Practical knowledge and language skills

In my presentation, I will discuss the distinction between practical and propositional (or theoretical) knowledge in relation to linguistic competence.
I'll begin by presenting the distinction between knowledge and know-how, considering its salient aspects. I will then briefly explain Chomsky's position on linguistic competence, which is fundamentally based on the idea that this competence is not practical knowledge, but propositional knowledge.
After criticizing Chomsky's arguments in support of his thesis, I will conclude with some remarks aimed at showing that linguistic competence is practical knowledge.

Annalisa Coliva

Annalisa Coliva is Associate Professor at the University of Modena and Reggio-Emilia and Deputy Director of the COGITO philosophy research center (Bologna). In Italy, she studied in Bologna (MA) and Verceil (PhD in philosophy of language). She also studied in Scotland, at St Andrews, where she received a PhD under the supervision of Crispin Wright. She subsequently obtained post-doctoral fellowships in Italy (Bologna and Modena) and Switzerland (Fribourg). She has been a Fulbright Fellow (Columbia, NY), Fellow of the Italian Academy at Columbia University in the City of New York and Alexander von Humboldt Fellow (Heidelberg), visiting professor at Université Paris 7 Denis Diderot, and at Scripps College (California).

She has also lectured at the University of Geneva.

She is the author of numerous books in Italian and English, the most recent of which are: Extended Rationality. A Hinge Epistemology (Palgrave2015); Moore and Wittgenstein. Scepticism, Certainty and Common Sense (Palgrave 2010); Scetticismo. Dubbio, paradosso, conoscenza (Laterza2012); I modi del relativismo (Laterza 2009).

She has also published numerous articles on topics relating to epistemology, philosophy of mind, the history of analytic philosophy and the first person. She has edited numerous collective works, including The Self and Self-Knowledge (OUP 2012) and Mind, Meaning and Knowledge. Themes from the Philosophy of Crispin Wright (OUP 2012) and,with Danièle Moyal-Sharrock and Volker Munz, Language, Mind and Action(De Gruyter 2015).

She is currently writing two books, one on the knowledge of our mental states(The Varieties of Self-Knowledge, Palgrave) and the other on relativism, in collaboration with Maria Baghramian(Relativism, Routledge).