protagonist who exists inside the family conflicts, yet fears failing her family’s expectations. As the central figure between the reader and the story, she is the means through which the reader accesses the characters surrounding Anna, and the world they all occupy. Anna, thus, must come to terms with her familial and independent positions, and learn how to take control and act for herself

Reviving the performative hypothesis?

A traditional problem with the performative hypothesis is that it cannot assign proper truth-conditions to a declarative sentence. This paper shows that the problem is solved by adopting a multidimensional semantics on which sentences have more than just truth-conditions. This is good news for those who want to at least partially revive the hypothesis. The solution also brings into focus a lesson about what issues to consider when drawing the semantics/pragmatics boundary

Hedged testimony

Speakers offer testimony. They also hedge. This essay offers an account of how hedging makes a difference to testimony. Two components of testimony are considered: how testimony warrants a hearer's attitude, and how testimony changes a speaker's responsibilities. Starting with a norm-based approach to testimony where hearer's beliefs are prima facie warranted because of social norms and speakers acquire responsibility from these same norms, I argue that hedging alters both components simultaneously. It changes which attitudes a hearer is prima facie warranted in forming in response to testimony, and reduces how much responsibility a speaker undertakes in testifying. A consequence of this account is that speakers who hedge for strategic purposes deprive their hearers of warrant for stronger doxastic attitudes