Language and Hermeneutics in John Dewey's Theory of Inquiry.

After defining hermeneutics as the systematic and justified revelation of a meaning, I will try to demonstrate in my paper that John Dewey's theory of inquiry is a type of hermeneutics. I consider that Dewey's hermeneutics is highly comprehensive, since it also examines the meanings which man creates when interpreting nature. In order to prove it, I will analyse the novel Baltagul [The Hatchet] written by a famous Romanian writer, Mihail Sadoveanu, trying to show that both the main character, Vitoria Lipan, in her detective investigations, and the hermeneut, who -- at a different level -- looks for the hidden meaning of the novel, follow the same Deweyan "pattern of inquiry". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]