Mapping the aliran of the academic discipline of entrepreneurship: A ...

1.1.2 Philosophy
1.1.2.00 What is knowledge, how is knowledge constituted, and who can consider
what is acceptable knowledge? Questions of this nature tend to fall within the field of
philosophy and for this reason this dissertation has a philosophical perspective that is
introduced in this section.
1.1.2.01 This dissertation takes a philosophical approach involving ‘philosophy-as-
in-concepts’ and in particular the application of these concepts. It intends to add a
pragmatic slant to what is traditionally, particularly in regards to the works of Foucault
and Heidegger, taken as less than pragmatic, philosophically. This pragmatism is from a
‘know-how’, r ather than a ‘know-that’ perspective is discussed further in section 1.2.
1.1.2.02 The question of knowledges in their plurality and how they are treated within
the concepts of epistemology and ontology are an integral part to this discussion. The
relationship between ontology and epistemology has been described as confused [Gruber,
1993]. This dissertation intends to offer a delineation to reduce such confusion.
Heidegger’s work ‘Being and time’ is considered an author itative text on ontology while
Foucault’s work on knowledge and in particular the aspects of power on knowledge are an
integral part of epistemology, be ing t he theor y of knowledge. Bot h are drawn on.
1.1.2.03 From Foucault the lineage of archaeology is used in this dissertation as the
philosophical method as opposed to the ahistorical nature of the genealogy, another
philosophical method outlined by Foucault. While traditionally associated with lineage the
term genealogy has been re-assigned a role as another form of ‘strategic apparatus’ to
deconstruct or to create another reality using the ahistorical. To avoid confusion, I use the
word lineage instead of genealogy, in this dissertation, when discussing the aspect of the
flow of knowledge and ideas over time. While the term genealogy is often associated with
Nietzsche’s [1998], ‘On the genealogy of morality’ it can in itself trace a lineage back to
Schopenhauer’s [1995] ‘On the basis of morality’. In the do wnstream lineage from
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