Narrative and Metaphor as Cognitive Instruments
Ortega y Gasset’s Work and the Linguistic Turn in Historical Theory
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15848/hh.v18.2402Keywords:
linguistic turn, José Ortega y Gasset, dramatic substancesAbstract
The notion of the linguistic turn and its implications became particularly prominent within Anglophone academic contexts, where it emerged as a central theme in discussions of historical theory. This article examines other intellectual traditions that, in different ways, also rearticulated the role of language and narrative in the constitution of historical knowledge, with particular attention to José Ortega y Gasset, whose contributions have frequently been neglected in these debates. Whereas Danto, Mink, and White, from an epistemological standpoint, treated narrative and metaphor as cognitive instruments, Ortega advanced an ontological framework that safeguards a place for historical reality. The aim here is not to present him as a precursor to the Anglophone formulations of the linguistic turn, but rather to demonstrate how, in parallel with these developments, he articulated modes of inquiry capable of preserving the domain of historical reality. Ortega consistently maintained attention to the ontological particularities of the human past. To elucidate these particularities, this article introduces two conceptual categories: entities that function analogously to dramas and dramatic substances.
Downloads
References
ANKERSMIT, F. Narrative Logic: A Semantic Analysis of Historian’s Language. Hague/Boston/London: Martinius Nijhoff Publishers, 1983.
ANKERSMIT, F. Historical Representation. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.
ANKERSMIT, F. Historia y Tropología: ascenso y caída de la metáfora. Ciudad de México: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2014.
BARTHES, R. Introduction à l’analyse structural des récits. In: Communications, no. 8, pp. 1 – 27, 1966.
DANTO, A. Narration and Knowledge. New York: Columbia University Press, 2007.
HEMPEL, C. The Function of General Laws in History. In: The Journal of Philosophy, vol. 39, no. 2, pp. 35 – 48, (Journal of Philosophy)1942
KELLNER, H. Language and historial representation: getting the history crooked, London: University of Wiscosin Press, 1989.
KOSELLECK, R. Estratos do Tempo: estudos sobre história. Rio de Janeiro: Contraponto, 2014.
MINK, L. Historical Understanding. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. El tema de nuestro tiempo [1923]. In: Obras Completas, tomo III. Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966, p. 141-242.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Unamuno y Europa, Fábula [1909]. In: Obras Completas, tomo I. Madrid, Revista de Occidente, 1966g, p. 128-132.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. La pedagogía social como programa político [1910]. In: Obras Completas, tomo I. Madrid, Revista de Occidente, 1966h, p. 503-522.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Renan [1909]. In: Obras Completas, tomo I. Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966f, p. 443-467.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Las dos grandes metáforas [1924]. In: Obras Completas, tomo II (1916-1934). Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1963, p. 387-402.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Kant: reflexiones del centenario [1924]. In: Obras Completas, Tomo IV. Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966d p. 25-48.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Ni racionalismo ni vitalismo [1924]. In: Obras Completas, tomo III. Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966a, p. 270 – 280.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Las Atlántidas [1924]. In: Obras Completas, tomo III, Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966b, p. 281-316.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. La deshumanización del arte [1925]. In: Obras Completas, tomo III. Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966c, p. 353-386.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. La “Filosofía de la Historia” de Hegel y la Historiología [1928]. In: Obras Completas, tomo IV, Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1966e, pp. 521- 541.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Historia como sistema [1935/1941]. In: Obras Completas, tomo VI (1941-1946). Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1964, p. 13-50.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. ¿Qué es filosofía?” [1929/1930]. In: Obras Completas, tomo VII (1948-1958). Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1964a, p. 275 – 440.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Idea del Teatro [1946]. In: Obras Completas, tomo VII (1948-1958). Madrid: Revista de Occidente, 1964b, p. 441 – 501.
ORTEGA Y GASSET, J. Sobre una nueva interpretación de la Historia Universal: exposición y examen de la obra de Arnold Toynbee: A Study of History [1948]. In: Obras Completas, tomo IX (1933 – 1948), Madrid: Taurus, 2010, pp. 1583-1900.
SAHLINS, M. Islas de Historia. Barcelona: Gedisa, 1997.
WHITE, H. Metahistory: historical imagination in nineteenth-century Europe. Baltimore and London: John Hopkings University Press, 1975.
WHITE, H. The historical text as verbal artifact. In: Tropics of Discourse: essays in cultural criticism. Baltimore; London: John Hopkings University Press, 1985.
WITTGENSTEIN, L. Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Translated by D. F. Pears and B. F. McGuiness. New York and London: Routledge, 1974.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Ulisses do Valle
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors hold the copyrights to the manuscripts submitted. História da Historiografia: International Journal for Theory and History of Historiography is authorized to publish the aforementioned text. Authors are solely responsible for data, concepts and opinions presented in the papers, along with the accuracy of document and bibliographical references.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
