Embodied Mind and Neural Underpinnings of the Aesthetic Experience. A Case Study from the German Eighteenth Century: 4E Cognition Theories Forecasted by Johann Gottfried Herder

Recent theories within the avenue of the bio-cultural turn, and particularly about embodied cognition are forecasted in the anthropological, philosophical, physiological and scientific debate of the late 18th century in Germany. Philosopher and theologian Johann Gottfried Herder contributed to this discourse sigificantly, opening up new perspectives on the link among thought and language and body. In this paper we aim at highlighting some core issues of Herders's discourse about knowledge, perception and cognition, that seem to anticipate some of the most recent 4E Cognition issues

Neurohermeneutics A Transdisciplinary Approach to Literature

Summary In the epistemic frame of the biocultural turn and of the neuroaesthetics, we have developed neurohermeneutics as an approach to literature that aims at contributing to the current debate about the linkage between literary, cognitive and neuroscientific studies, focusing on the relationship between mindbrain processes mirrored in the formal features of the text and the strategies activated by the author in a text in order to guide the reader in imagining, emotionally feeling and cognitively getting meanings out of the literary experience. The aim of the neurohermeneutical approach is to grasp and describe phenomenologically the mirroring process between the two extremes of the literary experience, i.e. the writer's creative process as it is mirrored in the formal features of the literary work and the reader's imaginative reconfiguration of the text, and what they share in common. The reader revives the mental imaginative processes of the author by creating his/her unrepeatable individual experiences of the text and subjectively redesigning it in an endless loop of features that trigger the imagination and its creative potential both while writing and by reading literature

Die «unerfüllt gebliebene Sehnsucht» der «Lebenskünstlerin» Lina Loos

The role Lina Loos had to play in her artistic milieu involved a permanent struggle between her authentic self and the male-dominated society which obliged her to serve as an inspiring “muse”, first of all for her more famous husband Adolf Loos. This contrast was the object of her play Wie man wird, was man ist. This paper will attempt to outline Lina Loos’s struggle to stand as a woman writer in a society which rejected the female creative work, her social engagement during the Second World War and in the following years, as well as all the psychological contrasts and stylistic features characterising her literary and journalistic work

Cognitive literary Anthropology and Neurohermeneutics. A theoretical Proposal

Following Wolfgang Iser’s studies, literary criticism could no longer avoid a confrontation with the phenomenology of the act of reading. This has led the analysis of a literary text towards new researches regarding the reader’s response theory. In particular, it is impossible to define the field of literary investigation, its coordinates and characteristics, without considering the anthropological dimention which defines the epistemological nature of literature itself. We propose in this study a new approach that we call “neurohermeneutic approach”. Unlike an analytical or descriptive approach, the neurohermeneutic approach investigates broth the relations that the reader’s mind establishes with the text figurations and how these figurations stimulates the reader’s mind in that inexhaustible, always new and surprising act of the reading. A partire dagli studi di Wolfgang Iser, la riflessione critica non ha più potuto evitare il confronto con la fenomenologia dell’atto della lettura, e questo ha condotto l’analisi del testo fino alle recenti ricerche in merito alla reader’s response theory. Soprattutto risulta ormai impossibile definire il campo di indagine letterario, le sue caratteristiche e coordinate, a prescindere da un affondo nella dimensione antropologica che definisce la natura epistemologica della letteratura stessa. Proponiamo in questo studio un nuovo approccio che definiamo “neuroermeneutico” e che, a differenza di un approccio analitico o descrittivo, indaga sia le relazioni che la mente del lettore instaura con le figurazioni del testo, sia come queste figurazioni sollecitino la mente del lettore in quell’atto inesauribile, sempre nuovo e sorprendente, della lettura.

