La notoriété dont jouit l’apport de Gadamer à la tradition de l’herméneutique philosophique tend à éclipser la finesse et la complexité de ses réflexions dans le domaine de la philosophie pratique. Or, Gadamer souligne lui-même que, dès le début de sa carrière, sa principale préoccupation a été celle de comprendre à partir des Grecs ce que sont la praxis et la philosophie pratique qui l’étudie. C’est cette préoccupation qui l’a conduit à développer par la suite ses réflexions sur l’herméneutique – discipline qu’il comprend comme une philosophie pratique. Dans ses écrits éthico-politiques, Gadamer porte une attention particulière à la philosophie grecque, pour laquelle son intérêt est si puissant que, dès ses premiers écrits, il aspirait à en revitaliser certains éléments liés à l’exercice de la dialectique et représentés par le mode de vie dialogique de Socrate. La philía est l’un de ces concepts grecs que Gadamer vise à ranimer dans les esprits contemporains puisque, selon lui, la philía révèle des vérités sur l’existence humaine que les conceptions subjectivistes dominantes dans la modernité ne réussissent pas à expliquer. Contrairement à l’idée selon laquelle l’être humain serait fondamentalement un être individuel et seulement de manière secondaire un être social, l’appropriation gadamérienne de la philía met en évidence la nature sociale de l’être humain, c’est-à-dire son appartenance essentielle à la sphère sociale – dont les dimensions les plus fondamentales sont celles de la solidarité et l’amitié, selon Gadamer. Ce mémoire vise à montrer comment, en associant la notion grecque de philía aux phénomènes de l’amitié et de la solidarité, Gadamer comprend ces dernières comme reposant essentiellement sur le dialogue et la coexistence entre les êtres humains (par lesquels il leur est possible d’identifier le bien commun). Selon Gadamer, autant l’amitié que la solidarité consistent en l’orientation de l’agir de l’individu vers le bien des communautés auxquelles il appartient en vertu d’une reconnaissance du lien d’interdépendance qui l’unit à celles-ci. Dans la sphère de l’amitié, l’essence sociale des êtres humains se manifeste dans le partage de la tâche d’auto- connaissance qui est la leur : le dialogue et la coexistence des amis leur permettent de mieux se connaître qu’ils ne le feraient individuellement. Dans la sphère de la solidarité, l’essence sociale des êtres humains se manifeste dans le partage des tâches – comme la communication et la division du travail – qui rendent possible l’existence même de l’humanité. / The reputation of Gadamer’s contributions to the tradition of philosophical hermeneutics tends to eclipse the finesse and complexity of his reflections on practical philosophy. Gadamer himself states that, since the beginning of his career, his main concern has been understanding praxis and the practical philosophy that studies it. Gadamer’s ethical-political writings are heavily focused on Greek philosophy, his lifelong interest in which is evidenced in his attempts to revitalise certain elements related to the exercise of dialectics as represented by the dialogical life led by Socrates. The Greek notion of philía is one such concept that Gadamer aimed to revive in the minds of his contemporaries; he understood philia as revealing certain truths about human existence that the subjectivist conceptions dominating modern thought fail to grasp and explain. Unlike the idea that humans are fundamentally individual beings and only secondarily social, Gadamer’s appropriation of philia accentuates the social nature of human beings – that is, their essential belonging to the social sphere – whose most fundamental dimensions are those of solidarity and friendship. This thesis aims to highlight the ways in which Gadamer’s association of the Greek notion philia to the phenomena of friendship and solidarity leads him to characterise these phenomena as fundamentally relying on the dialogue and coexistence between human beings (through which they are capable of identifying the common good). Gadamer maintains that both friendship and solidarity entail individuals orienting their actions toward the well-being of the communities to which they belong in accordance with their recognition of the interdependence that unites them. In Gadamer’s conception of philia as friendship, the social nature of human beings manifests in the way they share the task of self-knowledge (a task obligatory to every human being): the dialogue and coexistence between friends is what allows humans to understand themselves better than they would individually. In Gadamer’s conception of philia as solidarity, the social essence of human beings manifests in the shared tasks that make the very existence of humanity possible – such as the task of communication and the division of labour.

