I am in a tearing hurry this morning and don’t have time to develop this idea, but I’m going to post a single quote for you to think about — as I am. I ran across this sentence in the Dilthey subsection of a Wikipedia article about hermeneutics and I’ve been chewing on it ever since. Think about it with reference to interpretation and/or perception of a photograph:
“Empathy involves a direct identification with the other. Interpretation involves an indirect or mediated understanding that can only be attained by placing human expressions in their historical context. Understanding is not a process of reconstructing the state of mind of the author, but one of articulating what is expressed in the work.”
First, does this apply to empathy for a person in the photo, or only to the photographer (author)? And second does it mean that empathy and understanding are unrelated? (I hope I’m making sense … I should be gone already …)
-Julie
