010094 VO Intercultural Philosophy (2026S)

In view of an accelerating, profound, and radical process of globalization and pluralization, and the inevitable confrontation and mutual interpenetration of cultures and ways of life of the most diverse origins, religions and worldviews are encountering each other on a much broader and more intense scale than ever before in history. Religious wars and religiously motivated terrorism document the enormous potential for conflict inherent in religious diversity and call for intensified efforts to promote understanding in order to foster constructive change in how religions perceive themselves and others and in their capacity for pluralism. Here, philosophy has the task of establishing a cross-cultural basis for communication and exploring universally binding and transculturally acceptable foundations for orientation.
The first part of the lecture clarifies the basic concepts and epistemological foundations of intercultural philosophy: in addition to a critical discussion of the guiding concepts of philosophy, religion, and culture, this primarily concerns the claims to validity and limits of validity of reason, language, and logic in a global philosophical context. The second part of the lecture provides an overview of the basic concepts and positions of contemporary intercultural philosophical discourse and addresses the basic methodological rules of intra- and intercultural hermeneutics. In the third part, we will examine specific new approaches within intercultural philosophy. In addition to Ken Wilber's concept of integral hermeneutics and Perry Schmidt-Leukel's concept of fractal hermeneutics of religious traditions, Hans P. Sturm's transcultural philosophy will also be covered in the lecture.
For a detailed program/overview of topics, see Moodle.
Method: Lecture with discussion.