Cognitive Poetics

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HARALD FRICKE /RALPH MÜLLER

Cognitive Poetics Meets Hermeneutics
Some considerations about the German reception of Cognitive poetics
Theoretical discussions and applications of cognitive approaches such as Biopoetics and Cognitive poetics are remarkably growing in number among German scholars. This indicates that the cognitive turn has definitely reached a broader audience in the traditional “Literaturwissenschaften”.1 This article is meant to investigate the reception of Cognitive poetics in the context of German hermeneutics. It will outline the theoretical and cultural differences between Hermeneutics and Cognitive poetics; but it can also demonstrate that the differences between Cognitive poetics and some forms of Hermeneutics are smaller than they may appear at first sight. At stake is whether Cognitive poetics holds the potential to be extended to some kind of cognitive literary studies which is not at all constrained to studying principles of literature, but which could add value to the interpretation of literature itself.
At the same time, we want to discuss if Hermeneutics can afford to ignore cognitive approaches.
Obviously, in the following overview we will focus on Cognitive poetics. Many of our observations should, however, also be applicable to Biopoetics. Even if Cognitive poetics and Biopoetics draw on conflicting background theories (e.g. Cognitive linguistics vs. Evolutionary psychology),2 both Cognitive poetics and Biopoetics are basically scientific programmes explicitly concerned with elucidating the interaction between texts and minds.

Cognitive hermeneutics?
The difficulties of a co-operation between Cognitive poetics and Hermeneutics

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