Michael N. Forster

Johann Gottfried Herder

Philosophical Writings (Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy)

Herder

Forster's reading reveals the Phenomenology of Spirit as in fact an impressively coherent text containing a rich array of ideas of extraordinary philosophical originality and depth.

Hegel's Idea of a Phenomenology of Spirit

Michael Forster explores the tradition of the study of language in German philosophy. He also makes the case that the most important thinker within that tradition was J.G. Herder.

Philosophy of Language in the German Tradition

After Herder

Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) is a towering figure in modern thought, but one who has hitherto been severely underappreciated. Michael Forster seeks to rectify that situation He considers Herder's philosophy in the round and argues that it is both far more impressive in quality and far more influential in modern thought than has previously been realized. After an introduction on Herder's intellectual biography, philosophical style, and general program in philosophy, there are chapters on his philosophy of language, his hermeneutics, his theory of translation, his contribution of the philosophical foundations for both linguistics and cultural anthropology, his philosophy of mind, his aesthetics, his moral philosophy, his philosophy of history, his political philosophy, his philosophy of religion, and his intellectual influence. Forster argues that Herder contributed vitally important ideas in all of these areas; that in many of them his ideas were seminal for major subsequent philosophers, including Friedrich Schlegel, Schleiermacher, Wilhelm von Humboldt, Hegel, and Nietzsche; that they indeed founded whole new disciplines, such as linguistics, anthropology, and comparative literature; and that moreover they were in many cases even better than what these subsequent thinkers and disciplines went on to make of them.

Herder's Philosophy

Presents a reappraisal of Immanuel Kant's conception of and response to skepticism, as set forth principally in the "Critique of Pure Reason". This book argues that Kant undertook his reform of metaphysics primarily in order to render it defensible against these types of skepticism.

Kant and Skepticism

Michael Forster presents a ground-breaking study of German philosophy of language in the nineteenth century, and its continuing significance. This book explores the lasting impact of J. G. Herder's work in the tradition, and traces his legacy in the philosophy of Friedrich Schlegel, Wilhelm von Humboldt, and G. W. F. Hegel.

From Schlegel to Hegel and Beyond

German Philosophy of Language

What is the nature of a conceptual scheme? Are there alternative conceptual schemes? If so, are some more justifiable or correct than others? The later Wittgenstein already addresses these fundamental philosophical questions under the general rubric of "grammar" and the question of its "arbitrariness"--and does so with great subtlety. This book explores Wittgenstein's views on these questions. Part I interprets his conception of grammar as a generalized (and otherwise modified) version of Kant's transcendental idealist solution to a puzzle about necessity. It also seeks to reconcile Wittgenstein's seemingly inconsistent answers to the question of whether or not grammar is arbitrary by showing that he believed grammar to be arbitrary in one sense and non-arbitrary in another. Part II focuses on an especially central and contested feature of Wittgenstein's account: a thesis of the diversity of grammars. The author discusses this thesis in connection with the nature of formal logic, the limits of language, and the conditions of semantic understanding or access. Strongly argued and cleary written, this book will appeal not only to philosophers but also to students of the human sciences, for whom Wittgenstein's work holds great relevance.

Wittgenstein on the Arbitrariness of Grammar

Lina Steiner

This book offers a broad re-evaluation of the key ideas developed by the German Romantics concerning philosophy and literature. It focuses not only on their own work, but also on that of their fellow travelers (such as Hölderlin) and their contemporary opponents (such as Hegel), as well as on various reactions to and transpositions of their ideas in later authors, including Coleridge, Byron, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Dostoevsky.

Romanticism, Philosophy, and Literature

Kristin Gjesdal

No period of history has been richer in philosophical discoveries than Germany during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. And while it was the eighteenth century that saw Germany attain maturity in the discipline (above all in the works of Immanuel Kant), it was arguably the nineteenth century that bore the greatest philosophical fruits. he Oxford Handbook of German Philosophy in the Nineteenth Century is the first collective critical study of thisgreat period in intellectual history. A team of leading experts explore individual philosophers working in the period, including Fichte, Hegel, Kierkegaard, and Nietzsche; key philosophical movements associatedwith it, Idealism and Romanticism amongst them; different areas of philosophy that received particular attention at this time; and the central philosophical topics under debate. An essential resource for anyone working in the area, the Handbook will lead the direction of future research in this vital period of philosophy.

The Oxford Handbook of German Philosophy in the Nineteenth Century

Alexander Von Humboldt Professor Holder of the Chair in Theoretical Philosophy and Co-Director of the International Center for Philosophy Michael N Forster

Michael N. Forster

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