Beyond communicative content

Slurs-racist, sexist, and homophobic epithets-are powerful. Their very utterance can offend, appal, enrage, and intimidate. The use of such terms is a problem as it makes life worse for those they target. For philosophers of language, slurs are also often treated as a kind of puzzle. These words seem to straightforwardly refer to certain groups of people, as well as convey something negative about that group. However, there is substantial disagreement about just what this additional negative content is.