Epoché: A Journal for the History of Philosophy

Volume 8, Issue 1, Fall 2003

Reading the History of Philosophy

Kant, Heidegger and the Performative Character of Language in the First Critique

By tracing the discourse employed by Critical philosophy back to a pre-predicative level of language, this paper adds a dimension to Heidegger’s retrieval of Kant. By making explicit the role that language plays in the first Critique—both in the development of the transcendental schema of knowledge in the Transendental Analytic and the determination of the boundaries of pure reason in the Transcendental Dialectic—a bridge is formed between Heidegger’s hermeneutics and Kant’s critical enterprise. Heidegger’s destructive-retrieval of Kant’s thought is then seen to hinge as much on exploring the issue of language, as it is on the issue of temporality.