Abstract

A hermeneutics of ignorance may, at first, appear to be a contradiction in terms. Yet, ignorance and stupidity remain a pressing issue in the realm of today’s public discourse. The form this takes concerns, not the actual intelligence of people per se, but rather the use of the denomination of ‘stupidity’ as an active framing of debate, or the use of perceived ignorance to strategically organise individuals, publics and audiences. This offers a challenge to hermeneutic practice; or, at least, a pause for reconsidering some of the assumed figures that govern the hermeneutic endeavour, namely dialogue and intelligibility. In this paper, I want to sketch out some provisional areas of consideration for such a challenge and its potential response. Focusing on one aspect of the contemporary media milieu – the work of the spoiler and the trigger – I want to suggest how the digital ecology through which much of public discourse takes place requires adjustments to hermeneutic approaches, and the implications of these to what a hermeneutics of ignorance might look like.