The Problem of Reference and Geographic Structuration

Abstract

In geographic structuration, a view urged in several recent methodological papers in human geography, it is suggested that an explicit theory of social action can only be developed by theorizing about the spatial and the social dimensions of society which are fully constitutive of individual human action. This paper begins with the question of whether any theories of reference, meaning, or truth would be possible within such a view of society. In the first part of the paper, some of the historical approaches taken to reference in both space–time languages and attribute languages are discussed. A distinction is made between the more formal types of reference used in such languages and reference as it is used in everyday discourse. In the second part of the paper, an alternative view of reference, derived from Quine's web-of-belief concept, is suggested, and it is demonstrated that this view of reference is capable of dealing with fictional as well as nonfictional entities. Reference is relativized to a language, sentences are true or false, and words can refer or ‘talk about’ different entities, but this is all within a particular discourse.