Expressesthat

Expressesthat is a term used in linguistics and philosophy of language to denote a hypothetical operator or function that represents the act of expressing a proposition. It is used to distinguish the expressive force of an utterance from its truth-conditional content, focusing on how speakers convey attitudes, stance, or illocutionary force rather than what the sentence asserts about the world.

Definition and scope

Expressesthat is proposed as a meta-semantic tool for modeling speech acts. When applied to a proposition p, expressesthat(p) encodes the information that the speaker is expressing p, rather than merely stating that p is true. It is distinct from operators that indicate belief, assertion, or knowledge, because its primary purpose is to capture expressive intent and affect rather than factual content.

Linguistic and philosophical use

In analysis, expressesthat helps analysts separate the content of what is said from how it is said. It is relevant to discussions of performativity, stance, or attitude markers, and can illuminate cases where different utterances express the same proposition with varying expressive force. Researchers may compare expressesthat with other meta- propositional notions to clarify how mood, tone, or context influences interpretation.

Computational perspective

Some approaches to computational semantics and annotation schemes consider expressive force as a dimension to be labeled in corpora. Expressesthat could be used to annotate sentences where the speaker’s expressive act is central, aiding tasks such as stance detection, sentiment analysis, or pragmatic interpretation.

Example

The sentence “It’s cold in here” can be analyzed as expressing that the speaker conveys the proposition that the environment is cold, with the expressive force potentially signaling discomfort or demand for action, depending on context.

See also

Speech act, Expressivity, Stance, Pragmatics, Meta-semantics.