The Oxford Handbook of Process Philosophy and Organization Studies


Book Description

Process approaches to organization studies focus on flow, activities, and evolution, understanding organizations and organizing as processes in the making. They stand in contrast to positivist approaches that see organizations and phenomena as fixed, static, and measurable. Process approaches draw on a range of ideas and philosophies. The Handbook examines 34 philosophers and social theorists, both those commonly linked to process thinking, such as Whitehead, Bergson and James, and those that are not as often addressed from a process perspective such as Dilthey and Tarde. Each chapter addresses the background and context of this thinker, their work (with a focus on the processual elements), and the potential contribution to organization and management research. For students and scholars in the field of Organization Studies this book is an entry point into the work of philosophical thinkers and social theorists for whom the world is far from being a solid place.




Philosophy of Wilhelm Dilthey


Book Description

First published in 1998.This is Volume VIII of twenty-two in the Sociology of Social Theory and Methodology series. Written in 1952, this book looks at the concepts behind the German philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey, whose ideas extend into several fields of learning, of which philosophy is only one. They include critical and historical studies of literature and music; studies in educational theory and in the history of educational practice, ancient and modern; researches into the history of religious and political as well as philosophical ideas, especially since the Renaissance and Reformation, which have shaped his thinking.




Wilhelm Dilthey's Philosophy of History


Book Description

Looks at the philosophy of history by Wilhelm Dilthey as he attempted a philosophical justification for the work of the German Historical school which arose in the 18th century in reaction to the ideas of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution.




Interpreting Dilthey


Book Description

Examines Dilthey's hermeneutics, aesthetics, practical philosophy, and philosophy of history, showing how his work remains relevant for philosophers today.




Introduction to the Human Sciences


Book Description

For some two centuries, scholars have wrestled with questions regarding the nature and logic of history as a discipline and, more broadly, with the entire complex of the "human sciences, " with include theology, philosophy, history, literature, the fine arts, and languages. The fundamental issue is whether the human sciences are a special class of studies with a specifically distinct object and method or whether they must be subsumed under the natural sciences. German philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey dedicated the bulk of his long career to there and related questions. His Introduction to the Human Sciences is a pioneering effort to elaborate a general theory of the human sciences, especially history, and to distinguish these sciences radically from the field of natural sciences. Though the Introduction was never completed, it remains one of the major statements of the topic. Together with other works by Dilthey, it has had a substantial influence on the recognition and human sciences as a fundamental division of human knowledge and on their separation from the natural sciences in origin, nature, and method. As a contribution to the issue of the methodologies of the humanities and social sciences, the Introduction rightly claims a place. This is the first time the entire work is available in English. In his introductory essay, translator Ramon J. Betanzos surveys Dilthey's life and thought and hails his efforts to create a foundational science for the particular human sciences, and at the same time, takes serious issue with Dilthey's historical/critical evaluation of metaphysics.




Wilhelm Dilthey: Selected Works, Volume III


Book Description

This volume provides Dilthey's most mature and best formulation of his Critique of Historical Reason. It begins with three "Studies Toward the Foundation of the Human Sciences," in which Dilthey refashions Husserlian concepts to describe the basic structures of consciousness relevant to historical understanding. The volume next presents the major 1910 work The Formation of the Historical World in the Human Sciences. Here Dilthey considers the degree to which carriers of history--individuals, cultures, institutions, and communities--can be articulated as productive systems capable of generating value and meaning and of realizing purposes. Hegel's idea of objective spirit is reconceived in a more empirical form to designate the medium of commonality in which historical beings are immersed. Any universal claims about history need to be framed within the specific productive systems analyzed by the various human sciences. Dilthey's drafts for the Continuation of the Formation contain extensive discussions of the categories most important for our knowledge of historical life: meaning, value, purpose, time, and development. He also examines the contributions of autobiography to historical understanding and of biography to scientific history. The finest summary of Dilthey's views on hermeneutics can be found in "The Understanding of Other Persons and Their Manifestations of Life." Here, Dilthey differentiates understanding relative to three kinds of manifestations of life. After giving his analysis of elementary understanding, he examines the role of induction in higher understanding and interpretation, and the relevance of transposition and re-experiencing for grasping individuality.







Dilthey and the Narrative of History


Book Description

Although he never produced a comprehensive statement of his own theory of historical understanding, Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911) has played a crucial role in the development of modern phenomenology and philosophy of history. Drawing from Dilthey's reflections a systematic philosophy of history, Jacob Owensby offers a groundbreaking introduction to the full range of Dilthey's work. In his clear and accessible account, Owensby considers several vital but only recently published texts and many of Dilthey's writings that have never before been translated into English.




Wilhelm Dilthey


Book Description

Philosophy originates in man's amazement over the richness and complexity of reality. It attempts to articulate in words and con cepts what reality is. Starting from the recognition that this reality is experienced by all humans but experienced in many different ways, the philosopher tries to find reality's heart, its center, its hidden treasure - the tree in the middle connecting heaven and earth, the central point from which the stupendous intricacy of experience begins to make sense and from which order can become visible. To ask "what is reality?" is, indeed, to recognize that we have entered a maze. The hermeneutic philosophy of Wilhelm DiIthey (1833-1911) is the fruit of his own wanderings in this maze. Like many intellectuals of his age, he had lost faith in the Christian religion in which he was raised. In his college years, he turned from theology to philosophy, in particular, the history of philosophy and of human thought in general - wondering about the origin and value of the astounding variety of past belief systems. At the center of reality's maze he found the insight that reality as faced by man is comparable to a literary text: it "means" something to us. Reality is not a mute object, but an autonomous source of meaning, an act of self-disclosure; knowledge of reality is therefore not the product of actions per formed by an active subject upon a passive object, but a com municative interaction between two SUbjects.




Wilhelm Dilthey: Selected Works, Volume III


Book Description

This volume provides Dilthey's most mature and best formulation of his Critique of Historical Reason. It begins with three "Studies Toward the Foundation of the Human Sciences," in which Dilthey refashions Husserlian concepts to describe the basic structures of consciousness relevant to historical understanding. The volume next presents the major 1910 work The Formation of the Historical World in the Human Sciences. Here Dilthey considers the degree to which carriers of history--individuals, cultures, institutions, and communities--can be articulated as productive systems capable of generating value and meaning and of realizing purposes. Hegel's idea of objective spirit is reconceived in a more empirical form to designate the medium of commonality in which historical beings are immersed. Any universal claims about history need to be framed within the specific productive systems analyzed by the various human sciences. Dilthey's drafts for the Continuation of the Formation contain extensive discussions of the categories most important for our knowledge of historical life: meaning, value, purpose, time, and development. He also examines the contributions of autobiography to historical understanding and of biography to scientific history. The finest summary of Dilthey's views on hermeneutics can be found in "The Understanding of Other Persons and Their Manifestations of Life." Here, Dilthey differentiates understanding relative to three kinds of manifestations of life. After giving his analysis of elementary understanding, he examines the role of induction in higher understanding and interpretation, and the relevance of transposition and re-experiencing for grasping individuality.