Abstract
ABSTRACTI use a simplified version of Stalnaker's model of conversation to provide an explanation of what and how speakers who utter ‘Black lives matter’ mean. My explanation reveals that such utterances prompt an under‐appreciated form of presupposition accommodation, which I dub negative accommodation. I demonstrate with an analogous example how by exploiting an interpreter's ability to negatively accommodate an otherwise infelicitous utterance, a speaker can express a criticism of her addressee's actions. This analysis explains how an activist who pronounces ‘Black lives matter’ expresses a charge of moral hypocrisy: despite our collective presupposition that all lives matter, we act as if we do not believe that Black lives matter. I then use this account to explain why using ‘All lives matter’ to repudiate such a pronouncement of ‘Black lives matter’ is plausibly characterized as racist.
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