This thesis explores and discusses foundational issues concerning the relationship between phenomenological philosophy and the enactive approach to cognitive science, with the aim of clarifying, developing, and promoting the project of enactive phenomenology. This project is framed by three general ideas: 1) that the sciences of mind need a phenomenological grounding, 2) that the enactive approach is the currently most promising attempt to provide mind science with such a grounding, and 3) that this attempt involves both a naturalization of phenomenology (...) and a phenomenologization of the concept of nature. More specifically, enactive phenomenology is the project of pursuing mutually illuminative exchanges between, on the one hand, phenomenological investigations of the structures of lived experience and embodied existence and, on the other, scientific accounts of mind and life – in particular those framed by theories of biological self-organization. The thesis consists of two parts. Part one is an introductory essay that seeks to clarify some of enactive phenomenology’s overarching philosophical commitments by tracing some of its historical roots. Part two is a compilation of four articles, each of which intervenes in a different contemporary debate relevant to the dissertation’s project. (shrink)

Since its inception, phenomenological philosophy has exerted an influence on empirical science. But what is the best way to practice, use and apply phenomenology in a non‐philosophical context? How deeply rooted in phenomenological philosophy must qualitative research be in order to qualify as phenomenological? How many of the core commitments of phenomenology must it accept? In the following contribution, I will take a closer look at Max van Manen's work. I will argue that van Manen's understanding of and presentation of (...) phenomenology is quite problematic and that his book Phenomenology of Practice rather than amounting to a clear and accessible presentation of the phenomenological method that would make it do‐able to researchers who are not themselves professional philosophers is in fact both abstruse and excessively complicated. I will then turn to nursing, and by taking that as my example, outline a better way to apply and practice phenomenology. (shrink)

Whereas classical Critical Theory has tended to view phenomenology as inherently uncritical, the recent upsurge of what has become known as critical phenomenology has attempted to show that phenomenological concepts and methods can be used in critical analyses of social and political issues. A recent landmark publication, 50 Concepts for Critical Phenomenology, contains no reference to psychiatry and psychopathology, however. This is an unfortunate omission, since the tradition of phenomenological psychiatry—as we will demonstrate in the present article by surveying and (...) discussing the contribution of Jaspers, Minkowski, Laing, Basaglia, and Fanon—from the outset has practiced critical thinking, be it at the theoretical, interpersonal, institutional, or political level. Fanon is today a recognized figure in critical phenomenology, even if his role in psychiatry might not yet have been appreciated as thoroughly as his anticolonial and antiracist contributions. But as we show, he is part of a long history of critical approaches in psychopathology and psychiatry, which has firm roots in the phenomenological tradition, and which keeps up its critical work today. (shrink)

Husserl’s (2023) “Paradox of the Psychological Reduction,” with support and elucidation from Husserl’s published writings, shows the necessity of employing the phenomenological epoché and reduction in order to perform valid psychological research. The relationship between the transcendental and psychological reductions, including their closeness, differences, and peculiar identity are explored. Although necessary, the phenomenological method does not guarantee true psychological knowledge but rather requires a reflexive, self-critical, self-corrective historical process that confronts and overcomes naturalistic prejudice and other misguiding assumptions and dogma (...) as well as superficial and flawed research performances. Phenomenological psychology and philosophy are inseparable, in a bidirectional relationship that informs the socio-cultural sciences including empirical psychology and all disciplines that study persons, communities, human artifacts, and humanity. The implications and relevance of phenomenological method are spelled out in light of the history and contemporary challenges of psychology. (shrink)

This article further systematizes the existential body, contributing to the ethnographic model of embodied objectivity. It situates embodiment as the foundation of knowledge, demonstrating its underdevelopment in anthropological literature. The paper explores the philosophical relationship between being-in-the-world and Merleau-Ponty’s body-proper, emphasizing the central role of embodied pre-objective signification in representational ethnographic knowing. This aspect is often insufficiently addressed, particularly in light of certain ethnographic applications of the epoché. The paper concludes that, given the oscillatory apprehension of embodiment, the use of (...) terms like “systematizing” and “inter-objectivity” adequately enhances its portrayal as a pre-objective phenomenon rather than an objective one. (shrink)

