Textual context in the history of political thought and intellectual history

Bibliographic Data

ID11348107
AuthorsAdrian Blau (0000-0002-3682-5472, King's College London, corresponding author)
Year2019
Volume45
Issue8
Pages1191-1210
Publication date2019-11-17
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory of European Ideas (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0191-6599 • E-ISSN: 1873-541X
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01916599.2019.1656945
OpenAlexW2971489530
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited66

We can easily misread historical texts if we take ideas and passages out of their textual contexts. The resulting errors are widespread, possibly even more so than errors through reading ideas and passages out of their historical contexts. Yet the methodological literature stresses the latter and says little about the former. This paper thus theorises the idea of textual context, distinguishes three types of textual context, and asks how we uncover the right textual contexts. I distinguish four kinds of textual-context error, and offer practical tips for avoiding these errors. However, the beating heart of this paper is the history–philosophy debate: in contrast to the prevailing assumption that historical and philosophical analysis are fundamentally different, I show that a commitment to textual context, which should be entirely uncontroversial, also commits one to think philosophically

Archaeology · Art · Context (archaeology · Epistemology · Intellectual history · Linguistics · Literature · Political history · Political science · Politics · Reading (process · Sociology · History · Law · Philosophy · Political Theory and Influence · Rousseau and Enlightenment Thought · Seventeenth-Century Political and Philosophical Thought

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