No abstract available. / Thesis (M.Th.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2010.

Ce mémoire est consacré au problème de la place de l’herméneutique dans l’œuvre d’Emmanuel Levinas. Au premier abord, l’œuvre semble présenter une forte ambivalence quant à la valeur que le philosophe accorde aux catégories herméneutiques. D’abord, dans les œuvres proprement philosophiques, Levinas présente une critique sévère de la compréhension dans laquelle il décèle un geste de totalisation et d’appropriation du sens contre lequel il élèvera une pensée de l’éthique comme « philosophie première ». D’autre part, un autre pan du corpus levinassien, celui des Lectures talmudiques, est consacré au déploiement d’une herméneutique des textes religieux de la tradition juive où Levinas fait puissamment intervenir les catégories éthiques propres à sa philosophie au sein de son activité exégétique. L’un des paradoxes intéressants que nous présente donc l’œuvre levinassienne est celui d’une philosophie s’érigeant en bonne partie sur une critique de la catégorie centrale de l’herméneutique, la compréhension, et qui ne se décline pas moins elle-même en une théorie de l’interprétation des textes. Afin de résoudre ce paradoxe, il nous faut d’abord exposer la critique de la compréhension qui est consubstantielle au projet philosophique de Levinas. En nous appuyant sur quelques textes centraux de son œuvre, nous expliciterons à la fois le déficit éthique de la compréhension que pointe Levinas et les possibilités de sens au nom desquelles cette critique s’accomplit. Nous verrons ainsi ce qui conduit Levinas à suggérer qu’autrui, en son visage, témoigne d’un sens qui ferait exception à la structure gnoséologique du sensé que suppose l’herméneutique. Dans un deuxième temps, nous tenterons de cerner les raisons qui peuvent légitiment conduire Levinas à faire usage, dans le contexte de son herméneutique talmudique, des « concepts » nés de sa critique de la compréhension. L’étude du rapport entre éthique et herméneutique, entre texte et visage, nous conduira à identifier le principe directeur de l’herméneutique levinassienne et à articuler la façon dont il se rattache à l’éthique du visage. Finalement, nous tenterons de faire valoir la pertinence philosophique de l’herméneutique levinassienne en étudiant la manière dont elle peut rendre compte de phénomènes fondamentaux liés à l’interprétation des textes. / This thesis presents a study about the place of hermeneutics in the work of Emmanuel Levinas. At first glance, the writings of the philosopher seem quite ambiguous concerning the value that ought to be given to hermeneutics. In his strictly philosophical works, Levinas presents a severe critique of understanding (compréhension) which he views as a totalising approach of meaning. Against the reduction of meaning to understanding, Levinas will defend the idea that the structure of meaning is primary ethical, the relationship to the other being the privileged site where the world, the self as well as the idea of God first become meaningful. Nonetheless, in the other part of the levinassian corpus, that of his Talmudic Readings, Levinas develops an hermeneutics of his own using the ethical categories of his major philosophical works and applying them to his exegetical activity. We are then faced with this paradox, inherent to the work of Levinas, of a philosophy which largely develops itself as a critique of the central category of hermeneutics (i.e. comprehension) but which can nonetheless also present itself as a theory of interpretation (i.e. hermeneutics) in a significant portion of Levinas’ writings. Resolving this apparent paradox will necessitate that we first present the philosophical project of Levinas and the critique of hermeneutics which is consubstantial to it. Using a few central texts of the philosopher’s work, we will try to point with precision at the ethical deficit which Levinas sees in hermeneutics and to identify the possibilities of meaning that, according to Levinas, are being left behind by the primacy conferred to comprehension. We will then see what leads Levinas to suggest that the face (visage) of the other bears a meaning that constitute an exception to the hermeneutical structure of meaning which philosophy, at least explicitly since Heidegger, supposes. In a second step, we will attempt to present the reasons that justify Levinas’ use, in his Talmudic Readings, of the ‘concepts’ born out of his critique of comprehension in order to better grasp the unity of his work. The study of the relationship between ethics and hermeneutics, between the text and the face, will lead us to identify the guiding principle of what might be called levinassian hermeneutics and to articulate how it relates to the ethics of the face. Finally, we will attempt to assert the relevance of the ‘‘philosophical hermeneutics’’ of Levinas by presenting how it can account for two fundamental phenomena related to interpretation, namely the mode through which the subject enters into relation with a text and the individuation of the subject taking part in this relation.