In recent years there has been a notable increase in the use of phenomenology as a research method, particularly in educational research. With the rise of phenomenology as a research method, confusion has also arisen concerning what counts as phenomenology, and how best to practice phenomenological research in non-philosophical contexts. Consequently, this article will be concerned with three issues: firstly, to contextualise the debate, I provide a brief overview of three popular and influential approaches to phenomenology as a research method: (...) (1) Giorgi’s descriptive phenomenological method; (2) van Manen’s hermeneutic phenomenology; and, (3) Smith’s interpretative phenomenological analysis; secondly, for the sake of conceptual clarity, I then turn my attention to a critical discussion of these approaches and argue that these approaches tend to converge phenomenology into either a descriptive or interpretative focus that essentially transforms phenomenology into a kind of solipsist subjectivism; and, lastly, to progress the debate forward, I argue that it makes sense to look beyond the qualitative or educational research literature to successful applications of phenomenology in non-philosophical contexts because there are plenty of relevant resources that can offer significant theoretical and methodological support to researchers. (shrink)

In this article, I introduce engaged phenomenology as an approach through which phenomenologists can more explicitly and critically consider the generative conditions and implications of their rese...

In the present article, I introduce Husserl’s analyses of ‘natural causality’ and ‘volitional causality’, which are collected in the volume ‘Wille und Handlung’ of the Husserliana edition Studien zur Struktur des Bewußtseins. My aim is to show that Husserl’s insight into these phenomena enables us to understand more clearly both the specificity of, and the relation between, the motivational nexus belonging to the sphere of the will in contrast with the causal laws of nature. In light of this understanding, in (...) the last part of the article I reflect on whether and to what extent there is, in fact, an ontological and epistemological compatibility between volitional causality and natural causality. (shrink)

Today, there is a considerable interest in phenomenology within psychiatric academic communities as well as among clinical practitioners; as a result, a growing number of institutions demonstrate their commitment to phenomenology as a privileged speculative companion. The main focus of existing teaching programs in phenomenology is usually placed on psychopathological issues and on describing the experience of mental illness from a non-naturalistic and person-centered perspective. In this article, I argue that phenomenological training should also be focused on the role of (...) the psychiatrist in providing such a phenomenologically informed patient-centered approach. In this perspective, phenomenological interviews such as EASE, EAWE and EAFI appear to be a particularly relevant form of training, as they allow the trainee to engage actively in the learning process. To focus on the person of the psychiatrist allows, however, to reconsider the meaning of the clinician’s neutrality, advocated by the authors of the phenomenological interviews. The attitude produced by adopting the phenomenological approach should instead be described as a particular reflective attitude which allows for paying attention to the embodied dimension of experience. This attitude differs from both the neutrality associated with the objectivity of classic psychiatry, and the neutrality to which a psychoanalyst strives. By taking into account embodied awareness as characteristic of phenomenological attitude, one then may address, through training, the specifics of phenomenological practice, such as its unstable and laborious nature, its integration in the lived experience, and the challenge that it poses to the psychiatrist’s scientific background. (shrink)

This paper considers what Günter Figal’s perspective on objectivity and more generally, his hermeneutic phenomenology, may contribute to the traditions of phenomenological psychological research, as well as non-phenomenological approaches to qualitative research. Across qualitative research approaches and methods developed outside of phenomenology over the past 30–40 years, there has been a trend away from notions of consciousness and subjectivity, as well as objectivity. Günter Figal’s hermeneutical phenomenology retrieves these key ideas and recasts them with greater clarity and precision. These ideas, (...) in conjunction with an understanding of the philosophical position of critical realism, suggest renewed possibilities and significant places for both objectivity and subjectivity within both phenomenological and non-phenomenological psychological qualitative research. (shrink)

