Page - 30 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 03/01

30 | Christian Wessely www.jrfm.eu 2017, 3/1, 17–44 fUNCtiONAL ChArACteristiCs the sPeCifiC reCePtiON sitUAtiON Schleiermacher defined hermeneutics in summary as a process that seeks to remedy the fundamental misconceptions that encompass every human com- munication. such correction can be found in the circular and active interaction of reader and text30 that he deemed necessary for the reception process from its outset.31 An appropriate frame of comprehension (or texture in the case of comics) will allow a precise process-oriented understanding of the text. An earlier understanding is corrected and a hermeneutic draft simultaneously de- veloped, producing a profound new understanding of the texture, which be- comes its own pre-understanding (the hermeneutic circle). every texture can be considered, and every significant texture must be considered, in this light. And Hans-Georg Gadamer ponders whether it is truly sufficient for understanding to mean the avoidance of misunderstanding, for, he asks, does not every misun- derstanding require a supporting understanding?32 the supporting understanding that precedes every understanding – and also every misunderstanding – is tied to the possibility of comprehension or miscom- prehension. every texture is seen by the recipient through this precondition, and if a texture is incomprehensible, the reception is bound to fail. here we have a balance between precision and ambiguity: the richer a medium’s com- municative potential, the greater the challenge for the hermeneutic process; in reverse, however, an accurate and singular description – a mathematical for- mula, for example – has a minimum of hermeneutic requirements and a single possible meaning. The reception of comics as viewed in this context is very specific and ex- pressed synaesthetically: sound, smell, taste, and touch are transformed into the visual effect contained by the picture and the word; lines give the impres- sion of movement; time’s course is defined by the sequence of panels.33 Drech- sel/Funhoff/Hoffmann note that comics do not follow the laws of reality that we humans expect, with our logics of space, time, and dimension.34 A fine example of synaesthetical expression can be seen in fig. 11: while word and picture complement each other, the picture dominates; smell is expressed by facial colour and facial expression; the reproduction of the scene is accom- panied by sounds that can be “heard” in onomatopoetic articulation outside the speech bubbles (“fschchch”, “schnupper schnupper”), movement is por- 30 schleiermacher 1838, 30. 31 schleiermacher 1838, 189. While schleiermacher discusses the example of dialogue, his results are compelling for all forms of communication. 32 Gadamer 1990, vol. ii, 223. 33 Other media might utilize synaesthetic approaches, but only the comic is necessarily synaesthetic. 34 Drechsel/Funhoff/Hoffmann 1975, 94.