The Hermeneutics of Original Argument: Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric (Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy) - Hardcover

P. Christopher Smith (author)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0810116073 ISBN 13: 9780810116078

Publisher: Northwestern University Press, 1998

Synopsis

What, precisely, does the word hermeneutics mean? And in what sense can one speak of the hermeneutics of original argument? In The Hermeneutics of Original Argument, P. Christopher Smith explores these questions in building upon Heidegger's hermeneutical thought. In applying Heidegger's basic notion that hermeneutics is not a doctrine of interpretation but is its actual execution, Christopher Smith penetrates the abstractions that conceal original argument and explores the structure and nature of argument as it originally occurs.

About this title

Synopsis

What, precisely, does the word hermeneutics mean? And in what sense can one speak of the hermeneutics of original argument? In "The hermeneutics of Original Argument", P. Christopher Smith explores these questions in building upon Heidegger's hermeneutical thought. In applying Heidegger's basic notion that hermeneutics is not a doctrine of interpretation but is its actual execution, Smith explores the structure and nature of argument as it originally occurs. The task of the book is thus to get behind logical demonstration and dialectic, and, following Heidegger's hermeneutical strategy, to "lay bare" and "lay out" the origins of argument in rhetoric. In this way Smith seeks to overcome the contemporary preoccupation with visible writing and to recover our original, communal experience of hearing the spoken word.

About the Author

Smith is professor of philosophy at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell.

Edition details

• Publisher: Northwestern University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0810116073
• ISBN 13: 9780810116078
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 211