The term “explication” has its root in the Latin word “explicare,” which means literally “to unfold.” When we explicate a text what we are trying to do is to unfold or unravel the author’s basic position in this text. Think of a philosophical work as a “gorgon’s knot” that must be carefully pulled apart in order to discover the essence of the author’s position. In explicating a text, all we expect you to do is to be able to explain the author’s position in as simple terms as possible.There are three steps involved in the act of explicating a text:
1.
Stating the Author’s Thesis:
The thesis of a text is that overall point that the author is trying to make in the work. Authors typically will reveal the thesis of their work in their preface, introduction or first chapter. In other words, read the beginning of the work carefully in order to determine its overriding thesis. The first book of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, for example, enables the careful reader to summarize the thesis of the work in the following way: “Happiness is the supreme good of human existence. It is achieved through the possession of virtue, although other worldly goods, such as health, wealth and friendship, are also necessary in order to ensure supreme happiness.”
2. Outlining the Author’s Arguments:
Arguments are the building blocks that a philosopher will use to advance his thesis. Remember: every book has a point that it is trying to make. Every author is trying to “sell” you something. The point that the author is trying to make, the thing that he is trying to sell you, is the thesis of the text. Arguments are the tools that author uses to sell you his thesis. Unless an author backs up his thesis with strong arguments, his thesis is nothing more than mere opinion.
We will see later that arguments can either be sound or unsound. Right now it is simply important to be able to identify an author’s arguments, and to understand how he uses them to support his thesis.
3. Summing Up the Author’s Position (in your own words, of course):
A position (literally “that which is put forth”) is nothing more than the author’s thesis combined with the arguments that he uses to support that thesis. It is extremely important for you to be able to sum up the author’s position in your own language in order to demonstrate that you fully understand what he is arguing for or against.
To give you an example of what we mean by a position, a political candidate who is asked to give his position on the death penalty might respond in the following way: “It’s my belief that the death penalty is dead wrong (thesis). In the first place, it is far more expensive than life in prison (argument 1), and in the second place it can lead to the State mistakenly taking the life of an innocent person (argument 2).” Of course, a philosophical position will probably be much longer and more complicated than the one used in this example, but it will still always involve some thesis supported by some kind of arguments
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© 2000, Michael S. Russo. For more information contact: mrusso@molloy.edu
