Book contents
- Kant on Language
- Kant on Language
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Linguistic Implications of Kant’s Thought
- Part II Historical and Philosophical Implications
- Chapter 8 Kant’s Vocabulary in Context
- Chapter 9 Cassirer on Kant and W. v. Humboldt on Language: “Die Freiheit und Selbständigkeit des geistigen Tuns”
- Chapter 10 Anthropology and the Deaf and Dumb
- Chapter 11 Not Those Who “All Speak with Pictures”
- Chapter 12 Like Entering a Bright Room?
- Chapter 13 Kant and the Moral Challenges of Rhetoric
- Chapter 14 Kant’s Inferentialism
- Chapter 15 Was Kant an Expressivist?
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 9 - Cassirer on Kant and W. v. Humboldt on Language: “Die Freiheit und Selbständigkeit des geistigen Tuns”
from Part II - Historical and Philosophical Implications
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 September 2025
Book contents
- Kant on Language
- Kant on Language
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- Part I Linguistic Implications of Kant’s Thought
- Part II Historical and Philosophical Implications
- Chapter 8 Kant’s Vocabulary in Context
- Chapter 9 Cassirer on Kant and W. v. Humboldt on Language: “Die Freiheit und Selbständigkeit des geistigen Tuns”
- Chapter 10 Anthropology and the Deaf and Dumb
- Chapter 11 Not Those Who “All Speak with Pictures”
- Chapter 12 Like Entering a Bright Room?
- Chapter 13 Kant and the Moral Challenges of Rhetoric
- Chapter 14 Kant’s Inferentialism
- Chapter 15 Was Kant an Expressivist?
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
According to Cassirer, Kant’s Critique achieves a new look at the dichotomy between “consciousness and actuality, the I-world and the world of things.” Indeed, the Critique of Reason “sets out a new positive concept of subjectivity and objectivity […]. The world of the subject and objects no longer stands as two opposing halves of one absolute being; rather, being constitutes one and the same realm of spiritual functions through which we obtain the content of both […]. This abstract result was introduced by Humboldt, through the mediation of language in the concrete consideration of spiritual life.” Humboldt seizes on a possibility indicated in the first Critique and builds his philosophy of language as a mediation of the subjective and the objective. This is an original way of understanding Humboldt. Understanding Humboldt’s philosophy of language in light of Kant will constitutes the first part of this chapter. In the second part, I spell out what this Humboldtian interpretation of language means for Cassirer. Cassirer sees Humboldt as a precursor to his own work on language. My chapter sheds light on a possibility regarding language indicated by Kant, worked out by Humboldt, and then exploited by Cassirer.
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- Kant on Language , pp. 160 - 177Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
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