What is a context?

Abstract

In this chapter, I examine a variety of criteria for context individuation, with an eye towards identifying and distinguishing various theoretical projects in semantics and pragmatics for which they would be appropriate. The discussion is organized around six possible desiderata for contexts: (1) that they metaphysically determine proposition expressed, (2) that they be non-trivial (in a sense explained in the text), (3) that they provide epistemic illumination of how hearers understand what proposition was expressed, (4) that they be (in various senses) finite, (5) that they be non-intentionally characterized, and (6) that they be context-insensitively characterized. Particular attention is directed to the conceptions of context developed by Lewis, Stalnaker, and Davidson(ians).