Prof. Harendarski will be visiting our group to present the new for us theoretical framework, within the general field of pragmatism, which we have already established overlaps with phenomenology, but with greater emphasis on inference. Welcome to the room for the "real life" event, or to the zoom link.

I will outline some of the defining aspects of Robert B. Brandom's (1994) pragmatist and linguistic theory, and point out where our group’s linguistically based semiotic attempt leaves the framework and moves to the specific refocusing, metadiscursive role of some verbs due to force aspects of sign functions in interactional settings (in the broadest sense, including texts, etc.). Brandom's pragmatist approach assumes the already ongoing discursive practice as a field of theoretical enquiry and as a condition in itself (represented in the formula one of us; or: what does it mean to be one of us). The approach itself is determined by the role of a participant in the discourse (one of us). ‘To be one of us in this sense of 'us' is to be the subject of normative attitudes, to be capable of acknowledging proprieties and improprieties of conduct, to be able to treat a performance as correct or incorrect.’ (Brandom 1994: 32) While Brandom focuses on deontic states, vocabularies, etc. (his normative pragmatism), we have focused on the linguistic means by which the ascription of intentionality occurs and have found that there are certain verbs that can always be used to conceptualize a certain aspect of actions in the third person – as recourse to cooperative and communicative actions. The core element is the attribution of intentionality. If, for example, assertive sign functions are denied or rejected, verbs can be used to focus on the semantic content or the normative force of the action. Certain verbs thus appear to be interpreters of co-operative (interactional) actions, although they are not their names. At the end I will discuss, how this kind of linguistic theory of normative pragmatics may contribute to cognitive semiotics.

 Brandom, Robert (1994) Making it Explicit. Reasoning, Representing, and Discursive Commitment. Princeton, NJ. 

Harendarski, Ulf (2021) Implizite Intentionalitätszuschreibung an Andere. Die Funktion von Verben. In : Ulf Harendarski, ed.: Reden über Andere. Diskursive Konstitutionen von Subjektpositionen und Personalität. Tübingen: Stauffenburg (Stauffenburg Linguistik, 121), S. 31–76. (

We are members of the Department of German Studies. We therefore publish in German but are currently working on English texts.)