The Meaning of the Proper Name in the Works of Philosophers and Linguists of the 20th–21st Centuries

The subject of this research is the proper names. The object of the study comprises the theories of linguists and philosophers of the 20th–21st centuries that explain the nature and meaning of the proper name. This work helps to trace the development of theories, beginning with a brief overview of the perspectives of thinkers including J. S. Mill, G. Frege, and B. Russell, and concluding with works from recent years. The paper examines J. Searle's cluster theory, S. Kripke's causal theory, the views of G. Guillaume, the complex predicativism of E. Agolli, the systematic polysemy of K. Kijania-Placek, the polyreferentialism of L. Delgado, the encyclopedic approach of K. Allan, as well as the praxematic and socially oriented concepts of P. Siblot, R. Lafont, and P.-A. Taguieff. Examining the works of these scholars allows us to observe how the understanding of the proper name has evolved from a word that points to an object and lacks meaning (or constitutes a hidden description) into a complex linguistic phenomenon that depends on context, combines the function of reference, semantic flexibility, and pragmatic aspects. In writing this article comparative methods of analysis and synthesis were employed. The novelty of this research lies in the fact that, while elucidating the core ideas of major language philosophers of the 19th–20th centuries, it pays special attention to the works of researchers from the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This study makes the first attempt to present a maximally diverse array of contemporary perspectives on the meaning of the proper name. The main conclusions are that modern theories of the proper name reject a one-sided understanding of its meaning and strive to account for its semantic flexibility, dependence on context, and the influence of cultural, social, and historical information.