Names that Misbehave
Abstract
Philosophical discussions concerning the semantics of proper names suffer from an almost exclusive focus on personal names. When names for other types of entities, such as ‘France’, are occasionally mentioned they are standardly assumed not to differ from personal names in any interesting respects. This is unfortunate, as nation names do differ significantly from personal names. In particular, whereas personal names only have one default referent, names for nations have several. As argued by Kijania-Placek (2021), names for nations (and cities) systematically refer to geographical locations, political entities, and people, as in (1).
(A)
- France has a temperate climate. [Geographical location]
- France is a founding member of the EU. [Political entity]
- Last year France voted to pick its next president. [People]
This behavior is not restricted to names for nations (and cities). Group names, such as ‘Arsenal’ and ‘Queen’, refer systematically to what could loosely be described as an “organization” (such as a team, a club, or a band) and people. Consider (2) and (3).
(B)
- Arsenal recently launched the No More Red campaign against knife crime. [Organization]
- Arsenal are wearing all-white kits in their match against Oxford United. [People]
(C)
- Even after Freddie’s death, Brian and Robert had a fruitful career in Queen. [Organization]
- To this day, Queen are still at the top of their game. [People]
This behavior is not something that standard theories of proper names are designed or equipped to handle. As such, names that “misbehave” in this sense constitute a challenge for the standard theories. In this paper, I present the challenge from names that misbehave in detail and discuss its ramifications.
References
Kijania-Placek, K. (2021). Names of places. Semiotica, 2021(240), 187–210.
https://doi.org/10.1515/sem-2021-0020