Peter Frederick Strawson's- Philosophy of Language

Preface The present work is an attempt to understand Sir P.F.Strawson's Philosophy of Language against certain misconceptions. Once these misconceptions are cleared away, it will provide, I believe, a right perspective on a theory of empirical language and its conceptual structure. My aim in this work is to show that a basic combination of Reference and Predication as two semantic classes will issue in a knowledge of things, persons and events that facilitates an understanding of communication as a major function of language. Hence it is, I feel, imminent to distinguish this approach to a study of language from a truth- theoretic model popularly advocated for a well regimented language by Alfred Tarski and for natural language by Donald Davidson and John McDowell.

I shall give an exposition of Strawson's approach vies-a- vies truth-theoretic approach. I shall also try to maintain that the notion of identifying knowledge is a necessary condition for successful communication and it is not a step towards a complete description of a thing or a person. The notion of communication-intention of the speaker is not something to be divined deep beneath the linguistic clothing. It is not something hidden from the view of the audience nor it is intended to go against the practice of a language-speaking community.

**Contents and Sample Pages**