Coherence and Truthfulness in Communication Intracommunicational and Extracommunicational Indexicality
Lars Elleström (Linné University)
The aim of this paper is to construct a model that demonstrates how human communication, involving all kinds of media, may not only correspond to but put us in contact with what we perceive to be the surrounding world. How is truthfulness actually established by communication? To answer this question, the notion of indices is employed; signs based on contiguity or real connections. However, an investigation of the outward direction of indices – creating truthfulness in communication – also requires an understanding of their inward direction – establishing coherence in communication. To be able to investigate these two functions of indices properly, further concepts and various elementary categorizations will be proposed: there are several types of contiguity and many varieties of indexical objects.