10.26180/5dc0b7e38d3e3
JAMES FRANCIS KENT
JAMES FRANCIS
KENT
Traces of the Past: History and Myth in Vico, Benjamin and Blumenberg
Monash University
2019
Giambattista Vico
Walter Benjamin
Hans Blumenberg
myth
history
cultural memory
Philosophy
2019-11-04 23:44:33
Thesis
https://bridges.monash.edu/articles/thesis/Traces_of_the_Past_History_and_Myth_in_Vico_Benjamin_and_Blumenberg/10250846
This thesis argues that the dichotomy between ‘myth’ and ‘reason’ is untenable because myth is a primary inculcation of a rational life. This conclusion is based on the premise that myths are stories that connect individuals and communities to their pasts (both real and imagined). I offer a critique of Giambattista Vico's, Walter Benjamin's, and Hans Blumenberg's philosophical approaches to myth. All three argue that mythic stories are a locus where individuals and groups can reflect, and ‘work on’, their pasts. Myth, therefore, plays a vital role in how human beings come to orientate, and exercise, their historical, and thus rational, agency.