Across the Fence: Verstehen

Today, I have chosen a Germanism in the English Language that touches on psychology as well as sociology. It is called Verstehen (pronounce: fair-shtay-enn, meaning understanding). Very obviously, it goes beyond the mere hearing of what somebody else is saying. It is not a physical event but a motivated psychological one. Now, what does that mean, and when was this concept of Verstehen conceived?

In the 19th century, German philosopher Droysen came up with differentiating between Nature which could be scientifically explained, and Time, which meant one had to deal with understanding history. History involves human beings at every step, and they have to be seen in their social surroundings. Basically, it means to put oneself into the shoes of the “actor” (the person who does something), in order to understand his reasons to act in a specific way.

To me this also implies that if you want to understand one single person’s motivations, you have to understand the society that is surrounding them and the history that has shaped that specific society at a specific point in time. Meaning, I cannot isolate a person from their sociological background as well as I cannot isolate a society from the history it has experienced. But isn’t this some Herculean task, pretty much impossible to be undertaken?

Sokrates said that he knew that he knew nothing. And in this context, it might be easy to understand why he came up with this. Knowledge is a bottomless pit (although I’d rather define it as “the sky is the limit”). Once you start out at a single point, you find that there is so much more to know. In order to understand a single person, you have to know about their individual (hi)story and their influential peers. You then have to know where those peers come from. You have to read up on what the history of a people, of political borders and their shifting, what economy and environment did to a society and/or a nation.

Verstehen is not to assume or to label somebody because one THINKS one knows them. Verstehen implies that all human beings are similar in their basic needs, no matter where they hail from. Thus, implicitly, the benchmark for Verstehen is that all human beings have been created equally. I can’t understand somebody if I measure/analyze them by different standards than anybody else. Only in using the same method of understanding for everybody will I figure out the individual motivation for acting, the individual sources for motivation. There is no putting oneself above or below another human being in trying to understand them. Again, it’s putting oneself in that individual’s shoes.

It’s as in having a cup of coffee. Everybody who orders one, obviously wants one. But the ingredients might differ. So, the need is the same; we sometimes simply just have a gumption for a slightly different flavor. Maybe even for a different container. I, for one, dislike cups that are made from anything else than china. I grew up like this. I’m sitting down and drinking my cup at a table. That doesn’t mean that somebody else does it wrong; they may have a reason to prefer a thermos cup or a paper one, a sleeve or a straw, a shot of milk or of sweetening syrup. Everybody buying their coffee comes from a different place and has a different destination.

Verstehen doesn’t mean labeling. Labeling is the first step to libeling. Verstehen means to listen very closely. I hope we learn this more again in our shaken world. There is a load to learn about everybody out there. And isn’t learning always exciting?!