This essay discusses the normative significance of the spatial dimension of conflict events. Drawing on qualitative interviews conducted with political actors – politicians, officials, and activists – and on Heidegger’s account of spatiality in Being and Time, I will argue that the experience of conflict space is co-constituted by the respective conflict participants, as well as the location where the conflict unfolds. Location and conflict parties’ (self-)understandings ‘open up’ a space that enables and constrains ways of seeing and acting. Yet, (...) a purely transcendental phenomenology will remain oblivious to the quasi-transcendental, societal structures of power that shape a person’s conflict experience. To illuminate these facets of the phenomenon, phenomenology has to join forces with critical theory. Introducing Garland-Thomson’s feminist distinction of fit/misfit, I will illustrate how power shapes conflict space in manifold ways. The essay thereby fills a gap in the philosophical literature that rarely analyses political conflict as a phenomenon sui generis. (shrink)

The paper aims to contribute to the ongoing conversation on critical phenomenology with reflections on its method. The key argument is that critical phenomenology should be understood as a form of historico-transcendental inquiry and therefore it cannot forgo the phenomenological reduction. Rather, this methodological step should be centered in critical phenomenology, and appropriated in problematized and rethought forms. The methodological assessment of critical phenomenology has implications also for how we read its canon. The paper shows that while Simone de Beauvoir (...) did not adopt the phenomenological reduction in its full Husserlian meaning, her analyses of experience did not remain on the level of personal or experiential description either. The contention is that if we want to read her as a critical phenomenologist, we should focus on her seminal modification of the historico-transcendental method of phenomenology. (shrink)

The paper aims to contribute to the ongoing conversation on critical phenomenology with reflections on its method. The key argument is that critical phenomenology should be understood as a form of historico-transcendental inquiry and therefore it cannot forgo the phenomenological reduction. Rather, this methodological step should be centered in critical phenomenology, and appropriated in problematized and rethought forms. The methodological assessment of critical phenomenology has implications also for how we read its canon. The paper shows that while Simone de Beauvoir (...) did not adopt the phenomenological reduction in its full Husserlian meaning, her analyses of experience did not remain on the level of personal or experiential description either. The contention is that if we want to read her as a critical phenomenologist, we should focus on her seminal modification of the historico-transcendental method of phenomenology. (shrink)

Phenomenology of illness has grown increasingly popular in recent times. However, the most prominent phenomenologists of illness defend a psychologizing notion of phenomenology, which argues that illness is primarily constituted by embodied experiences, feelings, and emotions of suffering, alienation etc. The article argues that this gives rise to three issues that need to be addressed. (1) How is the theory of embodiment compatible with the strong distinction between disease and illness? (2) What is the difference between problematic embodiment and illness? (...) (3) How is existential edification, that illness can give rise to according to the phenomenologists, to be understood? The article then engages in an analysis of Heidegger’s and Waldenfels’ phenomenology with the ambition of developing a notion of existence, which can transgress the psychologization of illness. Rather than arguing that illness is constituted by experiences of suffering and alienation, it emphasizes that broaches upon conatively guided activities constitute illness. (shrink)

There is an absence in the literature on sports of a conceptualization of what in French are labeled sports de glisse: sports that imply gliding on water, through air, and on snow and ice, such as surfing, paragliding, skiing, and skating. Inspired by Ingold’s (1993) concept of the taskscape, we introduce the idea of the glidescape: a perceptual field in which gliding sports practitioners inhabit, create, and transform their environment while at the same time being recreated and transformed themselves. Using (...) an applied phenomenological approach, we describe the main experiential qualities and structure of the glidescape. In the quest for extended phases of effortless movement, gliders engage in a clearly accentuated rhythm with sharp contrasts between forceful effort and smooth effortlessness based on a fine-tuned proprioceptive sense for material and ecological resonance, which opens fleeting and emplaced moments of freedom and authenticity. (shrink)

