Words Always Have A Context. Or Many.

The context in which utterances are delivered has a crucial bearing on their significance. To borrow a vivid example from Robert Stecker, the exhortation “The bus is coming” can signify radically different things depending on the context. If we are late and the bus is arriving, I am urging you to sprint towards the bus stop. If we are at the bus stop already and you are standing in the street as the bus approaches, I am warning you to leap away before you are flattened. A variety of other factors – such as irony, satire and common idioms – can also displace words from their traditional meaning