Slurs as logical fallacies

Slurs are derogatory epithets that offend both an individual and a target group of persons. Slurs are rmuch debated in the recent literature because of their so-called “scoping out” behavior (Hedger, 2012). This led some authors to defend a “pragmatic account” of slurs (Bianchi, 2013): slurs are truth-conditionally equivalent to their neutral counterparts, but would moreover pragmatically convey a derogatory content, as a presupposition (Schlenker, 2007, Macià, 2011), or as a conventional implicature (Potts, 2007, 2012, Williamson, 2009). In this presentation, I will argue against the pragmatic account of slurs, and propose to identify the meaning of slurs with their neutral counterpart (semantically equivalent to a concept / a set of individuals), and to account for the difference between the two by means of the notion of Fregean tone.