Introduction. A plural and antidogmatic tradition: the paths of Humanism

Abstract

In this introduction, the editorial and informative goals that this monographic issue on Humanism and on the scope of rhetoric as a philosophical tool are explained, and a brief review of the humanist tradition in Western thought and culture is made, beginning with the history of the term “humanism”, and its relationship with the concepts of paideia and humanitas, to continue with the development of humanist culture in Classical Antiquity and the Renaissance, its influence on the emergence of individualism, the plurality of ideas and the appraisement of imagination and ingenuity as a means of knowledge, its relationship with literature and aesthetics, and its frontal opposition to the various types of rationalist and universalist dogmatisms. In the final part a brief summary is made on the theme or perspective of each of the articles of this monographic number.