Hom and Camp [Alberto Torrigiotti]

Hom introduces combinatorial externalism (a semantic theory) because he sees no way for pragmatic minimalism to account for certain properties of slurs, and rejects radical contextualism for its wholesale skepticism toward semantic explanations. Probably the biggest difference between Hom's theory and Camp's is what makes Hom's theory externalist, i.e., that the force and meaning of the derogatory content in slurs is causally dependent upon the institutions that inform those slurs. Hom takes combinatorial externalism to be a sort of natural development of semantic externalism applied to slurs.

Camp's theory does not really set out to argue for or against semantic/pragmatic approaches to the study of slurs, and doesn't really engage with many of Hom's arguments directly or specifically. She wants to argue that what gives slurs their rhetorical force must be something like an allegiance to some perspective; perspectivalism is primarily concerned with the contributions of the speaker and recipient in uses of slurs. By using some slur, we signal our "affiliation with a way of thinking and feeling" about the targeted group, which is why listeners and bystanders may feel complicit simply in virtue of allowing themselves to entertain these thoughts and feelings, or engage with them on any level at all. (Camp 2013, 340)

I was initially convinced by Hom's sentiment that slurs ought not to be treated on an ad hoc basis because there is a sense in which it would seem superficial or arbitrary to treat slurs as exceptions or as so different from anything else in language that it ought to be approached uniquely, but I don't think I feel this way anymore. This change has led me to have more sympathy for Camp's view, particularly with regard to unique perspectival considerations for slurs, and though there certainly are incompatibilities between Hom's and Camp's theories, I think that there is room for them to be combined into a better overarching theory. Altogether, I probably have to favor Hom's theory because it is clearer, more comprehensive, gives deeper explanations for truth conditions, and includes elements or adaptations from semantic externalism which resemble my own view.