Language Beyond Postmodernism: Saying and Thinking in Gendlin Philosophy

388 Pages·1997·34.98 MB·

by  David Levin

Northwestern University
Studies in Phenomenology
and
Existential Philosophy
Founding Editor James M. Edie
General Editors John McCumber
David Michael Levin
Consulting Editors
Robert Bernasconi J. N. Mohanty
Judith P. Butler fMaurice Natanson
David Carr Graeme Nicholson
Edward S. Casey Frederick Olafson
Stanley Cavell Paul Ricoeur
Roderick M. Chisholm Tom Rockmore
Hubert L. Dreyfus George Schrader
Lester Embree Calvin O. Schräg
Dagfinn F0llesdal Thomas Sheehan
Véronique Fôti Hugh J. Silverman
Irene Harvey Robert Sokolowski
Dieter Henrich IHerbert Spiegelberg
Don Ihde Charles Taylor
tEmmanuel Levinas Bruce W. Wilshire
Alphonso Lingis David Wood
William McBride

L A N G U A GE
BEYO N D
P O S T M O D E R N I SM
Saying and Thinking in
Gendlin's Philosophy
Edited by David Michael Levin
Northwestern University Press
Evanston, Illinois
Northwestern University Press
Evanston, Illinois 60208-4210
Copyright © 1997 by Northwestern University Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN cloth 0-8101-1358-9
paper 0-8101-1359-7
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Language beyond postmodernism : saying and thinking in Gendlin's
philosophy / edited by David Michael Levin.
p. cm. — (Northwestern University studies in phenomenology
and existential philosophy)
"A collection of critical studies . . . Following each of the
studies, there is a reply by Gendlin"—Introd.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8101-1358-9 (alk. paper).—ISBN 0-8101-1359-7 (pbk. :
alk. paper)
1. Gendlin, Eugene T., 1926- —Contributions in philosophy of
language. 2. Language and languages—Philosophy. I. Gendlin,
Eugene T., 1926- . IL Levin, David Michael, 1939- .
III. Series: Northwestern University studies in phenomenology 8c
existential philosophy.
P85.G455L36 1997
149'.94—dc21 97-19492
CIP
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI 739.48-1984.
We must distinguish between the existing system of language forms, on
the one hand, and the power of language, on the other. . . . Language
escapes the old forms of language, although the forms are never absent.
If we dwell in anything explicitly formed, we attend to more than that form.
This "more" is what fresh thought-steps can "follow" from. We can call it
"implicit" only if we allow that word to "open" to this kind of "following."
A fresh step of thought must "follow"; we must be able to come with the
old word-uses and follow the new one. This word brings the old logical
type of following, which meant: What follows was already implicit in the
logical form that preceded. Now we "open" this so that the old "following"
enables the new one to follow. What now follows "was" already there . . .
but not as a logical form.
If we dwell, we dwell with how anything is both already formed, shaped,
cut, present, represcntable, and yet also implicit and being-for further
moves. What is implied-from-the-form can be gotten directly, but any-
thing is also "implicit," which means, if we dwell, that it is for poetizing.
"Implicit" does not convert into explicit, ever, as if it were merely a form
we did not notice.
Eugene T. Gendlin, "Dwelling"

Contents
Introduction: David Michael Levin 1
1 Eugene Gendlin 3
How Philosophy Cannot Appeal to Experience, and How It Can
2 David Michael Levin 42
Gendlin's Use of Language: Historical Connections, Contemporary
Implications
3 David Kolb 65
Filling in the Blanks
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
4 William James Earle 84
Tacit Knowledge and Implicit Intricacy
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
5 Hans Julius Schneider 97
The Situatedness of Thinking, Knowing, and Speaking: Wittgenstein
and Gendlin
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
6 Meredith Williams 120
The Implicit Intricacy of Mind and Situation
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
7 Mark Johnson 148
Embodied Meaning and Cognitive Science
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
8 J. N. Mohanty 176
Experience and Meaning
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
9 Robert C. Scharff 190
After Dilthey and Heidegger: Gendlin's Experiential Hermeneutics
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
CONTENTS
10 Lawrence J. Hatab 234
Language and Human Nature
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
11 Kenneth Liberman 252
Meaning Reflexivity: Gendlin's Contribution to Ethnomethodology
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
12 Jerald Wallulis 270
Carrying Forward: Gadamer and Gendlin on History, Language, and
the Body
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
13 Graeme Nicholson 288
Intricacy: A Metaphysical Idea
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
14 Véronique M. Fôti 305
Alterity and the Dynamics of Metaphor
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
15 Joseph Margolis 321
Language as Lingual
Eugene Gendlin: A Reply
Works Cited 339
Notes 343
Contributors 375