Words in Contexts: Fregean Elucidations
Hans Rott

Abstract:
The paper addresses the question: How do we come to understand word-words
occurring in sentences, texts and utterances? Various writings of Frege are
consulted in an attempt to give an answer to this question. I first suggest
a way of conceiving how the Fregean principles of compositionality and
context can be reconciled and in fact seen as working together in the
enterprise of interpretation. Secondly, I try to show that another Fregean
theme, that of elucidation-the elucidation of primitive, undefinable terms
of logic, mathematics and metamathe-matics-secures a place for the context
principle in the writings of the late Frege in which no explicit reference
to this principle can be found. Elucidations provide a particular striking
and important case for the thesis that small linguistic units get a meaning
only through the interpretation of larger chunks of linguistic products.
Thirdly, we see that when thinking about the way elucidations work, Frege
is compelled to acknowledge a principle of charitable interpretation. I
argue that there is an intimate connection between these three points, and
that not only the first and the second, but also the third one is indeed a
Fregean theme.