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La distance historique qui nous sépare de la publication de Vérité et méthode permet une meilleure intelligence de l’aspect universel de l’herméneutique de Hans-Georg Gadamer qui a suscité tant de débats immédiatement après la parution de son ouvrage. L’herméneute a en effet pu, dans plusieurs textes qu’il a écrits au cours des dernières décennies, préciser sa conception et mieux attester cette universalité, notamment en l’associant à l’universalité de la rhétorique elle-même. Un nouveau regard porté sur les divers débats suscités par cette prétention de l’universalité de l’herméneutique permet aussi de s’en faire une idée plus claire et limpide. Le présent mémoire se penche sur le sens à donner à l’universalité de l’herméneutique en tenant compte des sections décisives de Vérité et méthode qui y sont consacrées, des écrits plus tardifs de Gadamer sur la question et de la littérature secondaire afin de voir si cette prétention à l’universalité peut être défendue face aux critiques formulées par Jürgen Habermas. Nous soutiendrons dans ce mémoire que c’est le cas, mais aussi que la critique de Habermas a aidé Gadamer à mieux formuler et faire comprendre l’universalité de l’herméneutique. C’est précisément en tenant compte de l’apport de ceux qui pensent autrement que s’atteste l’universalité de l’herméneutique. / The historical distance that separates us from the publication of Truth and Method allows a better understanding of the universal aspect of hermeneutics defended by Hans-Georg Gadamer and which sparked so much debate immediately after the publication of his book. The hermeneut has indeed had the opportunity, in several texts he has written over the past decades, to specify his conception and better establish this universality, particularly by associating it with the universality of rhetoric itself. A survey of the various debates surrounding this universality claim of hermeneutics also helps to get a better picture of what is at stake. This essay looks at the meaning of universality of hermeneutics by considering the decisive sections of Truth and Method devoted to it, the later writings of Gadamer on the issue and the secondary literature to see if this claim to universality can be upheld against the criticism raised by Jürgen Habermas. We will argue in this paper that this is the case, but also that Habermas's criticism has helped Gadamer to better formulate and defend the universality of hermeneutics. It is precisely by taking into account the contribution of those who think differently that this universality of hermeneutics is demonstrated.

Within the environmental aesthetics literature, there is a noticeable schism between two general approaches to understanding the aesthetic value of nature: the ambient approach and the narrative approach. Ambient thinkers focus on the character of aesthetic appreciation of nature, the way in which one is embedded in multi-sensory environment. These ambient theorists emphasize the importance of those aesthetic experiences that are difficult to articulate. Narrative thinkers argue that aesthetic appreciation of nature is enhanced and enriched by narratives that are relevant to the natural object or environment encountered. Certain narratives – usually those based on scientific knowledge – encourage a depth of appreciation that is inaccessible to those unfamiliar with the narratives. In this dissertation, I attempt to articulate an account of environmental aesthetic experience that does justice to both of these approaches by drawing on the resources of philosophical hermeneutics, and especially on the aesthetic theory of Hans-Georg Gadamer. The most important aspects of Gadamer's work for environmental aesthetics are his phenomenology of play, his revival of practical philosophy, and his emphasis on the interpretive character of all understanding. His discussion of play fleshes out the core of ambient accounts, his focus on interpretation explains the insights of narrative accounts, and the two accounts are tied together by his attention to practice.

