Alasdair MacIntyre’s contribution to communication theory

This article provides an account of Alasdair MacIntyre’s contribution to communication theory. That contribution is made explicit through a comparison between MacIntyre and Thomas Kuhn. The article begins with a review of Kuhn’s incommensurability thesis, followed by a summary of the intellectual debates in which MacIntyre situates his position. It then presents MacIntyre’s analysis of the incommensurability of traditions, followed by an account of his model of communication and dialogue. It will be shown that MacIntyre’s answer to the problem of rational choice between incommensurable traditions is a direct consequence of his nuanced analysis of translation and understanding.