Hermeneutics?

This man embodies what he interprets

What exactly is Hermeneutics? It sounds like some kind of weird exercise program when you hear it. What is it exactly though? Who invented it? Well if you do a little research you're able to see that it is very important to our society and helps us better understand ourselves.

So first we must figure out what hermeneutics is. A very basic definition states that hermeneutics is the study of signs. But what does that mean? Well a more formal definition states that hermeneutics is the study of the methodological principles of interpretation. Now let's break that down and see what it means. before understanding what exactly this area of study is let's figure out what a sign is first. A sign is anything that stands for something greater than itself. Now we can move on with our analysis.

So who exactly cam up with the idea to study something that doesn't even represent itself? Well the answer to this question is not very easy to answer. Throughout the ages there have been many different philosophers that have tackled the issue including Plato, Habermas and even Sigmund Freud. So to study the people who addressed the issue doesn't really give us that much of an insight into what hermeneutics is. So we'll have to take a different approach.

How does one study signs? Well a sign is anything that points to something greater than itself so in order to study the sign you have to take several things into mind. First, what is the object? Signs can come in many different forms from a word, an object, or even a piece of music. The second thing to look at is, who is observing the sign? Depending on who is observing this sign will depend on the meaning they get out of it. Thirdly, we should look at who gave the sign that specific meaning. When we figure out who gave the sign the meaning we're able to better understand it.

Now lets take a look at Hermeneutics as a whole. What's the point? Well as a society, everything you look at is pretty much a sign. So the point is to better understand the world because our world is full of signs. So how do we study a world full of signs? Well we have to assign those signs to categories and break them down. Unfortunately, there are many different categories so I will only address a couple of them. The categories I will attempt to cover are Normative, Scientific, Philosophical, Depth, and Natural.

Normative Hermeneutics-interpretation of text

In order to address these categories properly would take hours so I will simply give a brief definition of each. Normative is the art of of text interpretation as a deliberate discipline by a specialist caste. For example priests, judges, and lawyers each study specific texts and their meanings in order to interpret them for the benefit of others. Scientific hermeneutics is the foundational discipline of the human or historical sciences. Basically I see this as meaning to interpret what we have done as a society or to figure out where we came from as human beings. Philosophical is just a general philosophy of existence. In other words the age old question "Why are we here?" Depth hermeneutics is also known as the hermeneutics of suspicion. This area attempts to free our minds from the social dogmas and oppression society places upon us to conform to their ideologies. And finally Natural hermeneutics which is just the interpreting we do on an everyday basis without really thinking about it. See my blog on Media Literacy for more insight into this area.

So that's Hermeneutics in a nutshell. It's a very interesting field of study because it helps to understand what makes us human. As intellectual individuals, it also helps us to better understand the society that we live in. We should all take an interest in hermeneutics because without it, we are nothing but what the society and signs dictate we become.

Without hermeneutics, there is no "unique" only the illusion of free will.