Thesis advisor: Richard Kearney / By the 20th century the Confessions had become a “classic” of western civilization, yet it seems to elude any easy explanation and categorization. While scholars of Late Antiquity puzzled over the nature, structure, and meaning of the work, a parallel reception was occurring by some of the most original thinkers across both traditions of Contemporary philosophy, including Ludwig Wittgenstein, Martin Heidegger, Hannah Arendt, Hans Jonas, Karl Jaspers, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Paul Ricoeur, Jean-Francois Lyotard, Jacques Derrida, Jean-Luc Marion, Jean Louis Chrétien and Stanley Cavell. This study will focus on four of these thinkers, Wittgenstein, Gadamer, Ricoeur and Marion, and the ways that the Confessions has influenced their attempts to address fundamental questions on subjects ranging from time and memory to history and hermeneutics, evil and the will, the self and personal identity, language and narrative, conversion, skepticism and materialism, God and onto- theology, and ultimately the very practice of philosophy itself, its autobiographical and especially its confessional character. In turn, this study also asks whether the engagements of these highly original contemporary philosophers can uncover new dimensions of this highly original work that has been read and interpreted throughout a centuries-long history of reception. The hermeneutic wager is that the past illumines the present philosophical terrain, but also that present insights allow us to read a classic text of the past with new understanding. This study will benefit from the interconnected nature of the problems that these writers confront, in their “family resemblance” of shared affinities and marked differences. Chapter One, “Scholarly Engagements: A Problematic Classic,” introduces some of the key interpretive problems which arose in the course of a century of scholarly engagements, including occasion, veracity, composition, and sources of Saint Augustine’s Confessions. Chapter Two “The Early Wittgenstein: Tractatus, Testimony and Confession” discusses the confessional philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, and the deep affinities he shared with Saint Augustine in his life and his first major work, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922), despite its reception and use as a foundational for Logical Empiricism and its spirited offspring. Chapter Three: “The Later Wittgenstein: Philosophical Investigations as Philosophical Confession” discusses the influence of Saint Augustine on Wittgenstein’s second major work, the Philosophical Investigations (1953), which uses a quotation from the Confessions as a point of departure for his own philosophical confession of errors and temptations. Chapter Four “Saint Augustine and Gadamer: Hermeneutic Anticipations and Affinities” discusses the hermeneutical insights of Saint Augustine, through the ways he encountered or struggled with texts in the Confessions, as well as through his idea of the “inner word” which would be for Gadamer the foundation of a philosophical hermeneutics. Chapter Five, “Ricoeur: Sin, Time, Memory, and Narrative” discusses Ricoeur’s engagement with Saint Augustine on the question of evil as well as his appropriation of the Augustinian aporia of time from the Confessions as pivotal for his narrative turn. Chapter Six, “Jean-Luc Marion’s Confessions” lays out Marion’s phenomenological unfolding of the Confessions beyond and before metaphysics, offering his reading of six dimensions of the inaccessibility of the self explored by Saint Augustine in the Confessions. This study will conclude by highlighting the themes that have suggested themselves across the many readings of this classic text. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2019. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Philosophy.

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Humanities, Department of Dramatic Art, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in partial fulfilment for the requirements of a Masters degree, March 2015 / This research report examines the state of play in contemporary South Africa utilising Gadamer's concepts of the 'seriousness of play' and the 'relation between play, art and truth'. My investigation argues a more robust approach to Gadamer's thinking; that the investigation of play as it occurs within a particular historical moment in a specific social setting requires a more politicized understanding of the phenomena. [Abbreviated Abstract. Open document to view full version] / CK2018

