Beyond hermeneutics: Levinas, language and psychology.

Abstract

Eastern Nazarene CollegeThe work of Emmanuel Levinas presents a unique challenge to psychotherapy, particularly by revisiting the phenomenon of language in such a way that all human speech is already loaded with obligation to one's neighbor. This article reflects on the nature of language in Levinas's later works, with particular regard to the kinds of speech important to psychotherapy. First by exploring the hermeneutic tradition and its approach to language and understanding, the author points to Levinas's claim that hermeneutics will not suffice to articulate responsibility to the neighbor. Speech is already, for Levinas, weighted with a primordial debt to the other. As such, the author suggests that language be considered in another register, at a level already familiar with infinite debt and obligation: prayer and liturgy. Such a suggestion is not primarily theological in nature, but relational. Ultimately pointing to a way of thinking about language in therapy that surpasses hermeneutics in the interest of a faithful response to the suffering of the other.

Levinas and psychoanalysis: An antihermeneutic approach.

“…It is my contention that a Levinasian “therapeutics” would have to prioritize an ethics of alterity above hermeneutics and the image of clinical change itself. More recently, Severson (2012) has formulated a similar critique of the hermeneutic reading of Levinas to the one I am proffering in this article. Yet, like others (Dueck & Goodman, 2007; Dueck & Parsons, 2007), Severson (2012) borrows theological methods like prayer, stripped of the theological ties, to explain clinical technique beyond hermeneutics (p. 257).…”

“…More recently, Severson (2012) has formulated a similar critique of the hermeneutic reading of Levinas to the one I am proffering in this article. Yet, like others (Dueck & Goodman, 2007; Dueck & Parsons, 2007), Severson (2012) borrows theological methods like prayer, stripped of the theological ties, to explain clinical technique beyond hermeneutics (p. 257). I believe that psychoanalysis offers an alternative language for exploring an antihermeneutic approach to clinical work.…”

The talking of therapy: A Gadamerian discourse.

“…Frie (2010) used Gadamer to highlight the hermeneutical nature of conversation and the mutuality of psychotherapy, whereas Richardson (2002) incorporated his concept of fusion of horizons to affirm the malleability of truth in therapy without succumbing to relativism. In addition, Severson (2012) drew on Gadamer to establish an ontology of understanding. While these resources indicate the importance of Gadamer’s thought for the hermeneutic turn in psychotherapy, they also tend to emphasize dimensions of his arguments related to the fusion of horizons and neglect fuller elaboration of other conceptual areas that he developed around language and linguisticality.…”