Persuasiveness of the Words, Pictures and Gestures in the History of Political Ideas
Persuasiveness of the Words, Pictures and Gestures in the History of Political Ideas

Author(s): Béla Mester
Subject(s): History of ideas, Political history
Published by: Universitatea Petrol-Gaze din Ploieşti
Keywords: early modernity; theory of gestures; interpretation; history of political ideas;
Summary/Abstract: A historian of political ideas used to interpret the words of political communities, pictures shown by them, and their gestures as political acts. During the interpretation, the switch between the analyses of the former three is often problematic. Interpretation of the words causes the fewest problems, and we have methods for the interpretation of pictures from the history of arts. In the intellectual history, the Cambridge school had offered a method for taking “the text in context”, using the term of “writing act” in the historical analysis, based on the philosophies of “speech acts.” Deep researches of the Cambridge school have re-established the authority and role of rhetoric in political philosophy, at least in its historical concern. “Pictorial turn” has offered the term of “pictorial speech act” for the theory and history of the religious and secularised fine arts. However, the terms of “writing act” and “pictorial act” are relatively new tools for the intellectual history, and their usage is abundant in theoretical problems; the real trouble has emerged, when the picture starts moving, or the talking person makes gestures. At first we think the cause of the trouble that of the authors of our written sources; later we understand that it is in our own point of view; finally, we recognise that the theories of the history of philosophy about the relationship between the picture and word are useless for our aims. The solution is hidden in a theory of gestures, developed independently from the theories of pictures, and languages. I have met this problem at first in my researches concerning English classics. In the present lecture I will show early modern instances from the history of religion and political ideas, with an analysis of the parallel reasoning by words, pictures and gestures in historical situations of early modernity.

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