After a brief overview of the ways in which self-expression is often invoked but little scrutinized in philosophy and related cognitive sciences, this chapter situates the phenomenon within the broader framework of communication. Four conceptions of communication are considered: the signaling, code, inferential, and ‘extended senses’ models. The code and inferential models are shown to be insufficiently general, while the extended senses model encourages a blurring of the distinction between information gained by perception and that gained by communication with others. The signaling model is then promoted as being broad enough to accommodate what is right about the other three, while still being substantive enough to be explanatory. The chapter also situates the book methodologically as a work both of philosophy-as-pre-science, and a humanistic contribution to our knowledge of ourselves. It ends with a preview of ten of the major topics that will be addressed in the following pages.
Keywords: signaling model, code model, inferential model, communication, extended senses, intention