The Complicated History of Einfühlung
Magdalena NOWAK
The article analyses the history of the Einfühlung concept. Theories of ‘feeling into’ Nature, works of art or feelings and behaviours of other persons by German philosophers of the second half of the nineteenth century Robert and Friedrich Vischer and Theodor Lipps are evoked, as well as a similar theory of understanding (Verstehen) by Wilhelm Dilthey and Friedrich Schleiermacher, to which Dilthey refers. The meaning of the term Einfühlung within Edith Stein’s thought is also analysed. Both Einfühlung and Verstehen were criticized as non objective and naive methods consisting only in the identification of the subject with the object or the projection of feelings onto the object. The article refers to criticism by Georg Gadamer and Bertolt Brecht and proposes ways to restitute the concept of Einfühlung after this criticism, recalling the theory of empathy by Dominick Lacapra, in terms of its advantages for the historical enquiry, or the myth of Narcissus analyzed in the spirit of psychoanalysis by Julia Kristeva...
The article proposes a reformulationof the concept of mimesis, connected to the Einfühlung, understood as the identification, analogy, imitation of feelings (as it was described by Lipss and Vischer). Mimesis does not necessarily mean a passive repetition and reconstruction of the feelings of the object, but serves only as a starting point for the interest of the subject for the outside world or for the experiences of historical protagonists. Then there is no identification or projection of feelings, but the creative, active and critical reformulation of
knowledge. It is stated that empathy is not a passive, uncritical process, but that it deals with the critical choice of the object of empathy and with an active approach to the perceived feelings and appearances. In addition to this cognitive aspect, empathy may also contribute to the analytical and valuable introspection. Furthermore empathy allows us to connect the analysis of the facts with a personal narrative and understanding of individual identity in historical knowledge.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BRECHT, Bertolt (1994): Alienation Effects in Chinese Acting (1936), [in:] John WILLET
(ed.): Brecht on Theatre: The Development of an Aesthetic, New York: Hill and Wang.
COLLINGWOOD, Robin G. (1993): The Idea of History, Oxford: University Press.
DIDI-HUBERMAN, Georges (2002): L’image survivante. Histoire de l’art et temps des fantomes
selon Aby Warburg, Paris: Minuit.
DILTHEY, Wilhelm (1976): The Development of Hermeneutics, [in:] Hans P. RICKMAN
(ed.): Selected Writings, Cambridge: University Press.
FORSTER, Michael: Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher, [in:] The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/schleiermacher/
(30.09.2011).
FRANK, Manfred (1997): The subject and the text: essays on literary theory and philosophy,
Cambridge: University Press.
GADAMER, Hans G. (2004): Truth and Method, transl. D. G. Marshall, J. Weinsheimer, London/
New York: Continuum International Publishing Group.
GREENBERG, Clement (1993): Modernist Painting (1960), [in:] Collected Essays and Critisism,
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
HABERMAS, Jürgen (1973): Knowledge and Human Interests, transl. J. J. Shapiro, London:
Heinemann.
HARRINGTON, Austin (2001): Dilthey, Empathy and Verstehen. A Contemporary Reappraisal,
European Journal of Social Theory 4, 311–329.
HERDER, Johann G. (1960): Myśli o filozofii dziejów, przeł. J. Gałecki, Warszawa: PWN.
KITLIŃSKI, Tomasz (2001): Obcy jest w nas. Kochać według Julii Kristevej, Kraków: Aureus.
KOSS, Juliet (2006): On the Limits of Empathy, Art Bulletin 88, 139–157.
KRISTEVA, Julia (1987): Tales of Love, New York: Columbia University Press.
LACAPRA, Dominick (2004): History in Transit: Experience, Identity, Critical Theory, Ithaca:
Cornell University Press.
LIPPS, Theodor (1914): Aesthetik: Psychologie des Schoenen und der Kunst, Vol. 1, Grundlegung
der Ästhetik, Leipzig/Hamburg: Voss.
LIPPS, Theodor (1914a): Aesthetik: Psychologie des Schoenen und der Kunst, Vol. 2, Die ästhetische
Betrachtung und die bildende Kunst, Leipzig/Hamburg: Voss.
MORAN, Dermot (2004): The Problem of Empathy: Lipps, Scheler, Husserl, Stein, [in:]
Thomas A. KELLY, Phillip W. ROSEMANN (ed.): Amor Amicitiae: On the Love that is
Friendship. Essays in Medieval thought and Beyond in Honor of the Rev. Professor James
McEvoy, Leuven/Paris/Dudley, MA: Peeters.
RAMPLEY, Matthew (1997): From Symbol to Allegory: Aby Warburg’s Theory of Art, Art
Bulletin 79, 41–55.
RYBICKI, Jan (1976): Teoria estetycznego „wczucia” według Teodora Lippsa, Annales Universitatis
Mariae Curie-Skłodowska 1, 27.
STEIN, Edith (1989): On the Problem of Empathy, [in:] The Collected Works of Edith Stein,
Vol. 3, Washington, D.C.: ICS Publications.
VISCHER, Robert (1873): Über das optische Formgefühl: Ein Beitrag zur Ästhetik, Leipzig: Credner.
VISCHER, Robert (1994): On the Optical Sense of Form: A Contribution to Aesthetics, [in:]
Harry F. MALLGRAVE, Eleftherios IKONOMOU (ed.): Empathy, Form, and Space. Problems
in German Aesthetics, 1873–1893, Santa Monica: The Getty Center for History of
Art and the Humanities.
WEBER, Max (1975): Roscher and Knies: The Logical Problems of Historical Economics, transl.
G. Oakes, New York: Free Press.
WĘGRZECKI, Adam (1992): O poznawaniu drugiego człowieka, Kraków: Wydawnictwo Naukowe
PAT.
WORRINGER, Wilhelm (2009): Abstraction and Empathy, [in:] Charles HARRISON, Paul
WOOD (ed.): Art in theory, 1900–2000: an anthology of changing ideas, Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing.
ZAHAVI, Dan (2006): Empathy, Embodiment and Interpersonal Understanding: From
Lipps to Schutz, Inquiry 53, 285–306.