SOURCE:

Faculty: Arts
Department: Philosophy

CONTRIBUTORS:

Onyenekwe, C. C.
Umeogu, B.

ABSTRACT:

This research is a philosophical appraisal of Gadamer’s hermeneutics. The background to the research is the age-long epistemological question, ‘how can man know?’ It is a contribution to epistemology as a branch of philosophy. The research is informed by the following questions: can man have a sourceless knowledge? To what extent can understanding in the human/social sciences be devoid of historical and cultural realities? And to what extent can Gadamer’s hermeneutics transform the knowing subject for a better co-existence in the world? The research work examines Gadamer’s dialogical-dialectic process of understanding as a bridge to subject/object dichotomy thinking and knowing and as a solution to the societal effects of subject/object dichotomy. Adopting the philosophical method of analysis, the study analyses Gadamer’s hermeneutics into smaller units in order to comprehend his points of view. The method equally enabled a critical quest into his views which led the researcher to the following findings: that Gadamer’s hermeneutics is transformative in its nature and inherent in it are the values of dialogical dialectics that leads to openness to one another, mutuality, respect and reciprocity for others. Other interesting findings made by this research are the implications of understanding as application to both man and his society and the reinvention of prejudice. Prejudice, according to Gadamer, acts as the initiator of the dialogical dialectics that allows both the subject and the object to be questioned by each other leading to a fusion of horizons where new ideas are given birth to. Gadamer’s discussion of understanding as application clearly affirms his position that hermeneutics is a practical philosophy. The work therefore concludes that adopting Gadamer’s hermeneutics as a mode of inquiry or understanding of realities in the human sciences will transform man who is the knowing subject by giving him a sense of holding himself open to the conversation thereby realizing the fact that he is not always right, and that there are possibilities that his partner may be right even when he is the superior.