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-14T13:55:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 421542.pdf: 290957 bytes, checksum: 53b291745eb75c59b7f76ef0740227ba (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-01-12 / Esta disserta??o tem o objetivo de recriar o conceito de compreens?o (Verstehen) na obra Verdade e M?todo de Hans-Georg Gadamer. Para ele, a compreens?o consiste num atributo da experi?ncia de mundo do ser humano. A tese ? desenvolvida a partir de dois pressupostos: (i) o conceito de Lebenswelt de Husserl, o qual ? condi??o de possibilidade de conhecimento: antes de ser sujeito cognoscente j? se ? objeto no mundo; (ii) a contribui??o de Heidegger, na defini??o de fenomenologia como hermen?utica atrav?s da retomada do sentido do ser no Dasein, que ? conhecida sob o nome de hermen?utica da facticidade. Primeiramente, tratase do modo de ser da obra de arte como par?metro a fim de se investigar o fen?meno da compreens?o. Assim como a experi?ncia da obra de arte, o conceito de jogo possui um fim em si mesmo, que se configura enquanto o espectador (o jogador) envolve-se no espet?culo (no jogo). Posteriormente, trata-se de pensar o princ?pio da historicidade da compreens?o, o qual inclui a substancialidade da historicidade do int?rprete e a consci?ncia do valor da tradi??o no ato de compreender textos. Aqui, a reabilita??o do preconceito como condi??o de possibilidade do int?rprete torna-se chave. Quando se diz da experi?ncia hermen?utica querse referir ? experi?ncia da finitude humana que nunca ? repetida, e est? em constante processo de aprendizado. Por fim, trata-se do car?ter da linguagem da compreens?o como meio privilegiado da experi?ncia hermen?utica. Especificamente, ? na linguagem - como di?logo - que se mostra o car?ter especulativo, no qual o sentido da coisa em quest?o mostra-se tal e qual ela ?. Nela ? que a compreens?o encontra sua objetividade e, por isso, d? ? compreens?o o car?ter de universalidade. Portanto, a finitude, a historicidade humana e o modo de ser linguagem s?o pressupostos da compreens?o, os quais atuam no acontecer da compreens?o e lhe d?o o car?ter de legitimidade ainda que n?o sejam demonstr?veis.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-14T13:55:14Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 440820.pdf: 1324084 bytes, checksum: 987a272d6829d85aa92b5f155bf3ad38 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-06-19 / This doctoral dissertation deals with the contribution of Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics to contemporary, ongoing debates on multiculturalism and the dialogue of cultures. Although Gadamer has not developed a political philosophy, he is often regarded as an author who contributed significantly to constructing an alternative account to multiculturalism or the dialogue of cultures. The question that guides the current research is as follows: Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics, as a finite reflection is emancipated only in the encounter with the Other and to the extent that it holds that the deepening of self-understanding (Selbstverst?ndnis) is attached to the understanding of other world views and life forms, can it be presented as a rational alternative to multiculturalism and the dialogue of cultures? The thesis presented here shows precisely that possibility. To the extent that he does not accept a relativistic idea of absolute incommensurability or incommunicability of the diverse world views and ways of life, and insofar as he defends a critical dialogue based on the art of asking questions and being open, Gadamer proposes a rationality that carries nearly universal standards for a dialogue of cultures or multiculturalism. / A presente tese trata da contribui??o da hermen?utica filos?fica de Gadamer ao debate contempor?neo sobre multiculturalismo e di?logo de culturas. Embora Gadamer n?o tenha desenvolvido uma filosofia pol?tica, em diversos momentos ? lembrado como um autor que contribuiu significativamente na constru??o de uma alternativa ao multiculturalismo ou mesmo ao di?logo de culturas. A quest?o que orienta a presente investiga??o ? a seguinte: a hermen?utica filos?fica de Gadamer, enquanto uma reflex?o finita que se emancipa somente no encontro com o outro na medida em que entende que o aprofundamento da autocompreens?o (Selbstverst?ndnis) est? unido ao entendimento de outras vis?es de mundo e formas de vida, pode ser apresentada como uma racionalidade alternativa ao multiculturalismo ou di?logo de culturas? A tese ora apresentada evidencia tal possibilidade. Na medida em que n?o aceita uma ideia relativista de absoluta incomensurabilidade ou incomunicabilidade das diversas vis?es de mundo e formas de vida e, ao defender um di?logo cr?tico baseado na arte de perguntar e estar aberto a perguntas, Gadamer prop?e uma racionalidade que carrega padr?es quase universais para um di?logo de culturas ou multiculturalismo.