Triple Learning: The Journey from Student to Scholar emanates from a phenomenological exploration of the lived experiences of six international graduate students studying at the University of Saskatchewan. Grounded in the knowledge of the growing numbers of students studying at post-secondary institutions, I aimed to unearth and re-present the daily lives of the selected participants to shed light on the experience of being an international graduate student. A phenomenological inquiry through in-depth and semi-structured interviews and observations, undergirded by an interdisciplinary culture, allowed me to explore their daily experiences. Exploring and airing their daily practices, though difficult, illuminated the worlds of international graduate students as they study in and negotiate communities of practice overseas. Furthermore, by examining and ventilating their stories I was able to portray and clarify the essence or meaning of being an international graduate student at a Canadian university in a new way. This research reaches into the lives of the selected students uniquely, revealing their personal and academic experiences while studying at the university. To date, such experiences have been minimally addressed by university officials and prior qualitative research. The anecdotes and reflections shared by participants bordered on and were based in lingua-cultural, social, and academic adaptations, and, ultimately, transformation. Participants were enthralled by the adaptive process of living in a new community. Being newcomers, these students viewed themselves fundamentally as outsiders within the community of practice. Yet their stories encapsulated change from being dependent “scholars to be” to becoming independent scholars. Essentially, findings pointed to the international graduate experience being similar to advancing from student to scholar. Through participation in the academic community of practice, they were learning to become independent scholars in the university. Participant accomplished the non-linear movement from student to scholar by seeking to engage in the communities of practice through situated learning and a process of triple learning. Triple learning emerged as a lingua-cultural phenomenon and was a significant finding borne of participants’ storied experiences. Qualitative data revealed that, in learning, participants were constantly weaving around and through three distinct registers of English lingua-cultures. They were negotiating the English lingua-culture acquired in their home countries, which positioned English as a formal language; that of the provincial community, which seemingly was less formal; and the academic English language specific to their area of study in the university. The academic language includes a variety of discipline-specific language skills, such as vocabulary, syntax, and discipline-specific terminology, and rhetorical conventions that allow students to acquire and develop knowledge and academic skills. These lingua cultures differed significantly, so students constantly shifted among the three to make approximations deemed appropriate for their academic purposes. A significant implication of this research is that it highlights the daily experiences of international graduate students, their perceptions, and conceptualized meanings of these experiences. Findings from this study also have implications for social learning theories and places learning as lingua-cultural in nature. In addition, an understanding of the phenomenon of being an international student can inform universities’ policy makers, recruiters, faculty members, and other staff of the daily plights and experiences of international students as they study. This knowledge has the potential to inform policies and plans to attract and retain a diverse international student body.

The article is about the mythopoeic idea of unity and interrelation of the human being and the Cosmic life, and its interpretation given in the texts of W. Shakespeare’s works. The human being, as represented in W. Shakespeare’s works, can be considered on three levels: personal, social and cosmic. As a person, a Shakespearean character is defined not only by his / her mind only, but also by the body. In the plays we see individuals of different gender, age, health and appearance. All these characteristics are relevant to the behavior of the individual and the response they get. Shakespeare skillfully shows different affects, and some states that can be explained with the help of the modern notion of hormones. All this was quite revolutionary for his epoch. Thus a human being is described as a creature with the complex psycho physiological constitution. One of the most important words in this context is "heart" that unites both physical and spiritual spheres. It brings to memory Ukrainian tradition of Cordocentrism, especially in P. Yurkevich’s interpretation. The metaphor of "body" is sometimes used in the pays to describe a social unity. Shakespeare was not a revolutionary, or even a political radical. Sometimes he shows the common people as politically deluded and easily lead. But mostly the commoners are portrayed as persons possessing the common scene and the moral standards, that guarantee the return to norm after social and political upheavals. It is important to note, that Shakespeare shows the kings as persons with weaknesses and problems, who must work hard to keep themselves and their country in order. In many plays he makes his monarchs declare the principal equality of human beings, with all the social differences appearing as secondary and transitory characteristics. Moreover, the same can be said about all the differences, underneath which all the humans are basically the same creatures with the same wants. All of them can suffer and thus are worthy of sympathy. There are some hints that animals can also be seen in the same context. This thought foreshadows the contemporary notion of animal rights an human responsibility for the planet. On the Cosmic level, the human beings are shown as the integral parts of the greater whole. In many plays there are statements reflecting the medieval model of the Universe, which goes back to the mythopoeia. The basic concept is the interrelation between the state of a person, of social group and of the world. Both the nation and its ruler were hold responsible for the cosmic state of affairs. The violation of the "Truth of the King" may have lead to turning the country into the Wasteland. This important mythologeme underlies all the plot of "King Lear". Taking this into consideration helps us to understand many obscure points. One of them is the behavior of the protagonist, that was traditionally explained only as the complete unreason of a madman who in the times of crisis asks irrelevant questions. In truth, Lear asks about the cause of the apocalyptical storm, which, on his opinion, was the direct result of some great sin. It is very close to the Greek belief, reflected in Sophocles’ "Oedipus", where the plague was sent by gods to punish the ruler’s crime. This belief also explains why in all Shakespearean plays – again, most noticeably in "King Lear" – there is an obligatory explanation in the finale. All the characters must tell their story and their confessions should be taken as forming the part of one general story. Shakespeare shows that the truth must be known and upheld, whatever the cost. Only thus the normal personal, social and cosmic life can continue. It doesn’t mean that all the plays are what was in the Soviet tradition called the "optimistical tragedies". Sometimes the losses are too great and the future is dubious. But it is the revealing of the human and cosmic truth that makes any future possible. In "King Lear" we also see the non-Aristotelian formula of catharsis, that sums up all the meaning of the suffering and losses: a person must learn compassion to restore or compensate what was destroyed in the blind egotistical strife. All these deeper senses of the plays, revealed by means of applying the principles of culturological hermeneutics, reflect the vestiges of the ancient belief in the human responsibility for the general state of the world. Such ideas, discarded by the Modern European Rationalism, are re-actualized in our times of the global ecological crisis, that demands a new level of awareness and new struggle with the human selfishness on all the levels: personal, social and universal. Taking into consideration these hidden meaning allows us deeper understanding of the Shakespearean tragedy. It can have both theoretical and practical importance, the latter being connected with the outlook-forming role of art. In the post-soviet theatres there is a tendency to turn the tragedies into the absurdist plays. It is an easy way for a director. But now it is more important to show that something can be, and must be done.

