Philosophy Dictionary of ArgumentsHome
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| Interpretation: A) Making statements about other statements, whereby new vocabulary may be introduced. If no new vocabulary is introduced, new information can be obtained by changing the syntactic grouping. B) In logic, interpretation is the insertion of values (objects) instead of the constants or free variables. _____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
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Hans-Georg Gadamer on Interpretation - Dictionary of Arguments
I 196 Interpretation/Gadamer: Schleiermacher sees the act of understanding as the reconstructive execution of a production. Such an act has to make aware some things that can remain unconscious to the author. It is obviously the aesthetics of genius that Schleiermacher transfers to his general hermeneutics with this formula. The creative method of the genius artist is the model case on which the theory of unconscious production and the necessary consciousness in reproduction is based(1). It also follows - something that hermeneutics should never forget - that the artist who creates an artwork is not the appointed interpreter of it. As an interpreter, he or she has no fundamental authority over the merely receiving. He or she is, insofar as the person reflects, his or her own reader. The opinion he or she has as a reflective person is not decisive. The yardstick of interpretation is solely what the meaning of his creation is, what it "means"(2). >Meaning, >Interpretation, >Hermeneutics, >Understanding. Thus, the doctrine of ingenious production here accomplishes an important theoretical achievement, by making the difference between I 197 interpreter and creator. It legitimizes the equation of both, as long as it is not the reflective self-interpretation, but the unconscious opinion of the author that is to be understood. Schleiermacher does not want to say anything else with his paradoxical formula (it is necessary to understand a writer better than he or she has understood him- or herself). >Hermeneutics/Schleiermacher, >Understanding/Schleiermacher. I 401 Interpretation/Gadamer: A correct interpretation "in itself" would be a thoughtless ideal that misjudged the nature of the tradition. Every interpretation must fit into the hermeneutical situation to which it belongs. Situational dependence in no way means that the claim to correctness, which every interpretation must make, dissolves into the subjective or occidental. For us, interpretation is not a pedagogical behaviour, but rather the consummation of understanding itself, which is not only completed for the others for whom one interprets something, but also for the interpreter him- or herself in the explicitness of linguistic interpretation. 1. H. Patsch has meanwhile clarified the early history of Romantic hermeneutics in more detail: Friedrich Schlegel's "Philosophie der Philologie" and Schleiermacher's early drafts on hermeneutics (Ztschr. f. Theologie und Kirche 1966, pp. 434-472). 2. The modern fashion of using the self-interpretation of a writer as a canon of interpretation is the consequence of a false psychologism. On the other hand, "theory", e.g. of music or poetics and oratory, can very well be a legitimate canon of interpretation. Cf. my recent work "Zwischen Phänomeektik - Versuch einer Selbstkritik" in Vol. 2 of the Ges. Werke, p. 3ff._____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Gadamer I Hans-Georg Gadamer Wahrheit und Methode. Grundzüge einer philosophischen Hermeneutik 7. durchgesehene Auflage Tübingen 1960/2010 Gadamer II H. G. Gadamer The Relevance of the Beautiful, London 1986 German Edition: Die Aktualität des Schönen: Kunst als Spiel, Symbol und Fest Stuttgart 1977 |
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> Counter arguments against Gadamer
> Counter arguments in relation to Interpretation
Ed. Martin Schulz, access date 2024-04-18