Preliminary Programme

Tue 13 April
    8.30
    10.45
    14.15
    16.30

Wed 14 April
    8.30
    10.45
    14.15
    16.30

Thu 15 April
    8.30
    10.45
    14.15
    16.30

Fri 16 April
    8.30
    10.45
    14.15
    16.30

All days
Go back

Tuesday 13 April 2010 14.15
X-3 ORA03 Using Narrative Biographical Data in Different Settings
M211, Marissal
Network: Oral History Chair: Alexander Von Plato
Organizers: - Discussants: -
Irene Bandhauer-Schoeffmann : Narrations and Narratives on Terrorism in Austria in the 1970s
tba

Karoline Feyertag : Transcriptions of Life: How to write a 'polyphonic biography' in a philosophical setting.
Parting from the crossover of three different text genres, which are philosophical text, auto/biographical text and the transcription of narrative interviews, the idea of a 'polyphonic biography' shall be discussed in my paper.

Writing a biography about a public person who had already died when I started my research, brought ... (Show more)
Parting from the crossover of three different text genres, which are philosophical text, auto/biographical text and the transcription of narrative interviews, the idea of a 'polyphonic biography' shall be discussed in my paper.

Writing a biography about a public person who had already died when I started my research, brought up several questions of 'factual authorship'. As I did not want to proceed in a classical way and tell the 'story of a life' with one voice that claims biographical 'truth' and overall authority in the name of the author, I decided to integrate Oral History into my research. These narrative interviews generated new texts once transcribed from the oral record. They are mostly testimonies about a third person who cannot respond anymore. This person is the French philosopher Sarah Kofman who committed suicide at the age of 60 in 1994. The interviews rarely generated any 'evidence' in the proper sense of the term. Each of the interviewees spoke in relational terms about Sarah Kofman and pronounced themselves in a thoroughly subjective manner about their experiences with Kofman either as a teacher or as a friend and colleague. The problem I had to confront then, was how to render their voices explicit in my own textual production on Kofman, alongside other sources I use such as archive documents, letters, published interviews, her philosophical texts etc. In my presentation I’ll try to give an example of the outcome of this endeavour of 'multiple authorship' through the integration of different 'voices', woven into the texture of biography.

The specific setting of this kind of interview is linked to the philosophical context with which they deal. The original, philosophical setting of an interview is not the 'narrative', but the 'argumentative' form as constituted within the Platonic dialogues. Sarah Kofman’s approach to philosophy consists exactly in considering the specific setting of philosophical argumentation. For her, the philosopher who seeks truth is the counterpart of the sophist who plays with language and consequently, with truth. In the very setting of philosophical dialogue the one (let’s say: the interviewer) tries to seduce the other (the interviewee) in order to make him or her admit that both are stuck in an aporia, in a 'no-way-out' situation. The performance of supremacy of the Platonic 'interviewer' might only be a rhetorical technique to impress the interlocutor. For instance, the famous Socratic phrase "I know that I know nothing" is a symptom of this philosophical discourse of supremacy. At the same time, it risks becoming the phrase of an Oral History interviewer at times. In an attempt to criticise this discursive tradition, my paper will discuss the setting of the 'narrative interview' for its potential to challenge the hierarchical power relation within philosophical knowlegde production and to transform it into a more equal and democratic way of 'thinking together'. (Show less)

Ela Hornung : Different Settings? Narrative interviews versus psychoanalytical interviews
In this paper, I will focus on two different types of biographical narrative interviews: I will examine the differences and similarities between biographical narrative interviews in historical research and in psychoanalytical settings. I will focus on the aim of biographical interviews to produce biographical narrative historical data and on the ... (Show more)
In this paper, I will focus on two different types of biographical narrative interviews: I will examine the differences and similarities between biographical narrative interviews in historical research and in psychoanalytical settings. I will focus on the aim of biographical interviews to produce biographical narrative historical data and on the psychoanalytical interviews, which also aim at biographical data, but also at symptoms, conscious motives to undertake a therapy, the unconscious resistance and the very important point of the psycho-dynamic in general between the analyst and the interview partner. The dynamics of transference start from the first moment of contact. Psychodynamics is here understood as a communicative process between two persons, which derives from unconscious experience in the analytical situation and stimulates the behaviour and organises the information material. So it is possible that the interview is experienced as a trial or as permanent request to speak, which for this person means a conflicting situation. I will focus on some examples and aspects trying to reconstruct some viewpoints and important points. (Show less)



Theme by Danetsoft and Danang Probo Sayekti inspired by Maksimer