La neurohermenéutica de la sospecha. Una aproximación teórica

Este artículo revisita la hermenéutica de la sospecha de Paul Ricœur considerándola un acto de interpretación inquisitivo basado en la intersubjetividad y destinado a desvelar significados ocultos y latentes del texto literario. En nuestra opinión, el marco teórico de Ricœur es relevante para los estudios neurocognitivos actuales aplicados a la literatura en cuanto a las cuestiones de encarnación (embodiment), simulación corporal e interpretación de signi¬ficados textuales latentes y ocultos tras los evidentes. La práctica de la sospecha de Ricœur supone uno de los dos polos de nuestra investigación actual del texto literario, siendo el segundo la apro¬ximación neurohermenéutica. Desde la perspectiva de lo que aquí definimos como la neurohermenéutica de la sospecha, el lector se convierte en intérprete y cuestiona el texto y los distintos niveles de sus rasgos superficiales cuando advierte claves inferenciales destacadas que desvelan significados secundarios. El proceso de construcción del significado depende de un acto creativo acaecido en la imaginación del lector, que encarna la (re-)construcción mental de la situación descrita en el texto. Por tanto, la interpretación de la sospecha no se apoya en el texto, el autor, el lector o el contexto cultural o cognitivo, sino en una relación compleja y dinámica que pivota alrededor de las facultades encarna¬das comunes a todo ser humano. Proponemos que Ricœur, especialmente en las derivas postcríticas de la actualidad, puede resultar de gran ayuda para redefinir el placer de descifrar los mundos ficticios de la literatura en tanto que pone a prueba al lector para “jugar” con el texto literario, concebido como una terra incognita de múltiples e inagotables significados.Dans cet article on revient sur l’herméneutique de la suspicion de Paul Ricœur en l’envisageant comme un acte d’interprétation basé sur l’intersubjectivité et destiné à dévoiler des significations cachées et latentes du texte littéraire. À notre avis, le cadre théorique de Ricœur est marquant pour les études neurocognitives actuelles appliquées à la littérature en ce qui concerne les questions d’incarnation (embodiment), simulation corporelle et interprétation des significations textuelles latentes et cachées derrière celles qui sont évidentes. La pratique de la suspicion de Ricœur suppose l’un des pôles de notre recherche actuelle du texte littéraire, l’autre étant l’approche neuroherméneutique. Dans la perspective de ce qui est ici défini comme la neuroherméneutique de la suspicion, le lecteur devient un interprète et questionne le texte et les différents niveaux de ses traits superficiels quand il remarque des clés inférentielles saillantes dévoilant des significations secondaires. Le processus de construction de la signification dépend d’un acte créatif advenu dans l’imagination du lecteur, qui incarne la (re)construction mentale de la situation décrite dans le texte. Par conséquent, l’inter¬pré¬tation de la suspicion ne repose pas sur le texte, l’auteur, le lecteur ou le contexte culturel ou cognitif, mais sur un rapport complexe et dynamique pivotant autour des facultés incarnées communes à tout être humain. Nous proposons que Ricœur, particulièrement dans les dérives postcritiques actuelles, peut être d’un grand secours pour redéfinir le plaisir de déchiffrer les mondes fictionnels de la littérature dans la mesure où il met à l’épreuve le lecteur pour « jouer » avec le texte, envisagé comme une terra incognita de significations multiples et inépuisables.In this paper we draw back to Ricœur’s hermeneutics of suspicion, consid-ered as an act of mistrustful interpretation based on intersubjectivity and aiming at disclosing latent and hidden meanings in the literary text. In our opinion Ricœur’s theoretical frame is relevant for present-day neurocognitive studies about literature, with regard to the issues of embodiment, bodily simulation and interpretation of textual latent meanings hidden beyond the manifest ones. Ricœur’s practice of suspicion is one of the two poles of our present inquiry about literary text, while the second is our neurohermeneutic approach. In the perspective of what we here define as neurohermeneutics of suspicion, the reader becomes an interpreter, questioning the text with regard to its multilayered surface features as marking inferential clues unveiling secondary meanings. The meaning-making process depends on a creative act of the reader’s imagination embodying the mental (re)construction of the situation described by a text. Therefore, suspicious interpreting does not rely in either the text, the author, the reader or the cultural and cognitive context, but in their complex and dynamic relationship, pivoting around the common embodied faculties of being a human. We claim that particularly in the postcritical venture, Ricœur’s hermeneutics, may be helpful in refiguring the pleasure of deciphering the fictional worlds of literature, challenging the reader to “play” with the literary text intended as a terra incognita of inexhaustible multiple meanings

The Foregrounding Assessment Matrix: An interface for qualitative-quantitative interdisciplinary research

