The Politics of Language

Beaver, David, Stanley, Jason

ISBN 10: 0691242755 / ISBN 13: 9780691242750

Published by Princeton University Press, 2025

About this Item

The Politics of Language, by David Beaver and Jason Stanley, published by Princeton University Press in 2025, presents a radical new approach to the theory of meaning. The authors argue that political and social identity, affect, and shared practices are as fundamental to communication as information - a departure from the standard frameworks of semantics and pragmatics that have long anchored the philosophy of language. The book's central argument is that speech - whether in private dialogue, group settings, or mass communication - functions to attune people to a shared reality, emotion, or identity. Beaver and Stanley apply this framework to a wide range of phenomena: dog whistles, covert persuasion, echo chambers, and genocidal speech, among others. Their analysis leads to the conclusion that speech is inherently political, carrying the resonances of ideology in every exchange. Drawing across linguistics, philosophy, and political theory, The Politics of Language addresses questions of free speech, democracy, authoritarianism, and protest that are central to contemporary public life. At 520 pages, it is a substantial work aimed at scholars and serious general readers with an interest in language and power. ISBN: 9780691242750. Published 2025, Princeton University Press.

Seller Inventory # BMC26241hmg2

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Politics of Language
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication Date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0691242755
• ISBN 13: 9780691242750
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

A provocative case for the inherently political nature of language

In The Politics of Language, David Beaver and Jason Stanley present a radical new approach to the theory of meaning, offering an account of communication in which political and social identity, affect, and shared practices play as important a role as information. This new view of language, they argue, has dramatic consequences for free speech, democracy, and a range of other areas in which speech plays a central role.

Drawing on a wealth of disciplines, The Politics of Language argues that the function of speech—whether in dialogue, larger group interactions, or mass communication—is to attune people to something, be it a shared reality, emotion, or identity. Reconceptualizing the central ideas of pragmatics and semantics, Beaver and Stanley apply their account to a range of phenomena that defy standard frameworks in linguistics and philosophy of language—from dog whistles and covert persuasion to echo chambers and genocidal speech. The authors use their framework to show that speech is inevitably political because all communication is imbued with the resonances of particular ideologies and their normative perspectives on reality.

At a time when democracy is under attack, authoritarianism is on the rise, and diversity and equality are being demanded, The Politics of Language offers a powerful new vision of the language of politics, ideology, and protest.

About the Author

David Beaver is professor of linguistics and philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin and director of the UT Cognitive Science Program. His books include Presupposition and Assertion in Dynamic Semantics and Sense and Sensitivity: How Focus Determines Meaning. Jason Stanley is the Jacob Urowsky Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. He is the author of How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them and How Propaganda Works (Princeton), among other books.