Poppy Mankowitz,
Department of Philosophy,
University of Bristol

I am a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Bristol. Previously, I was a Research Associate on the ERC project 'Truth and Semantics', and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Salzburg. I received my PhD from the University of St Andrews.

I work primarily on the philosophy of language, semantics, and metaphysics. My current research interests include: information structure, quantifier expressions, quantifier variance, verbal and metalinguistic disputes, slurs, semantic paradoxes and the meaning of natural language truth predicates.

1. Not Half True ±
   Forthcoming. Mind.

The word 'true' shows some evidence of gradability. For instance, there are cases where truth-bearers are described as 'slightly true', 'completely true' or 'very true'. Expressions that accept these types of modifiers are analysed in terms of properties that can be possessed to a greater or lesser degree. If 'true' is genuinely gradable, then it would follow that there are degrees of truth. It might also follow that 'true' is context sensitive, like other gradable expressions. Such conclusions are difficult to reconcile with most existing theories: deflationists and inflationists alike tend to reject the thesis that one true truth-bearer can have more or less truth than another. Based on work in natural language, I argue that 'true' is not a genuinely gradable expression. I also provide an explanation of the apparent evidence for gradability. Hence there is no reason to think that there is a truth property that comes in degrees.

2. Focus on Slurs ±
   Forthcoming. (Co-authored with Ashley Shaw). Mind & Language.

Slurring expressions display puzzling behaviour when embedded, such as under negation and in attitude and speech reports. On one hand, they frequently appear to retain their characteristic qualities, such as offensiveness and propensity to derogate. On the other hand, it is sometimes possible to understand them as lacking these qualities. A theory of slurring expressions should explain this variability. We develop an explanation that deploys the linguistic notion of focus. Our proposal is that a speaker can conversationally implicate metalinguistic claims about the aptness of a focused slurring expression. The inclusion of a sentential operator in the sentence (e.g., negation) affects the aptness claim conveyed, resulting in the availability of non-pejorative metalinguistic construals (e.g., that the slurring expression is not apt for certain purposes). The resulting explanation of variability relies on independently motivated mechanisms and is compatible with any theory of slurring expressions.

3. Paradox and Context Shift ±
   Forthcoming. Philosophical Studies (Special Issue).

The Liar sentence L, which reads 'L is not true', can be used to produce an apparently valid argument proving that L is not true and that L is true. There has been increasing recognition of the appeal of contextualist solutions to the Liar paradox. Contextualist accounts hold that some step in the reasoning induces a context shift that causes the apparently contradictory claims to occur at different contexts. Attempts at identifying the most promising contextualist account often rely on timing arguments, which seek to isolate a step at which the context cannot be claimed to have shifted or must have shifted. The literature contains a number of timing arguments that draw incompatible conclusions about the location of the context shift. I argue that no existing timing arguments succeed. An alternative strategy for assessing contextualist accounts evaluates the plausibility of their explanations of why the context shifts. However, even this strategy yields no clear verdict about which contextualist account is the most promising. I conclude that there are some grounds for optimism and for pessimism about the potential to adequately motivate contextualism.

4. How to Have a Metalinguistic Dispute ±
   2021. Synthese.

There has been recent interest in the idea that speakers who appear to be having a verbal dispute may in fact be engaged in a metalinguistic negotiation: they are communicating information about how they believe an expression should be used. For example, individuals involved in a dispute about whether a racehorse is an athlete might be communicating their diverging views about how 'athlete' should be used. While many have argued that metalinguistic negotiation is a pervasive feature of philosophical and everyday discourse, the literature lacks an account of this phenomenon that can be situated within a 'mainstream' view of communication. I propose an independently motivated account where individuals reconstruct metalinguistic propositions by means of a pragmatic, Gricean reasoning process.

5. The Liar without Relativism ±
   2021. Erkenntnis.

Some in the recent literature have claimed that a connection exists between the Liar paradox and semantic relativism: the view that the truth values of certain occurrences of sentences depend on the contexts at which they are assessed. Sagi (2017) argues that contextualist accounts of the Liar paradox are committed to relativism, and Rudnicki and Lukowski (forthcoming) propose a new account that they classify as relativist. I argue that a full understanding of how relativism is conceived within theories of natural language shows that neither of the purported connections can be maintained. There is no reason why a solution to the Liar paradox needs to accept relativism.

6. 'Quantifier Variance' is not Quantifier Variance ±
   2021. Australasian Journal of Philosophy. 99 (3): 611-627.

There has been recent interest in the idea that, when metaphysicians disagree over the truth of (say) 'There are numbers' or 'Chairs exist', their dispute is merely verbal. This idea has been taken to motivate quantifier variance, the view that the meanings of quantifier expressions vary across different ontological languages, and each of these meanings is of equal metaphysical merit. I argue that quantifier variance cannot be upheld in light of natural language theorists' analyses of quantifier expressions. The idea that metaphysicians are engaged in verbal disputes can be maintained only through alternative strategies that have nothing to do with quantifier expressions.

7. Expressions in Focus ±
   2020. Semantics and Pragmatics. 13 (13): 1-46.

It is commonly claimed that, when a constituent is the focus of an occurrence of a sentence, certain alternatives to that constituent are relevant to our understanding of the sentence. Normally these are alternatives to the denotation of the focused constituent. However, Krifka (2007) briefly discusses the notion of expression focus, where the alternatives are linguistic items. Yet an adequate account of expression focus has not been given within the literature. This is despite the fact that it holds the potential to provide analyses of several important metalinguistic phenomena, including metalinguistic negotiation, metalinguistic negation and embedded pejorative expressions. This paper provides an account of expression focus and shows the explanatory power it holds with respect to metalinguistic phenomena.

8. Triggering Domain Restriction ±
   2019. Mind & Language. 34 (5): 563-584.

It is well known that occurrences of sentences such as ‘Every bottle is empty’ will sometimes be understood relative to a subset of the set of all bottles in the universe. Much has been written about what mechanism should be used to model this phenomenon of domain restriction. However, comparatively little attention has been paid to the question of when domain restriction is triggered. I will begin by challenging a recent partial answer to this question. I will then develop my own partial answer based on observations pertaining to information structure.

University of Bristol

University of St Andrews

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