ABSTRACT
Ernst Cassirer's debt to the tradition of German idealist thought with regard to the aesthetics of poetic, or symbolic, forms will be apparent even from brief statement about his own theory. Several fundamental criteria for the concept of Culture may be defined from Johann Gottfried Herder's foundational writings about the philosophy of history that continue to be important in Cassirer's philosophy of culture. This chapter suggests that Cassirer's term Kulturwissenschaften may be regarded as synonymous with Wilhelm Dilthey's more familiar Geisteswissenschaften, at least insofar as Cassirer consistently attributes a spiritual component to the activity which constitutes the conscious understanding of symbolic forms. It deals with current debate concerning the nature and function of 'Cultural Studies' within the Humanities is the question of the status of Culture as a constituent aspect of university education. The chapter argues that Cassirer's concept must be seen as incompatible with much of what currently is celebrateci under the heading of Cultural Studies.
