Continental philosophy is a term originally coined by English-speaking philosophers, especially those associated with analytic philosophy to designate several philosophical traditions from continental Europe (especially Germany and then France). In use, the term continental philosophy corresponds to the Roman-Germanic tradition. In contrast, the other philosophy is that of British tradition. Asian philosophy is excluded from this classification which concerns only Western philosophy.
Extension of this concept
The term includes in a rather vague way:
- phenomenology of Husserl or Maurice Merleau-Ponty;
- fundamental ontology of Martin Heidegger;
- philosophy of the living or metaphysical reason of the human life of José Ortega y Gasset;
- genealogical criticism of Friedrich Nietzsche and Michel Foucault;
- psychoanalysis;
- existentialism;
- Marxism, except analytical Marxism;
- structuralism in the human sciences inspired by Claude Lévi-Strauss or Michel Foucault;
- hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer or Paul Ricœur;
- deconstruction of Jacques Derrida;
- critical theory of the Frankfurt School.
Use
The term is mostly used by non-European philosophers or departments of the humanities to describe an activity in contrast to analytic philosophy, and sometimes more popular outside the realm of the natural sciences, in the social sciences or even in aesthetics, literature, in cinema theory or in architecture.
A classificatory or controversial concept?
Contrary to the concept that is opposed to it, that of “analytic philosophy”, few people explicitly claim this tradition. The claims are from Marxism, phenomenology, etc., never of “continental philosophy”. However, the concept has spread over time and some people use it more positively, for example the Nota bene editions that created the Continental Philosophy Collection. We can also mention the specialist in intellectual history, Peter Gordon, who, in Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos, intends to show that the continental philosophy was divided between two main trends at the meeting between Cassirer and Heidegger to Davos in 1929.
Historically, this concept was created as a negative, privative concept, used to collect everything that does not belong to the analytic philosophy. There is not really a positive characteristic that is common to the great diversity of movements that we gather under this term.
One can wonder if the main function of this concept is truly classificatory (if the concept has a genuine theoretical content, if its instances have real common properties), or if it is not rather controversial. In the latter case, this concept would serve to form a set in relation to which “analytic philosophy” can position itself, that is to say, often, to which it can oppose.
Historically, the concept was initially controversial; it is possible that contemporary companies aiming at a dialogue between the two “traditions” will partially neutralize the controversial charge of this concept. Will it win a real positive classificatory usefulness?
Debate between analytical and continental philosophies
In a general way, so-called continental philosophers accuse the so-called analytical philosophy of naively repeating a scientific and formalistic perspective without asking enough questions about its presuppositions, whereas so-called analytic philosophy accuses so-called continental philosophy of making exegesis of authorities to clarify philosophical problems and to argue for their solution. Some argue that Alfred North Whitehead’s philosophy avoids analytic-continental breaking.
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