Zak Husain Najand

1st Year Graduate Student | M.A. program in Philosophy

Hi, I'm Zak, an international student from London.  I just graduated from the University of Manchester with a PPE (Politics, Philosophy and Economics) degree.  My primary interests are in the philosophy of language, for example the debate between different semantic theories of naming i.e. a Russellian/Fregean descriptive account compared to a direct reference account, and the implications of this on ontologies and meta-ontologies, for example those of Quine.  Another area of the philosophy of language I find fascinating is coming up with a semantic theory of slurs.  The problem here seems to lie in ascertaining where the derogatory content of a slur comes from; is it ordinary semantics, pragmatics, or an unconventional semantic device such as an expressive?  Another area that interests me is the philosophy of mathematics, particularly the question of whether mathematical objects exist and are abstract, or whether they are simply a useful fiction.  Whilst I have these specific interests, I am definitely excited to learn about new areas of philosophy and develop some breadth across the discipline.