Date: Sun, 2 Mar 1997 20:03:29 -0800 (PST)
From: Lois Shawver <rathbone-AT-crl.com>
Subject: HAB: reading Habermas




Mari,

You explained how you had begun reading Habermas by putting him in your
own words.  I think that is great instruction, not only in how to read
Habermas, but how to read any difficult author.  I use that technique
regularly with difficult authors.  I also begin reading a difficult text
by reading it quickly through, letting my mind slip over whatever isn't
intelligible, but at least gathering a sense of how the text is formatted,
what the subheadings are, etc.  Then I go back and do as you suggested. 
Then, after having gone through it in this laborious way, I might read it
again (not just my summary, but the text) and I find it is more
intelligible.  Having just published a paper on Derrida and another on
Lacan, I have been heavy into such "techniques". 

I think one of the problems that gets in the way for readers is that we
develop an ethic in reading fiction.  That ethic says you read straight
through and you don't look ahead.  You simply read line by line and turn
the page.  That ethic may work well for mystery books, but it doesn't work
well for obscure authors.  Better to follow a guideline derived from
Heidegger's notion of a hermeneutic circle.  You can never understand the
first sentence of the text until you have read the whole text because only
in this way can you put the text in context, but then reading it through
again, puts it into better context -- in sum, you don't just read, you
study the text. 

..Lois Shawver


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