Garfinkel’s Ethnomethodology (EM) at its core involves a praxeological, or interactional, respecification of Gestalt phenomena. In early EM, this is pursued through the development of a category of praxeological Gestalten in which social facts (or social units) are respecified as Gestalt phenomena, where members are the constituents and the social unit is the whole or Gestalt, produced praxeologically by the methodic work of its members. In later work, Garfinkel would praxeologically transpose traditional perceptual Gestalt phenomena, such as music, to explore (...) the interactional work done in the production and perception of those phenomena. In developing EM by praxeologically reconfiguring Gestaltism, Garfinkel drew on the constitutive phenomenology of Aron Gurwitsch, wherein Gurwitsch sought to integrate Gestalt Psychology and phenomenology. In drawing on Gurwitsch, while also being informed by the work of Schütz and, later, Merleau-Ponty, EM is often depicted as either heavily indebted to phenomenology or as a distinct type of phenomenology: praxeological phenomenology, perhaps. At the same time, parallels have been drawn between Ludwig Wittgenstein’s later work and EM, since Garfinkel’s Studies in Ethnomethodology was published in 1967. The parallels drawn have often centred on the treatment of rules and rule-following and on the similarities in the treatment of meaning in EM and in Wittgenstein’s later work. However, given the centrality of Gestalt psychology to the development of EM, it is worth noting that in his later manuscripts Wittgenstein discussed Gestalt phenomena and Gestalt Psychology extensively and in ways that often anticipate what Garfinkel would do with Gestaltist ideas. It is, therefore, worth exploring the similarities and differences between Wittgenstein’s, Gurwitsch’s and Garfinkel’s engagement with Gestaltism. This is what I seek to do in this article. In conclusion, I propose that EM should be seen, like Wittgenstein, as post-phenomenological. (shrink)

1 Context The idea for the current issue of Philosophia Scientiæ emerged from discussions which took place in the Manchester Ethnomethodology Reading Group. This reading group has its origins in Wes Sharrock’s weekly discussion groups, which have taken place in Manchester (UK) since the early 1970s. As the global Covid-19 pandemic hit in early 2020, the reading group moved online, facilitated by Phil Hutchinson and Alex Holder. Being an online reading group opened up participation to people b...

Wittgenstein frequently uses the word 'aspect' (Aspekt) in his writings from 1947 to 1949. There he uses the word along with aspect-seeing and aspect-change, so that readers are misled into thinking his primary concern in using the word is something like Gestalt psychology or philosophy of psychology per se. However, Wittgenstein's late treatment of aspect is only a special case of a more general problem, namely phenomenology. In the middle-period writings, the word 'aspect' refers to a phenomenological object. Basically, Wittgenstein's (...) aspect means the way an object appears to us. For him, an 'aspect' is a phenomenological object. (shrink)

Rush Rhees, Elizabeth Anscombe and Georg Henrik von Wright were Wittgenstein’s literary heirs and edited many posthumous volumes from Wittgenstein’s writings. Their archived correspondence provides unique insights into this editorial work. The selection of letters written by Rhees which is presented here stems from an early phase of his editorial endeavour to shed light on Wittgenstein’s philosophical development between the _TLP_ and the _PI_. The letters were written between 1962 and 1964, in connection with the volume that appeared as _Philosophische (...) Bemerkungen_, and show how Rhees’ understanding of Wittgenstein’s texts developed during editing. They contain some of the central considerations that governed Rhees’ work as Wittgenstein’s literary executor. (shrink)

Philosophical Investigations, Volume 45, Issue 2, Page 107-129, April 2022.