The Metaphysics of Language

One of my major research projects currently concerns the metaphysics of language. This project seeks to accommodate linguistic entities of all sorts (words, sentences, phonemes, linguistic properties, etc.) within our broader ontological and metaphysical theories. This often requires a strongly interdisciplinary approach, with work in this domain intersecting with research in linguistics, psychology, sociology, cognitive science, and any other subject with a strong interest in the nature of language. I also take the metaphysics of language to include the investigation of the metaphysical assumptions that underlie linguistic theorising. In this way, I see one aspect of the metaphysics of language as an extension of recent work in the metaphysics of science to linguistics.

There is now a growing interest in the metaphysics of language. But readings can sometimes be hard to find. To try to solve this issue, below is a list of work as a collated reading list for those new to the topic. I hope to continue to keep this list up to date with the latest research across all fields that are concerned with the metaphysics of language.

I'm certain that this list is incomplete - apologies for any glaring omissions. If you have suggestions for additions, please contact me (and feel free to suggest your own work!). Thanks are due to the organisers of the 'Metaphysics of Words' conference in Genoa for creating an initial list of sources.

Note: Myself and Tom Hughes are currently co-editing a Topical Collection (read: Special Issue) of Synthese on the Philosophy of Words. Once complete, I'll include a full list of the papers in that issue on this page, but in the meantime, the papers that are part of that issue that are available to read can be found here. My thanks to all the authors for submitting their work to the Special Issue (and to the many, many reviewers!).

Metaphysics of Language Reading List

Alward, P. (2005). ‘Between the Lines of Age: Reflections on the Metaphysics of Words’, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 86: 72-187.

Balletta, S. (2019). ‘The Metaphysics of Words’, Theoria, 85: 31-48.

Bloomfield, L. (1933). Language. New York: Henry Holt.

Bromberger, S. (1989). ‘Types and Tokens in Linguistics’. In Reflections on Chomsky, George, A. (ed.), Oxford: Blackwell, 58-88.

Bromberger, S. (2011). ‘What are Words? Comments on Kaplan (1990), on Hawthorne and Lepore, and on the issue’, The Journal of Philosophy, 108(9): 486-503.

Cappelen, H. (1999). ‘Intentions in Words’, Nous, 33(1): 92-102.

Davis, W. A. (2014). 'On Occurrences Of Types In Types'. Australasian Journal Of Philosophy, 92(2): 349-363 .

Devitt, M. (2006). Ignorance of Language. Oxford University Press.

Epstein, B. (2009). 'Grounds, Convention, and the Metaphysics of Linguistic Tokens', Croatian Journal of Philosophy, 9(25): 1-33.

Evnine, S. J. (2016) Making Object and Events: A Hylomorphic Theory of Artifacts, Actions, and Organisms. New York: Oxford University Press.

Gasparri, L. (2016). ‘Originalism about Word Types’, Thought, 5: 126-133.

Goodman, N., and W. V. O. Quine (1947). “Steps Toward a Constructive Nominalism.” Journal of Symbolic Logic 12: 105–122.

Hardie, C. D. (1936). ‘The Formal Mode of Speech’, Analysis 4(2/3):46-48.

Hawthorne, J. and Lepore, E. (2011). ‘On Words’, The Journal of Philosophy, 108(9): 447-485.

Hughes, T.J. and Miller, J.T.M. (2014). Lexicalisation and the Origin of the Human Mind, Biosemiotics,7(1): 11-27.

Irmak, N. (2019). ‘An Ontology of Words’, Erkenntnis. 84 (5):1139-1158 .

Juvshik, T. (2021). 'Good ‘Cat’, Bad ‘Act’', Philosophia. 49: 1007–1019.

Kaplan, D. (1990). ‘Words’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 64: 93-119.

Kaplan, D. (2011). ‘Words on Words’, The Journal of Philosophy, 108(9): 504-529.

Katz, J. J. (1981). Language and Other Abstract Objects. Totowa, New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield.

Katz, J. J. (2000). Realistic Rationalism. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Lando, G. (2019). 'A Uniform, Concretist Metaphysics for Linguistic Types', Metaphysica. 20(2): 195-221.

Leckie, G. and Williams, R. (2019). 'Words by Convention', in Ernie Lepore & David Sosa (eds.), Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Language, Volume 1, Oxford: OUP.

Macdonald, M. (1936). ‘Language and Reference’, Analysis, 4(2-3): 33-41.

MacIver, A. M. (1937). ‘Token, Type and Meaning’, Analysis, 4(4): 58-64.

Mallory, F. (2020) 'Linguistic types are capacity-individuated action-types', Inquiry, Online First. DOI: 10.1080/0020174X.2020.1772864

McCulloch, G. (1991). ‘Making Sense of Words’, Analysis, 51(2):73 - 79.

Miller, J.T.M. (2017). 'Language and Ontological Emergence', Philosophica, 91(1): 105-143.

Miller, J.T.M. (2019). 'Natural Name Theory and Linguistics Kinds', The Journal of Philosophy, 116(9): 494-508.

Miller, J.T.M. (2020). 'The Ontology of Words: Realism, Nominalism, and Eliminativism', Philosophy Compass, 15(7): 1-13.

Miller, J.T.M. (2020). 'On the Individuation of Words', Inquiry. 63(8): 875-884.

Miller, J.T.M. (2021). 'Words, Species, and Kinds', Metaphysics. 4(1):18–31.

Miller, J.T.M. (2021). 'A Bundle Theory of Words', Synthese. 198: 5731–5748.

Miller, J.T.M. (Forthcoming). 'There Are No Uninstantiated Words', Inquiry.

Munroe, W. (2016). ‘Words on Psycholinguistics’, The Journal of Philosophy, 113(12): 593-616.

Nefdt, R. M. (2019). ‘The Ontology of Words: A Structural Approach’, Inquiry, 62(8): 877-911.

Quine, W. V. O. (1960). Word and Object. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Quine, W. V. O. (1987). ‘Type versus Token’, in his Quiddities: An Intermittently Philosophical Dictionary. Harvard: Harvard University Press.

Rey, G. (2006). 'Conventions, Intuitions and Linguistic Inexistents: a Reply to Devitt', Croatian Journal of Philosophy, 6(18): 549-70.

Rey, G. (2008). 'In Defense of Folieism', Croatian Journal of Philosophy 8(23):177-202.

Stainton, R. (2014). ‘Philosophy of Linguistics’. Oxford Handbooks Online.

Stebbing, S. (1935). 'Sounds, shapes and words', Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supp., 14: 1–21.

Stojnić, U. (2021), Just Words: Intentions, Tolerance and Lexical Selection. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. Online First: DOI: 10.1111/phpr.12781

Szabò, Z. G. (1999). ‘Expressions and their Representation’, The Philosophical Quarterly, 49(195): 145-163.

Wetzel, L. (1993). ‘What are Occurrences of Expressions?’, Journal of Philosophical Logic, 22: 215-220.

Wetzel, L. (2002). ‘On Types and Words’, Journal of Philosophical Research, 27: 239-265.

Wetzel, L. (2009). Types and Tokens: An Essay on Abstract Objects. Boston, MA: MIT Press.