| “Continental philosophy” is the curious name used to designate philosophy – or, rather, a large number of philosophies – on the continent of Europe over the past two centuries or so, roughly since the work of Immanuel Kant at the very end of the eighteenth century. Since it is a label that is more appropriate overseas than in Europe itself, it is bound to generate a certain amount of confusion. For instance, apart from such well-known names as Hegel, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre, there is no agreed-upon group of philosophers who form the continental canon. Nor does “continental philosophy” refer to any single identifiable kind of philosophy, style, concern, or tradition. Indeed, what is called “continental philosophy” includes a good number of literary theorists and writers, sociologists, social critics, psychoanalysts, and political activists, many of whom would not normally be considered (nor would they have considered themselves) philosophers. Much less does “continental philosophy” mark off a particular piece of territory. What goes on under that label is now being produced at a much more prodigious rate in the United Kingdom, the Americas, and Australasia than in Europe, where much of the philosophizing has turned to linguistic matters and more “analytic” issues. Nor does the label mark off any particular temperament or method. Hegel and Kierkegaard, just to name two of the earlier authors discussed in this Guide, share very little of either temperament or method other than a few fancy terms (most of them ironically adopted by Kierkegaard to mock the Hegelian project). The existentialists reject the idealists, and the postmodernists reject the existentialists. Indeed, it too often seems that the primary function of the phrase “continental philosophy” is to mark off an artificial battle line between so-called “analytic” and “continental” philosophers, where the only thing that is clear is that the two are hostile, suspicious, or at best merely tolerant of each other. |