Revisiting the Philosophical Investigations’ Children
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Karin Lesnik-Oberstein
Abstract:
In my 2003 article “The Philosophical Investigations’ Children” I offered a non-essentialist reading of the child in Wittgenstein’s work, arguing that such a reading challenged previous interpretations of the text by analysing an a priori reliance on a “real child” as part of a reliance on a “real world” somehow outside of textuality. I further argued that my anti-essentialist reading of the child is authorised by the Philosophical Investigations’ own arguments and positions and that interpretations of this text that maintain an investment in a materialist “real” (including the child as real or actual) fail fully to understand the nature of Wittgenstein’s interest in and definition of “language games” and an attendant engagement with issues of perspectives and their implications. In this article, I follow up on the current status of readings of the child in relation to Philosophical Investigations and the wider implications of those readings, including for ideas of the “pedagogy” of Philosophical Investigations itself, including demonstrating how both subsequent essentialist and non-essentialist readings of Philosophical Investigations continue to overlook implications of non-essentialist thinking about childhood.
I wish to express my warm thanks for the invaluable suggestions of an anonymous peer-reviewer for revisions to the initial version of this article.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Titelseiten
- Titelseiten
- Articles
- Hinweis für Leser / Note for Readers
- Wittgenstein’s Vienna around 1900
- Wittgenstein’s Ambivalent Attitude toward Science and Culture
- Wittgenstein and the Theatre of Confession
- “What belongs to a language game is a whole culture.”
- Lebensform and “socio-cultural background”
- Culture as a Monastic Rule
- Frontverläufe in Wittgensteins Prototractatus
- Recherchen zu „Teil II“ der Philosophischen Untersuchungen und zur von Wittgenstein erstellten „C-Sammlung“ im Nachlass
- Wittgenstein’s Criticism of the “Atmosphere” Conception of Meaning in PI § 117
- Revisiting the Philosophical Investigations’ Children
- On Certainty, Epistemic Incommensurability and Epistemic Relativism
- „Das Buch ist voller Leben …“
- Die Autorinnen und Autoren des Bandes / Authors of this Volume
- Bisher erschienene Bände / Previously published Volumes
Articles in the same Issue
- Titelseiten
- Titelseiten
- Articles
- Hinweis für Leser / Note for Readers
- Wittgenstein’s Vienna around 1900
- Wittgenstein’s Ambivalent Attitude toward Science and Culture
- Wittgenstein and the Theatre of Confession
- “What belongs to a language game is a whole culture.”
- Lebensform and “socio-cultural background”
- Culture as a Monastic Rule
- Frontverläufe in Wittgensteins Prototractatus
- Recherchen zu „Teil II“ der Philosophischen Untersuchungen und zur von Wittgenstein erstellten „C-Sammlung“ im Nachlass
- Wittgenstein’s Criticism of the “Atmosphere” Conception of Meaning in PI § 117
- Revisiting the Philosophical Investigations’ Children
- On Certainty, Epistemic Incommensurability and Epistemic Relativism
- „Das Buch ist voller Leben …“
- Die Autorinnen und Autoren des Bandes / Authors of this Volume
- Bisher erschienene Bände / Previously published Volumes
