Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: In this paper I explore what it means to take ordinary language as the raw material of philosophy. To do so, I contrast what I call ‘grammar’ or the grammatical approach, which is characteristic of L. Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations and ‘ordinary language philosophy’ (OLP) as J.L. Austin understood it. I show that, while ‘standard’ OLP tends to focus on ‘historical situations’ understood as virtually plausible stagings of our actual uses of concepts, and thus contrasts ‘normal’ and ‘parasitic’ uses of language; the grammarian focuses on the logical possibilities of language through the invention of fictitious language-games. The latter thus extends the ‘ordinary’ up to the abnormal and the extraordinary and rather contrasts it with mere apparent uses that are no uses of language at all.
Source: JOLMA
Author: Valérie Aucouturier
Institutions: UCLouvain Saint-Louis Brussels, UCLouvain
Language: English
Subfield: Philosophy
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4404058670