Entre traditions: compréhension et altérité

In this paper I try to explore the nature of intercultural understanding with the help of a clarification of the basic presuppositions of understanding in general. Since understanding is always meeting something strange, coming to terms with this alterity is always implied in situations of interpretation. At the same time, understanding has to take as point of departure a previously given framework of knowledge, evaluations, and presuppositions. Consequently, understanding always takes place on the basis of a tradition and facing an alterity to be interpreted, and this structure necessarily occurs in situations of intercultural understanding. Taking the description of historical understanding given by Gadamer’s hermeneutics as a model of intercultural understanding, I argue that every understanding presupposes a set of shared assumptions and convictions, the existence of which cannot be guaranteed in advance by any technique or method. This argument marks a clear limit of efforts of understanding between cultures which can be overcome only by bilateral openness and good will.