Gadamer's Ethics of Play examines the ethical dimensions of understanding by focusing on the concept of dialogical 'play' in Hans-Georg Gadamer's Truth and Method. The book is accessible to an undergraduate audience, while also being relevant to ongoing debates among Gadamer scholars.

Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900-2002), one of the towering figures of contemporary Continental philosophy, is best known for Truth and Method, where he elaborated the concept of "philosophical hermeneutics," a programmatic way to get to what we do when we engage in interpretation. Donatella Di Cesare highlights the central place of Greek philosophy, particularly Plato, in Gadamer's work, brings out differences between his thought and that of Heidegger, and connects him with discussions and debates in pragmatism. This is a sensitive and thoroughly readable philosophical portrait of one of the 20th century's most powerful thinkers.

Play is a vital component of the social life and well-being of both children and adults. This book examines the concept of play and considers a variety of the related philosophical issues. It also includes meta-analyses from a range of philosophers and theorists, as well as an exploration of some key applied ethical considerations. The main objective of The Philosophy of Play is to provide a richer understanding of the concept and nature of play and its relation to human life and values, and to build disciplinary and paradigmatic bridges between scholars of philosophy and scholars of play. Including specific chapters dedicated to children and play, and exploring the work of key thinkers such as Plato, Sartre, Wittgenstein, Gadamer, Deleuze and Nietzsche, this book is invaluable reading for any advanced student, researcher or practitioner with an interest in education, playwork, leisure studies, applied ethics or the philosophy of sport.

Gadamer's Dialectical Hermeneutics contributes to the growing literature that takes seriously the significance of Plato for Gadamer's hermeneutics. What distinguishes this book is the way in which Lauren Swayne Barthold argues for a dialectic central to Gadamer's hermeneutics, one that recalls the Platonic chorismos, or separation, between the transcendent and sensory realms. Barthold demonstrates that Gadamer, too, insisted on the "in-between" nature of human understanding as characterized by Hermes: we are finite beings always striving for infinity--that which lies beyond being. Such a dialectical reading brings clarity to several themes crucial to, and contested within, Gadamer's hermeneutics. First, we are helped to see that Gadamer affirms the roles of both theory and practice for hermeneutics. Second, we are able to appreciate the nature of truth as the event of understanding--that into which we enter as opposed to that which stands apart from us as a criterion. Third, we gain insight into the significance of dialogue for understanding, including the necessary role of the other. And finally, we are able to substantiate the meaning of the good-beyond-being, as a key component to understanding. Gadamer's Dialectical Hermeneutics presents a reading of Gadamer that avoids the labels of realism or essentialism, and shows his primary motivation is to uncover the ethical, indeed dialectically ethical, and practical nature of philosophy.

Play is a vital component of the social life and well-being of both children and adults. This book examines the concept of play and considers a variety of the related philosophical issues. It also includes meta-analyses from a range of philosophers and theorists, as well as an exploration of some key applied ethical considerations. The main objective of The Philosophy of Play is to provide a richer understanding of the concept and nature of play and its relation to human life and values, and to build disciplinary and paradigmatic bridges between scholars of philosophy and scholars of play. Including specific chapters dedicated to children and play, and exploring the work of key thinkers such as Plato, Sartre, Wittgenstein, Gadamer, Deleuze and Nietzsche, this book is invaluable reading for any advanced student, researcher or practitioner with an interest in education, playwork, leisure studies, applied ethics or the philosophy of sport.

Are we being played? Is our understanding of the traditionally fixed and static concepts of philosophy based on an oversimplification? This book explores some of the theories of the self since Descartes, together with the rationalism and the empiricism that sustain these ideas, and draws some startling conclusions using Gadamer’s philosophical study of play as its starting point. Gadamer’s ludic theory, Sampson argues, reveals a dynamic of play that exists at the deepest level of philosophy. It is this dynamic that could provide a solution in relation to the Gadamer/Habermas hermeneutics debate and the Gadamer/Derrida relativism debate, together with a theory of totality. Sampson shows how ludic theory can be a game-changer in understanding the relationship between philosophy and literature, exploring the dynamic between the fictive and non-fictive worlds. These worlds are characterized simultaneously by sameness (univocity of Being) and difference (equivocity of Being). The book questions Heidegger’s idea that the univocity of Being is universal, instead maintaining that the relationship between the univocity of Being and equivocity of Being is real, and that ontological mediation is required to present them as a unified whole. Using the works of Shakespeare, Beckett and Wilde, Sampson contends that such a mediation, termed ‘the ludicity of Being’, takes place between literature and its audience. This literary example has profound implications not only for literature and its attendant theories but also for philosophy — in particular, ontology and hermeneutics.

Providing a concise and accessible introduction to the work of the celebrated twentieth century German philosopher, Hans-Georg Gadamer, this book focuses on the aspects of Gadamer’s philosophy that have been the most influential among architects, educators in architecture, and architectural theorists. Gadamer’s philosophy of art gives a special place to the activity of "play" as it occurs in artistic creation. His reflections on meaning and symbolism in art draw upon his teacher, Martin Heidegger, while moving Heidegger’s thought in new directions. His theory of interpretation, or "philosophical hermeneutics," offers profound ways to understand the influence of the past upon the present and to appropriate cultural history in ever new forms. For architects, architectural theorists, architectural historians, and students in these fields, Gadamer’s thought opens a world of possibilities for understanding how building today can be rich with human meaning, relating to architecture’s history in ways that do not merely repeat nor repudiate that history. In addition, Gadamer’s sensitivity to the importance of practical thinking – to the way that theory arises out of practice – gives his thought a remarkable usefulness in the everyday work of professional life.