Hermeneutical Generosity and Social Criticism

In: Critical review: an interdisciplinary journal of politics and society, Band 9, Heft 4, S. 447-464

Abstract

A review essay on a book by Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard U Press, 1989 [see IRPS No. 50/89c01206; also see listing in IRPS No. 88]). According to one model of social theory, the social theorist seeks to give as rich an account as possible of a society's own self-understanding or self-interpretation. The second model, by contrast, involves challenging the society's self-understanding on the basis of a radical vision of ultimate standards of judgment. Taylor claims that neither of these models should be privileged over the other; both are equiprimordial ways of theorizing social life. However, Taylor does privilege the first model in his own practice of social theory -- which can be summed up in the phrase, "the rhetoric of understanding.". 21 References. Adapted from the source document.