On interpretation

meaning and inference in law, psychoanalysis, and literature

Edición de la obra On interpretation

In this study Patrick Colm Hogan challenges a number of entrenched assumptions about being and knowing that have long kept theorists debating at cross purposes. He first sets forth a theory of meaning and interpretation and then develops it in the context of the practices and goals of law, psychoanalysis, and literary criticism. Hogan argues that the basis of interpretive method is ordinary inferential reasoning - that there is no general methodological difference between interpretation in the humanities and theory construction in the physical sciences. Further, the nature of interpretation does not entail cultural, historical, or other forms of relativism, as is commonly thought. However, this does not imply that there is only one way of approaching interpretation or that there is one true meaning of any particular work. Rather, there are many kinds of interpretation and many kinds of meaning and the interpreter is free to stipulate one of these in the context of a particular enquiry. More exactly, discussing the constraints upon stipulation, Hogan says that, although there are a large number and variety of intents (those of authors and readers, conscious and unconscious), there are no nonintentional meanings - Platonic, social, essential, or otherwise. Any particular discipline of interpretation can usefully concern itself only with varieties of intent, the relative importance of each variety, and the methods appropriate for inference to specific varieties in specific cases. To illustrate the range of applications for his theory, Hogan considers legal decisions in the United States, distinguishing a range of meanings far broader than that explicitly recognized by legal theorists. Next, he draws on the philosophy of action, cognitive science, and recent psychoanalytic theory to extend his general interpretive principles to psychoanalysis. He illustrates his conclusions with an interpretation of Freud's "Rat Man." Finally, Hogan takes up the cognitive literary principles of Sanskrit theorists to isolate and define a complex variety of meaning specific to literature. He illustrates the relevant interpretive procedures through an analysis of King John and King Lear.