In this article, we develop a new approach to integrating philosophical phenomenology with qualitative research. The approach uses phenomenology’s concepts, namely existentials, rather than methods such as the epoché or reductions. We here introduce the approach to both philosophers and qualitative researchers, as we believe that these studies are best conducted through interdisciplinary collaboration. In section 1, we review the debate over phenomenology’s role in qualitative research and argue that qualitative theorists have not taken full advantage of what philosophical phenomenology (...) has to offer, thus motivating the need for new approaches. In section 2, we introduce our alternative approach, which we call Phenomenologically Grounded Qualitative Research (PGQR). Drawing parallels with phenomenology’s applications in the cognitive sciences, we explain how phenomenological grounding can be used to conceptually front-load a qualitative study, establishing an explicit focus on one or more structures of human existence, or of our being in the world. In section 3, we illustrate this approach with an example of a qualitative study carried out by one of the authors: a study of the existential impact of early parental bereavement. In section 4, we clarify the kind of knowledge that phenomenologically grounded studies generate and how it may be integrated with existing approaches. (shrink)

This study clarifies the need for a renewed account of the body in physiotherapy to fill sizable gaps between physiotherapeutical theory and practice. Physiotherapists are trained to approach bodily functioning from an objectivist perspective; however, their therapeutic interactions with patients are not limited to the provision of natural-scientific explanations. Physiotherapists’ practice corresponds well to theorisation of the body as the bearer of original bodily intentionality, as outlined by Merleau-Ponty and elaborated upon by enactivists. We clarify how physiotherapeutical practice corroborates Merleau-Ponty’s (...) critical arguments against objectivist interpretations of the body; particularly, his analyses demonstrate that norms of optimal corporeal functioning are highly individual and variable in time and thus do not directly depend on generic physiological structures. In practice, objectively measurable physical deviations rarely correspond to specific subjective difficulties and, similarly, patients’ reflective insights into their own motor deficiencies do not necessarily produce meaningful motor improvements. Physiotherapeutical procedures can be understood neither as mechanical manipulations of patients’ machine-like bodies by experts nor as a process of such manipulation by way of instructing patients’ explicit conscious awareness. Rather, physiotherapeutical practice and theory can benefit from the philosophical interpretation of motor disorders as modifications of bodily intentionality. Consequently, motor performances addressed in physiotherapy are interpreted as relational features of a living organism coupled with its environment, and motor disorders are approached as failures to optimally manage the motor requirements of a given situation owing to a relative loss of the capacity to structure one’s relation with their environment through motor action. Building on this, we argue that the process of physiotherapy is most effective when understood as a bodily interaction to guide patients towards discovering better ways of grasping a situation as meaningful through bodily postures and movements. (shrink)

In this paper, I contend that the narrative presented in Husserl’s recently translated Text 7 is a strikingly clear affirmation and vindication of the psychological adaptation of phenomenology developed by Amedeo Giorgi. I argue that Giorgi’s methodological advocacy of the epoché makes good sense when considered in the context of the history of humanistic psychology. A review of Carl Rogers’s and Abraham Maslow’s attempts to revision psychology shows that they each, in their own way, argued for a turn away from (...) all-out objectivism in research, toward what phenomenologists would refer to as the being-in-the-world-with-others that permeates the relationship between researcher and research participants. But neither could envision or develop a methodological procedure for the researcher to simultaneously suspend their habitual way of making judgements and forming conclusions in that relationship. Instead, they advocated for the extension of a humanized therapeutic clinical presence of openness, acceptance, and affirmation in psychological research. Thus, a Husserlian approach to phenomenological psychology was not only a desirable addition to humanistic thought, it was sorely needed for humanistic psychology to fulfill its research promise. Giorgi, more than any other thinker of his time, provided this addition. It is further argued that Giorgi’s contribution remains highly relevant, though underappreciated. (shrink)

