ASSERTION AND CAPITULATION

Abstract

Abstract The context or manner of an utterance can alter or nullify the speech‐act that would normally be performed by utterances of that sort. Coercive contexts have this effect on some kinds of seeming assertions: they end up being non‐assertoric, and are merely capitulations. An earlier version of this view is clarified, defended, and extended partly in response to a useful critique by Roy Sorensen. I examine some complications that arise regarding resistance to speaking under coercion when ideological or religious commitments are implicated.