Derogatory Expressives with Two Dimensions

ORLANDO, ELEONORA; SAAB, ANDRÉS

Campinas

Congreso; IV Conference of the Brazilian Society for Analytic Philosophy; 2016

Expressivism concerning derogatory expressions is the view that they have an expressive dimension that does not contribute to the truth-conditions of the sentences in which they occur, namely, is independent of the so-called ?at-issue content?. In general, expressivists have focused on either (i) pure expressives, namely, expressive adjectives that do not have a descriptive meaning, such as ?damn?, ?fucking? and ?bastard? in prenominal occurrences (Potts), and (ii) slurs, namely, terms that are taken to have, on top of the above-mentioned expressive dimension, a descriptive one contributing to truth-conditions, such as ?nigger? and ?kike? (Williamson, Whiting, Jeshion). However, it is not so clear what they think about some expressives that also seem to have a descriptive dimension, as is the case with expressive adjectives in predicative positions, which are sometimes surprinsingly considered not to be expressives at all (see, for instance, Potts 2003).In this essay we want to argue that it is better to think of derogatory expressives not in terms of a uniform category since some of them can have different kinds of uses: in some uses they are purely expressive whereas in some others they have both an expressive and a descriptive dimension. Accordingly, a derogatory expressive like ?bastard?, for instance, is purely expressive when it occurs in a sentence in a prenominal position(1) That bastard Krege is late again.but is mixed, having a descriptive meaning roughly equivalent to bad person, when it occurs in predicative position (2) Krege is a bastard.Something analogous can be said regarding the derogatory expressive ?puta? as it occurs in the following pair of Spanish sentences:(3) No sé dónde puse las putas llaves. [purely expressive occurrence](4) María es una puta. [mixed occurrence]Now, there are two main aspects an expressivist theory of derogatory expressions should take care of concerning these cases. On the one hand, it is necessary to account for their expressive dimension, namely, to say whether it determines a presupposition, a conventional implicature or a bias, and whether it is propositional or not. On the other hand, with regard to cases like (2), it is necessary to say whether their descriptive dimension contributes to truth-conditions or not. On the basis of the analysis of some derogatory expressives in Spanish, we will argue, concerning the first point, that the expressive dimension at stake has a conventionally implicated hard core but can vary a lot in different contexts of use; moreover, it is the propositional description of an emotional attitude, which can in turn be very different in kind and strength in different contexts of use. For instance, there are uses in which a derogatory expressive such as ?hijo de puta?, whose conventional descriptive meaning is bad person and which serves to conventionally express that the speaker has an emotional attitude (of a certain degree of strenght) of scorn and hatred towards the person it is applied to, on certain occasions, it can express that the speaker has an extremely positive emotional attitude of love and tenderness towards the person referred to, as in(5) Sos un hijo de puta: me hiciste el mejor regalo del mundo.(which in turn seems to even determine a change in the descriptive meaning, turning it into wonderful person.) On the other hand, as far the second issue is concerned, we think that in most cases the descriptive dimension does contribute to truth-conditions. However, related to this second point, we would like to draw the attention towards a construction characteristic of Spanish, and other Romance languages, the ?NP de NP construction? (such as ?el ángel/la aburrida/ la muy malpensada/etc. de María?, which seems to give rise to derogatory expressives that behave in a peculiar way (different from both slurs and predicative cases). Two are the features we want to point out in connection with these cases. First, their descriptive dimension does not contribute to truth-conditions, as attested by tests such as the Cautious Assent / Wait a minute! tests. Faced to (6) El hijo de puta de Juan llegó tarde otra vez.someone could agree to the propositional content but reject the expressive dimension by replying (7) ¡Pará un momento! Sí, es verdad, pero no es ningún hijo de puta.Moreover, their whole content, that is, not only the expressive dimension, seems to project out of the scope of certain operators, like non-factive attitude verbs; in reporting(8) María cree que el hijo de puta de Juan es una buena persona.is the reporter or speaker, and not María, who believes Juan to be a bad person (on top of expressing a negative emotional attitude towards him).To summarize, our main point is suggesting an expressive conception of certain derogatory expressives, according to which they have, like slurs, two dimensions, an expressive and a descriptive one. Among them, derogatory expressives exemplifying the Spanish construction ?NP de NP? involve cases, in which, unlike slurs, the descriptive dimension seem both no to contribute to truth-conditions and to project out of the scope of certain operators.