A Tese Linguagem, Arte e Educação Ético-Estética em Perspectiva Hermenêutica Filosófica trata da plausibilidade de um ensino (educação) que considera os fundamentos de uma hermenêutica filosófica e do que se expressa na reflexão acerca da especificidade da arte como dimensões próprias do aprender. Argumento, por isso, que é interpretando algum componente simbólico da tradição em perspectiva própria, traduzindo-o em um dizer, ou seja, alçando-o ao âmbito da linguagem posta no horizonte cocriativo de cada um, que se configura a aprendizagem. Reivindico, portanto, uma abordagem hermenêutica não somente para o ensino da arte, mas, inclusive, para as demais áreas do saber que também precisam contemplar no seu ensino esse modo humano de apreender, justificando que todo aprendizado, seja ao modo de visões, comportamentos, inclusive o que poderíamos chamar de habilidades, somente se efetiva, tornando-se uma realidade para o sujeito, quando se constitui em formas simbólicas, em regra, em expressões linguísticas. Para tanto, recorro a Heidegger e Gadamer para tematizar a linguagem como uma dimensão constituinte do humano evidenciando que por ela temos um mundo. Destaco, porém, o pensamento de Gadamer, afirmando que o homem interpreta a si e aos outros em um horizonte histórico, em que a tradição se constitui em herança pela qual sabemo-nos parte de um todo, sendo ela um patrimônio do mundo humano. Também, que a linguagem é o modo pelo qual o homem compreende e compreende-se em um jogo dialógico intersubjetivo, em que se expressa a relação essencial entre pensamento e linguagem, interpretação e compreensão. Essa noção nos leva à arte e sua possibilidade inesgotável de nos colocar diante de verdades, pois, como algo irredutível ao cotidiano, nós a interpretamos a cada vez que a trouxermos em nosso horizonte interrogativo. Essa verdade que a arte nos permite conhecer se dá ao modo de sua própria especificidade poética, sendo ela um jogo de velamento e desvelamento do ser, que garante sempre novos sentidos, ficando, desse modo, impedida de tornar-se uma verdade absolutizada. A partir dessa ideia, apresento a arte como uma linguagem estética e proponho pensar a possibilidade de um ensino de arte que permita ao aluno viver a experiência da sua inesgotabilidade, posto que na relação com a arte ordenamos cada vez mais aquilo que nos compõe, o nosso mundo. Recorro, para tanto, à noção de educação ético-estética, apresentada por Nadja Hermann, por ver nela um horizonte de ampliação da abordagem da arte na educação e, por isso, uma possibilidade da sua ressignificação escolar, propondo que seu sentido esteja atravessado pela especificidade de ser uma linguagem ético-estética. Isso significa, por sua vez, que os conteúdos de seu ensino são de natureza ético-estética, pois a arte traz em seu próprio modo de ser a abertura ao outro. Desse modo, destaco a noção de experiência estética na qual Gadamer afirma ser ela a possibilidade de viver a experiência como experiência e, no caso do ensino da arte, seria um vivenciar as linguagens artísticas como um modo de acesso e compreensão das questões da arte e, ainda, de uma compreensão e autocompreensão das questões referidas à condição humana. Assim, pergunto pela legitimidade de uma educação que considere o diálogo como a oportunidade de o aluno emitir a sua palavra em vista de ressignificar o conhecimento e os conceitos, tornando-os próprios, tendo no professor um hermeneuta que comunica um patrimônio, transmitindo uma herança e, ao fazê-lo não somente permite aos alunos a noção de pertencimento a uma tradição, mas, ainda, as condições para aprender a aprender visando a uma formação para a singularidade. Por isso, a noção de que a arte sempre exigirá de nós que a trazemos em nosso próprio horizonte intersubjetivo, no qual os sentidos necessitam ser construídos, constitui uma tônica deste trabalho, posto que essa especificidade da arte leva-nos a pensar na própria dimensão do aprender. Nesse sentido, apresentamos as noções heideggerianas de uma educação que visa à autonomia por meio de um ensinar/aprender em que, juntos, alunos e professores se percebem parte de um fenômeno de educação, que, no meu entender, se coaduna com a visão gadameriana de que educar é se educar, pois, ambas, visam à força do humano na realização de sua própria autoeducação em um mundo historicamente constituído. / 198 f.