This article sets out to explore the hermeneutical problems in the narrative therapeutic theory of Michael White by investigating his understanding of "story" within its interpretative context. In both White's interpretative approach and his “story" are inconsistencies rooted in a meta-theoretical tension based on his account of the autonomy of a person. This tension lies between the postulation of contingency and the pressure of stability. This is shown by testing the sustainability of White's therapeutic approach against the logical consistency of the underlying theoretical and philosophical foundation. The fundamental meta-theoretical tensions are brought to the fore by means of these contradictions. / Thesis (M.A. (Philosophy))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2005.

This thesis is an investigation of Heidegger’s phenomenological analysis of religion. The author argues that Heidegger’s thought opens the way for descriptive conceptual analysis of religious experience and its object without undue theoretical distortion or reduction. Heidegger dismantles uncritical distortions of religious life under “scientific” rationality and objectivity. While the self-understanding implicit in religious practice is certainly transformed through Heidegger’s own philosophical analysis, philosophy undergoes its own transformation through thinking encounter with religious life. Philosophy cannot produce an objectively neutral, universal analysis of religion, but must in its own way participate in the object of religious life. The wonder and awe at the manifestation of being which gives rise to philosophical questioning finds orientation in poetic and revelatory sources of inspiration whose content exceeds conceptual grasp. Philosophical questioning brings thought to the paradoxes at the limits of our understanding of language and human experience. Philosophy cannot conceive of the origin systematically. But religious attunement to the origin, aided by the prophetic utterances of the poet, then enables philosophical speculation as to the highest form of human flourishing. The author concludes by calling into question interpretations of Heidegger’s phenomenology of religion in the work of Jean-Luc Marion and John D. Caputo. These remains bound up in part with the philosophical project for transcendental analysis of universal religion. Drawing on the hermeneutic phenomenology of Hans-Georg Gadamer and the philosophical theology of John Milbank and William Desmond, the author sketches an alternative reading of Heidegger’s critique of the Western metaphysical tradition and philosophical retrieval of religion in light of the notion of incarnation, arguing that this alternative offers a better phenomenological account of religion as such.

No description available.

This thesis explores the notion that we may be able to more fully understand the etiology of serial murder. Specifically, it concludes that the behaviours of serial murderers can be allegorical of unresolved childhood trauma - that in the murderous actions of the adult there can be a depth of subconscious allegorical connection to the repressed (forgotten) and unresolved trauma of the murderer's own childhood. The focus for this hermeneutic inquiry is the intersection that can be constructed between the phenomenon of serial murder and the assertion of the psychoanalyst Alice Miller that every perpetrator of violence was once a child who was (himself or herself) a victim. Alice Miller's concept of Poisonous Pedagogy is explained and critiqued. Her belief that our childhoods tell the stories of our adult behaviours is questioned in light of the similar theoretical ground of Life History, Life Narrative, Psychobiography, and Psychoanalytic Narrative. Miller's contention that there are directly allegorical connections between childhood abuse and adult murderous behaviours is illustrated by her analysis of the life of Jurgen Bartsch. A hermeneutic examination of the biographic records of two other serial murderers (Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy) is then undertaken to question the available support for Miller's contentions It is concluded that there is strong support for Miller's assertions regarding the etiology of violence, and that violent adult behaviour, even serial murder, can be allegorical of unresolved childhood trauma. It is suggested that there is a need to extend this area of research through face-to-face engagement with perpetrators of violence. It is recommended that we directly engage serial murderers in personal discourses that will allow further exploration of Miller's notion that serial murderers' behaviours are allegorical echoes of harm that was done to them.