Despite a recent surge in publications on Tourette Syndrome, we still lack substantial insight into first-personal aspects of “what it is like” to live with this condition. This is despite the fact that developments in phenomenological psychiatry have demonstrated the scientific and clinical importance of understanding subjective experience in a range of other neuropsychiatric conditions. We argue that it is time for Tourette Syndrome research to tap into the sophisticated frameworks developed in the philosophical tradition of phenomenology for describing experience (...) in a way that integrates discrete symptoms into an overarching experiential framework concerning the self, the body, and its modes of experience. Following a historical introduction that contextualises the pertinence of phenomenology to psychopathology, we distinguish this approach from the existing, psychologically oriented studies on TS that are also qualitative. We then outline gaps and opportunities for future research, including the sorts of questions that might be utilised in phenomenological interviews and why they are of potential benefit to research programs in philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. In conclusion we address some of the broader implications for phenomenology of the body and philosophy of action. (shrink)

This article seeks to provide a phenomenological inquiry into schizophrenia through which I propose to bring to the fore the mental violence exercised against the self in the case of a psychotic patient. My main aim is to show that a phenomenological analysis of mental illness, interpreted as a disintegration of the ego, can be very fruitful for understanding violence in general because it raises fundamental questions concerning intersubjectivity, intentionality, and self-awareness. In order to accomplish this objective, I will take (...) as my point of departure a case study of mental illness as presented by the analyst Marguerite Sechehaye, and I will explore, first, the phenomenological implications of the disintegration of the ego, and second, the dynamics of the reconstruction of the ego. Third, I will address the question whether mental illness is a form of violence against the self, sketching an answer by interpreting the transition from the disintegration of the ego to its reconstruction as an elevation from a poor phenomenon to a saturated phenomenon. Finally, I will suggest how opening a dialogue between phenomenology and psychoanalysis can contribute to understanding the phenomenon of mental violence. (shrink)

Once a marginal affair, applied phenomenology is now a vast and vibrant movement. With great success, however, comes great criticism, and critics have been harsh, accusing applied phenomenology’s practitioners of everything from spewing nonsense to assailing down-to-earth researchers with gratuitous jargon. In this article, I reconstruct the most damning criticisms as a dilemma: Either applied phenomenology merely describes experience, in which case it offers nothing distinctive, or it involves the kind of analysis characteristic of classical phenomenology, in which case it’s (...) only of interest to a small number of philosophers; either way, we should explore the experiential dimension by other means. Notwithstanding the enormous body of research in applied phenomenology, few authors have tried to explain what makes it an independent intellectual enterprise distinct from pure phenomenology, and none has defused this dilemma. Here I try my hand at both. After considering eight major approaches to applied phenomenology that fail to defuse the dilemma, I propose an approach that, I argue, does the job, one that understands applied phenomenology as a research program that brings the phenomenological method and the resources of at least one other discipline to bear on problems beyond the scope of any monodisciplinary approach. (shrink)

In some of his writings, George Psathas suggests that Alfred Schutz’s account of social-scientific methodology as constructing ideal types falls short of ethnomethodology’s approach, which, by giving an account of how actors produce their social order, exemplifies a kind of social-scientific following of Husserl’s stipulation that phenomenology return to “the things themselves”. By distinguishing Schutz’s phenomenology of the natural attitude which does return to the things themselves from his account of social scientific methodology, one can conceive various social-scientific methodologies legitimately (...) serving different scientific purposes with reference to the life-world basis, for instance, ideal–typical methodologies that might seek solutions to problems and ethnomethodological methods that capture actors’ production of order and mimic the phenomenological return to the things themselves. Despite delineating this distinction between phenomenology and ethnomethodology, which Psathas too makes, ethnomethodology reveals many of the investigative tendencies of phenomenology and the two can be seen to engage each other indirectly and interactively. Finally, ethnomethodologists maintain some intellectual, relevance-guided distance from the everyday actors they study, however minimal the distance between them and the actors they study may be. (shrink)

