Hermeneutics of suspicion

The hermeneutics of suspicion is a style of literary interpretation in which texts are read with skepticism in order to expose their purported repressed or hidden meanings.

This mode of interpretation was conceptualized by Paul Ricœur, inspired by the works of what he called the three "masters of suspicion" (French: maîtres du soupçon): Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, and Friedrich Nietzsche,^: 33, 35 who, he believed, shared a similar view of consciousness as false. Ricœur's term "school of suspicion" (French: école du soupçon) refers to his association of his theory with the writings of the three, who themselves never used this term,^: 32 and was coined in Freud and Philosophy (1965).^: 2 This school is defined by a belief that the straightforward appearances of texts are deceptive or self-deceptive and that explicit content hides deeper meanings or implications.