A REVISIONARY VIEW OF TEXTS, TEXTUAL MEANING, AND FICTIONAL CHARACTERS

• Authors: Pettersson Anders
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Using ideas from John Searle, Roy Harris, Michael Reddy, and Nelson Goodman, the author argues that texts, such as they are commonly conceived, lack brute existence. The common idea of texts is a conceptual construction which is useful in practical everyday contexts but not in serious theorizing, where it creates illusions and contradictions. One of these illusions is the idea of an objective textual meaning, a meaning which is “in the text”: what we actually have in the way of textual meaning are the ideas of various persons – authors, readers, and commentators - about the meaning of the text. When applied to fictional characters, this way of viewing things explains why it makes sense to regard fictional characters as being created and as lacking brute existence.

Keywords

EN

ONTOLOGY; TEXTS; TEXTUAL MEANING; FICTIONAL CHARACTERS; SEARLE JOHN; HARRIS ROY

• Publisher: Institute of Philosophy of the Slovak Academy of Sciences and Institute of Philosophy of Academy of Sciences of Czech Republic
• Journal: Organon F. medzinárodný časopis pre analytickú filozofiu
• Year: 2017
• Volume: 24
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 366 - 383

Contributors

author

Pettersson Anders

• Umeå University Humanisthuset, Biblioteksgränd 3, 901 87 Umeå, Sweden