Epistemology of Reading and Interpretation

This book explores the ways in which reading and textual interpretation function as sources of knowledge.

List of contents

Introduction; 1. Knowing and reading; 2. Reading and understanding; 3. Sources of knowledge and their individuation; 4. Why reading doesn't reduce either to attending to testimony or to perception; 5. Reading as a source of knowledge; 6. The objects of reading are the products of writing; 7. Texts, meanings, and interpretation; 8. Knowledge through interpretation (1): Allegory, difficulty, and disambiguation; 9. Knowledge through interpretation (2): Holism, reconstruction, externalism, and reader response.

About the author

René van Woudenberg is Professor of Philosophy at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and Director of the Abraham Kuyper Center for Science and the Big Questions. He is co-editor of The Cambridge Companion to Common-Sense Philosophy (with Rik Peels, Cambridge, 2020) and Scientism: Prospects and Problems (with Rik Peels and Jeroen de Ridder, 2018).

Summary

Reading and textual interpretation are ordinary human activities, but precisely how they function as sources of knowledge is not well understood. In this book, René van Woudenberg explores the nature of reading and interpretation and argues they are distinct sources of knowledge that are irreducible to perception and testimony.

Product details

• Authors: René van Woudenberg, Rene (Vrije Universiteit Van Woudenberg, René van Woudenberg
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press ELT
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 30.11.2021
• EAN: 9781316516799
• ISBN: 978-1-316-51679-9
• No. of pages: 270
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Philosophy > General, dictionaries; Non-fiction book > Philosophy, religion > Philosophy: general, reference works; PHILOSOPHY / Epistemology, PHILOSOPHY / Metaphysics, Philosophy: metaphysics & ontology, Philosophy: metaphysics and ontology, Philosophy: epistemology & theory of knowledge, Philosophy: epistemology and theory of knowledge