Meaning and Context: Quentin Skinner and His Critics

by James H. Tully (Editor)

"This confrontation between the foremost exponent of the "new history' of political thought and his critics will be of considerable interest not only to students of political theory but of legal and literary interpretation as well."--Terence Ball, University of MinnesotaQuentin Skinner is one of the leading thinkers in the social sciences and humanities today. Since the publication of his first important articles some two decades ago, debate has continued to develop over his distinctive contributions to contemporary political philosophy, the history of political theory, the philosophy of social science, and the discussion of interpretation and hermeneutics across the humanities and social sciences. Nevertheless, his most valuable essays and the best critical articles concerning his work have been scattered in various journals and difficult to obtain. Meaning and Context includes five of the most widely discussed articles by Skinner, which present his approach to the study of political thought and the interpretation of texts. Following these are seven articles by his critics, five of these drawn from earlier publications and two, by John Keane and Charles Taylor, written especially for this volume. Finally, there appears a fifty-seven page reply by Skinner--a major new statement in which he defends and reformulates his method and lays out new lines of research. The editorial introduction provides a systematic overview of the evolution of Skinner's work and of the main reactions to it.Besides James Tully, John Keane, and Charles Taylor, the contributors include Joseph V. Femia, Keith Graham, Martin Hollis, Kenneth Minogue, and Nathan Tarcov.

Genres: History, Philosophy

Paperback

First published January 1, 1989

Reviews

[Maheen]

Anyone interested in methodological issues for doing Intellectual History ought to have this on their shelves. It is better to get this than Quentin Skinner's Visions of Politics: On Method. Here you'll find the original versions of the essays, especially Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas, along with other essays and a very helpful introduction by James Tully and several responses of by Skinner's critics and Skinner's lengthy response to all of them.

[Samuel Weiss · Rating 3 out of 5]

The volume starts with an introductory essay provided by the editor, James Tully, which is the best summary of Skinner's methodology I've read, even better than the ones he provides himself. There are three more sections: first, orginial essays by Skinner himself outlining his methodological approach; second, criticisms of this approach; and third, a reply by Skinner to these critical essays (and, somewhat confusingly, a reply to critical essays not found in this volume).

All but one of Skinner's essays can be found in the first volume of Visions of Politics. It's probably worth reading Visions of Politics. First of all, the essay that is in this volume but not in Visions doesn't say much new. The second reason relates to the fact that the bulk of the critical essay touch on Skinner's discussion of how to glean an author's intentions from their texts. Skinner's claims tha he is not using a conception of intention that refers to having a plan to act. Instead, he is concerned with intention descriptions of actions and thus with the question of what an agent may have intended or meant by speaking or writing a certain way. In other terms, Skinner uses the neo-Aristotelean conception of intention Anscombe discusses in her monograph. He isn't at all clear that this is the concpetion of intention he is using, so it's easy to see how his critics made this misinterpretation. The essays found in Visions of Politics are revised to make this clear.

Nonetheless, the critical esssays produce a range of criticisms (though are also of diverse quality) which are worth reading. In his reply, Skinner doesn't respond to all of the criticisms raised, particularly those which, in my opinion, are the most salient.

[Henry Moskov · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must for students interested in the 'Cambridge School' of political thought in any capacity—it is no secret that Mr. Skinner has been the way-maker for the academic institutionalization of intellectual histories, it is thus so that the essays written by him and his contemporaries contained herein offer a pleasant introduction and expansion upon Mr. Skinner's flavor of political theory.

[Charles · Rating 2 out of 5]

Foucault, but far more anodyne and with a lot less soul.