The qualitative method of phenomenology provides a theoretical tool for educational research as it allows researchers to engage in flexible activities that can describe and help to understand complex phenomena, such as various aspects of human social experience. This article explains how to apply the framework of phenomenological qualitative analysis to educational research. The discussion within this article is relevant to those researchers interested in doing cross-cultural qualitative research and in adapting phenomenological investigations to understand students’ cross-cultural lived experiences in (...) different social educational contexts. (shrink)

Given their salience in many sports and physical cultures, it is surprising that the practices, processes and production of intercorporeality and ‘doing together’ remain under-explored from a sociological perspective. The ongoing achievement of ‘togethering’ can be particularly important for the embodied partnership between a visually impaired (VI) runner and a sighted guide (SG) runner: a specific sporting dyad whose experiences are currently under-researched. To address this lacuna and contribute original insights to sensory sociological studies, here we explore the accomplishment of (...) running-together by VI runners and sighted guides, focusing on the auditory dimension. To illustrate how these runners put the sense of hearing ‘to work’ in achieving finely attuned intercorporeality, often at considerable speed, we draw on qualitative data from a research project on VI running in the UK, involving five VI runners and five SGs. Here, we focus on auditory attunement in two domains identified as highly salient in the running-partners’ intercorporeal experiences: (1) Listening out – auditory attention to non-linguistic sounds; and (2) Tuning in – the importance of attending to team-talk between VI runners and SG runners. (shrink)

The intersection between philosophy and psychedelics is explored in the book “Philosophy and Psychedelics: Frameworks for Exceptional Experience”. The authors aim to develop a dialogue between the two disciplines and explore the various frameworks for understanding exceptional experiences that psychedelics have afforded human beings. The book delves into foundational, ontological, and epistemological questions, including the hard problem of consciousness, the metaphysical understanding of the self, and the aesthetic meaning of the sublime in psychedelic experience. The book provides valuable exploration of (...) questions concerning prevailing metaphysical frameworks, epistemic belief structures, and modes of inquiry, and the effort made by the authors to bring into dialogue multiple dialectics and practices, perspectives and methods is commendable. (shrink)

Aims and Objectives. This article uses the concept of embodiment to demonstrate a conceptual approach to applied phenomenology. -/- Background. Traditionally, qualitative researchers and healthcare professionals have been taught phenomenological methods, such as the epoché, reduction, or bracketing. These methods are typically construed as a way of avoiding biases so that one may attend to the phenomena in an open and unprejudiced way. However, it has also been argued that qualitative researchers and healthcare professionals can benefit from phenomenology’s well-articulated theoretical (...) framework, which consists of core concepts, such as selfhood, empathy, temporality, spatiality, affectivity, and embodiment. -/- Design. This is a discursive article that demonstrates a conceptual approach to applied phenomenology. -/- Method. To outline and explain this approach to applied phenomenology, the Discussion section walks the reader through four stages of phenomenology, which progress incrementally from the most theoretical to the most practical. -/- Discussion. Part one introduces the philosophical concept of embodiment, which can be applied broadly to any human subject. Part two shows how philosophically trained phenomenologists use the concept of embodiment to describe general features of illness and disability. Part three illustrates how the phenomenological concept of embodiment can inform empirical qualitative studies and reflects on the challenges of integrating philosophy and qualitative research. Part four turns to phenomenology’s application in clinical practice and outlines a workshop model that guides clinicians through the process of using phenomenological concepts to better understand patient experience. -/- Conclusion and Relevance to Clinical Practice. A conceptual approach to applied phenomenology provides a valuable alternative to traditional methodological approaches. Phenomenological concepts provide a foundation for better understanding patient experience in both qualitative health research and clinical practice, and therefore provide resources for enhancing patient care. (shrink)