Artigo Revisado por pares

By any other name: Kripke, Derrida and an ethics of naming

2003; De Gruyter Mouton; Volume: 32; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1515/jlse.2003.003

ISSN

1613-3838

Autores

Carrol Clarkson,

Tópico(s)

Philosophy and Theoretical Science

Resumo

Saul Kripke's Naming and Necessity (1972) has far-reaching metaphysical implications for contemporary analytic philosophy, and is also considered to pose a challenge to post-structuralism, especially after influential work done by Christopher Norris. In this paper I argue that Kripke does not pose a challenge to Derridean deconstruction on the grounds stipulated by Norris. Further, I show that Kripke's radical claim for the possibility of necessary a posteriori statements bears resemblance to Derrida's understanding of the referential effects of language. I conclude the paper by suggesting that the points of contact in Kripke's and Derrida's accounts of proper names serve as a starting point for broaching a different line of philosophical enquiry: an ethics of naming. In this context, names and naming in fiction can be understood to make an important contribution to serious thinking about singular referring terms - a contribution which extends traditional philosophical enquiries about the logical workings of reference. I take as my example Ondaatje's The English Patient.

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