Paul Ricoeur’s critical hermeneutics as a strategy for the reconfiguration of tradition in literary studies today

Abstract

This essay reviews the dichotomy between hermeneutics and the critique of ideologies as put forth by Paul Ricoeur, concerning the ways each of these philosophical gestures view the concept of tradition, in order to compare this dichotomy to oscillations observed throughout the history of feminist literary criticism. The way tradition is read by feminist criticism first as an oppressive force to be opposed, secondly as a positive search for the past (in the reconfiguration of a particularly female tradition [Showalter, 1977]), and lastly as a problem to be criticized once again, points to a fluctuation between the critical gesture and the hermeneutic impulse, contained in the same field of studies. Feminist literary criticism may therefore be recognized as a twofold field with a dynamic vocation, and work as an example for the necessary overcoming of the impasse between appreciation and criticism of the literary tradition in the research and education of literature today. In light of the all-important criticism of the canon in literary studies, Paul Ricoeur’s critical hermeneutics may offer a recuperation of tradition in such discussions.