Sören Stenlund, Language and Philosophical Problems, Chapter 2: "Notions of Language and Theories of Meaning"

There are two approaches to the study of meaning: an a priori approach, concerned with the "conceptual" conditions for the possibility of meaning (exemplified by Frege and the early Wittgenstein), and an empirical, naturalistic, approach, which dominates contemporary discussions of meaning. The naturalistic approach, while suitable for certain kinds of limited clarifications, when applied to fundamental questions about the nature of language and meaning, produces confusions. The basic mistake of the empirical approach is to assume that expressions of ordinary language have sense independently of the practices in which they are used. And the practices in which expressions are used are fundamental; they can't be explained in more basic terms. Any attempted explanation will presuppose what it tries to explain.