NIETZSCHE AND THE QUESTION OF INTERPRETATION: HERMENEUTICS, DECONSTRUCTION, PLURALISM

ALAN DOUGLAS SCHRIFT, Purdue University

Abstract

In emphasizing the interpretive nature of perception and knowledge, proponents of a hermeneutic approach are faced with a basic difficulty: how to avoid the dogmatic positing of a single correct interpretation without lapsing into an unmitigated relativism which, rejecting "correctness" as the interpretive telos, is unable to adjudicate between competing interpretations. The premise of this study is that this dilemma has animated the various controversies within the hermeneutic tradition and the aim of this study is to show that a pluralistic approach generated from Nietzsche's text suggests a way to avoid the noxious consequences of this hermeneutic dilemma. In part one, I examine the two leading interpretive methodologies as they are exhibited in their respective readings of Nietzsche. In so doing, I show that the disagreement between these two methods of reading emerges as a re-inscription of the dilemma of interpretive dogmatism and relativism. In chapter one, Heidegger is criticized for unjustifiably limiting the rich ambiguity of Nietzsche's text in his dogmatic claim to have discovered the "essential truth" of that text as the culmination of the metaphysical oblivion of Being. In chapter two, I examine the deconstructionist approach, showing that in opening new areas of interpretive inquiry within the Nietzschean text, their fondness for indeterminacy tends toward sanctioning any and all interpretations. In part two, I explore a pluralistic approach suggested by the Nietzschean text. In chapter three, his view of language is shown to open the fields of traditional epistemology to the creative play of interpretation. Chapter four examines the opposition between Nietzsche's two basic interpretive motifs, showing that in claiming there is nothing other than interpretation (perspectivism) while at the same time calling for an apprehension of the text without falsifying it by interpretation (philology), a tension is present which anticipates the hermeneutic dilemma. In chapter five, I argue that Nietzsche's genealogical method plays between the demands of philological attentiveness and perspectival creativity. Genealogy emerges as an example of the praxis of interpretive pluralism, allowing for a proliferation of interpretations while retaining a standard in terms of which these interpretations can be judged.

Degree

Ph.D.

Subject Area

Philosophy

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