You are cordially invited to this discussion with the author hosted by the Department of English Language and Literature.
Date: Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Time: 17:30 – 19:00.
This is an online seminar. To request event details please send a message to department.
Title: “Explanation beyond Interpretation”: A Discussion with the Author
Abstract: this will not be a talk in the traditional sense, but an opportunity to discuss with the author an article that has already been published: Aaron Hanlon’s “Explanation beyond Interpretation”, Philosophy and Literature 48.1 (April 2024): 165-84. If you would like to take part, it would be helpful if you could read the article beforehand (it should easily be accessible from any Bilkent computer at https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/article/930336/pdf). Feel free to prepare questions or observations and bring them along so we can discuss them with Dr Hanlon.
Original abstract: This article questions the extent to which interpretation explains literature, arguing that interpretation and explanation are not the same thing. It first engages with recent critical discussions of method and explanation in literary studies, finding that they are not much about method at all. It then offers a methodological framework that goes beyond various “method wars” over “critique” and “postcritique,” and toward ways of explaining literature that are not reducible to matters of interpretation.
Biographical note: Aaron Hanlon is an associate professor of English at Colby College. His research is concerned with British literature, c. 1600-1815, the Enlightenment in Britain, the philosophy of fiction, and historical epistemology.