This paper presents the results of a transdisciplinary research conducted by scholars working in the humanities and experimental psychologists in order to find an interface between the needs of a qualitative approach (mainly based on the evaluation of stylistic features) and those of a quantitative analysis, in order to find useful features for testing different reading behaviors and for new hermeneutical enquiries. The results of our research, which was conducted in two Labs (Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion at the FU Berlin and the NewHums – Neurocognitive and Human Studies at the University of Catania), consistently differ from previous ones, as they focus on the whole multi-layered foregrounded texture of a poem and try to evaluate predictable differences in reading, re-reading behaviour and meaning-making processes. We present the FAM, targeting foregrounding elements in three main categories: the phonological, morpho-syntactic, and rhetoric. To identify those elements, four different text levels were taken into account, the sublexical level of phonemes and syllables, the lexical level of single words, the interlexical level of word combinations across longer distance (e.g. two lines), and the supralexical level of whole stanzas or an entire poem. In contrast to previous quantitative analyses on short, isolated sentences and texts, mostly expository in nature (‘textoids’), or on single words or segments, the text is considered as a whole, marked by density fields that work as milestones along a reading route.This paper presents the results of a transdisciplinary research conducted by scholars working in the humanities and experimental psychologists in order to find an interface between the needs of a qualitative approach (mainly based on the evaluation of stylistic features) and those of a quantitative analysis, in order to find useful features for testing different reading behaviors and for new hermeneutical enquiries. The results of our research, which was conducted in two Labs (Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion at the FU Berlin and the NewHums – Neurocognitive and Human Studies at the University of Catania), consistently differ from previous ones, as they focus on the whole multi-layered foregrounded texture of a poem and try to evaluate predictable differences in reading, re-reading behaviour and meaning-making processes. We present the FAM, targeting foregrounding elements in three main categories: the phonological, morpho-syntactic, and rhetoric. To identify those elements, four different text levels were taken into account, the sublexical level of phonemes and syllables, the lexical level of single words, the interlexical level of word combinations across longer distance (e.g. two lines), and the supralexical level of whole stanzas or an entire poem. In contrast to previous quantitative analyses on short, isolated sentences and texts, mostly expository in nature (‘textoids’), or on single words or segments, the text is considered as a whole, marked by density fields that work as milestones along a reading route.This paper presents the results of a transdisciplinary research conducted by scholars working in the humanities and experimental psychologists in order to find an interface between the needs of a qualitative approach (mainly based on the evaluation of stylistic features) and those of a quantitative analysis, in order to find useful features for testing different reading behaviors and for new hermeneutical enquiries. The results of our research, which was conducted in two Labs (Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion at the FU Berlin and the NewHums – Neurocognitive and Human Studies at the University of Catania), consistently differ from previous ones, as they focus on the whole multi-layered foregrounded texture of a poem and try to evaluate predictable differences in reading, re-reading behaviour and meaning-making processes. We present the FAM, targeting foregrounding elements in three main categories: the phonological, morpho-syntactic, and rhetoric. To identify those elements, four different text levels were taken into account, the sublexical level of phonemes and syllables, the lexical level of single words, the interlexical level of word combinations across longer distance (e.g. two lines), and the supralexical level of whole stanzas or an entire poem. In contrast to previous quantitative analyses on short, isolated sentences and texts, mostly expository in nature (‘textoids’), or on single words or segments, the text is considered as a whole, marked by density fields that work as milestones along a reading route.This paper presents the results of a transdisciplinary research conducted by scholars working in the humanities and experimental psychologists in order to find an interface between the needs of a qualitative approach (mainly based on the evaluation of stylistic features) and those of a quantitative analysis, in order to find useful features for testing different reading behaviors and for new hermeneutical enquiries. The results of our research, which was conducted in two Labs (Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion at the FU Berlin and the NewHums – Neurocognitive and Human Studies at the University of Catania), consistently differ from previous ones, as they focus on the whole multi-layered foregrounded texture of a poem and try to evaluate predictable differences in reading, re-reading behaviour and meaning-making processes. We present the FAM, targeting foregrounding elements in three main categories: the phonological, morpho-syntactic, and rhetoric. To identify those elements, four different text levels were taken into account, the sublexical level of phonemes and syllables, the lexical level of single words, the interlexical level of word combinations across longer distance (e.g. two lines), and the supralexical level of whole stanzas or an entire poem. In contrast to previous quantitative analyses on short, isolated sentences and texts, mostly expository in nature (‘textoids’), or on single words or segments, the text is considered as a whole, marked by density fields that work as milestones along a reading route.This paper presents the results of a transdisciplinary research conducted by scholars working in the humanities and experimental psychologists in order to find an interface between the needs of a qualitative approach (mainly based on the evaluation of stylistic features) and those of a quantitative analysis, in order to find useful features for testing different reading behaviors and for new hermeneutical enquiries. The results of our research, which was conducted in two Labs (Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion at the FU Berlin and the NewHums – Neurocognitive and Human Studies at the University of Catania), consistently differ from previous ones, as they focus on the whole multi-layered foregrounded texture of a poem and try to evaluate predictable differences in reading, re-reading behaviour and meaning-making processes. We present the FAM, targeting foregrounding elements in three main categories: the phonological, morpho-syntactic, and rhetoric. To identify those elements, four different text levels were taken into account, the sublexical level of phonemes and syllables, the lexical level of single words, the interlexical level of word combinations across longer distance (e.g. two lines), and the supralexical level of whole stanzas or an entire poem. In contrast to previous quantitative analyses on short, isolated sentences and texts, mostly expository in nature (‘textoids’), or on single words or segments, the text is considered as a whole, marked by density fields that work as milestones along a reading route

Imagination as poetics of cognition

Abstract Our work bases on the hypothesis of an existing interconnection between the symbolic and the metaphoric elements of the text responding to a series of mind patterns compressing perception and experience through the emerging process of conceptual blending triggering the semantic process during the creative act of poiesis. This enquiry focuses on the use of a peculiar rhetorical figure in an exemplar literary text of the famous German poet Goethe. We will try to point out the allegorical function of the scene dedicated to the «Mothers’ Kingdom», in his Faust II as a powerful poetical meta-reflection on imagination, cognition and poetics itself