This thesis drew upon the resources of philosophical hermeneutics to construct a conceptual framework for understanding the process of educational change. The experience of a particular case of change was then analysed from the perspective of the hermeneutic change agency framework. The conceptual framework for the thesis was developed from the writings of Hans-Georg Gadamer and also from writers who engaged with Gadamer, most notably, Paul Ricoeur and Jurgen Habermas. The retrieval orientation in Gadamer's hermeneutics was balanced by the critical analyses of Ricoeur and Habermas. Gadamer's notion of the 'fusion of horizons' was presented as the culmination of the change process: a fusion between the horizon of the change text, and the horizons of the change process participants. The thesis explored the potential of hermeneutic strategies such as play and conversation as a means to animate a hermeneutic form of change agentry. The case investigated in this thesis was a change process comprised of four strategies conducted over the years 1980 to 1996 at a Jesuit school located on the east coast of Australia. The change strategies aimed to promote the Jesuit ethos of the school and hence have been described in this thesis as 'ethos strategies'. The purpose of the thesis was not to evaluate the success of the ethos strategies, it was to explore how insights derived from philosophical hermeneutics could illuminate an analysis of the lived experience of a particular case of change. The subject matter of this thesis is timely because many Catholic schools are currently in a period of transition from a leadership exercised by Religious (nuns, brothers or priests) to a leadership exercised by lay people. The thesis situated the ethos programs in their theological and demographic contexts by presenting relevant theological developments from the Second Vatican Council and by describing the sharp decrease in the numbers of Religious personnel available to work in the schools. The teacher response to the ethos programs was considered in the context of the many practical difficulties associated with the scheduling of teacher development programs in fast-moving and busy schools. Although this thesis was particularly focused on change strategies that were conducted in the context of Jesuit education, the thesis is more generally situated in the research literature on educational change. The hermeneutic orientation of this thesis highlighted the elements of understanding, interpretation and meaning, and these elements are given some prominence in the more recent research literature on the change process. The complexity of change and the cultural dimension of the change process has been emphasised in the most recent educational change research literature and these themes have also found expression in this thesis. Participant observation, document analysis and qualitative interviews were used as data collection strategies for the case study in this thesis. The researcher was actively involved in the events investigated in the case study, and a case narrative was developed from the researcher's experience as a change agent responsible for implementing one of the change strategies at the case site. The case narrative was written in the first person and from the perspective of the researcher as a change manager. The methodology of the research was grounded in the hermeneutic insight that understanding and tact lies at the heart of the research process, rather than procedure and method. Hermeneutic research relies upon a capacity to identify and respond to the question that is presented by the expression of life being understood. Change agentry was presented in this thesis as unfolding in a middle space between the familiarity of current practice and the unfamiliarity of the new world that a change process seeks to open up. Hermeneutics has long understood that that interpretation would be impossible if the expressions of life were totally alien and unnecessary if there was nothing alien in them. A hermeneutic approach to change agentry seeks to discover points of commonality and points of challenge between the world of current practice and the world that the change process would open up. This thesis points to the tactful and dialogical dimensions of change agency when it is considered from the vantage point of philosophical hermeneutics.

The increasing rates of intervention in childbirth are an issue for women, their families, health professionals, and society across much of the Western World. This study is a response to these increasing rates of intervention, as reflected in the research question: 'What is shaping the practice of health professionals and the understanding of the public in relation to increasing intervention in childbirth?' The participants in the study were nine health professionals: midwives and obstetricians, who were interviewed individually, and thirty-three members of the public who took part in six focus groups. The research was carried out under the umbrella of critical hermeneutics, and the particular approach used was that of critical interpretation as formulated by Hans Kogler. This approach enabled a hermeneutical thematic analysis of that which is shaped (worldviews) and a critical structural analysis (discursive orders, social practices, relationships of power and structures of domination) of the shaping and shapers of practice and understanding. The research process facilitated by critical interpretation in identifying and describing the shaping and shapers of practice and understanding adds an important dimension to the statistical picture of increasing intervention that is of concern, both to health professionals and the public. The research revealed that the everyday world and its associated processes of socialisation in the 21st century - in particular pain, choice, and technology - shape the practice of health professionals and the understanding of the public in relation to increasing intervention. The study's findings were supported by the revelation that many of the social and cultural values, such as convenience, ease, and control, that underpin Western society in the 21st century, correlate with what intervention has to offer, which results in intervention being increasingly sought after and utilised. This milieu of intervention, which increasingly surrounds childbirth, is shown to be calling into question those things that have traditionally been at the heart of childbirth: the ability of the woman to birth and the clinical skills of the health professional. This research provides insight and awareness of those things that are shaping understanding and practice and birth itself and creating a milieu in which intervention is increasingly normalised.