Phenomenology: The Basics

The Basics

by Dan Zahavi

Phenomenology: The Basics is a concise and engaging introduction to one of the dominant philosophical movements of the 20th century. This lively and lucid book provides an introduction to the essential phenomenological concepts that are crucial for understanding great thinkers such as Husserl, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty. Written by a leading expert in the field, Dan Zahavi examines and explains key questions such as:

- What is a phenomenological analysis?

- What are the methodological foundations of phenomenology?

- What does phenomenology have to say about embodiment and intersubjectivity?

- How is phenomenology distinguished from, and related to, other fields in philosophy?

- How do ideas from classic phenomenology relate to ongoing debates in psychology and qualitative research?

With a glossary of key terms and suggestions for further reading, the book considers key philosophical arguments around phenomenology, making this an ideal starting point for anyone seeking a concise and accessible introduction to the rich and complex study of phenomenology.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Psychology

210 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[Seyed Hashemi · Rating 4 out of 5]

ادراکِ لحظۀ جمعی؛
پدیدارشناسی چه نیست؟

مرور دوم پس از بازخوانیِ اول:

سعی می‌کنم بین دو مروری که برای کتاب نوشته ام، حداقل تداخل و تکرار وجود داشته باشد؛ در بعضی از اوقات تکرار لازم است.
تحدیدِ حدود: پدیدارشناسی مسیری پر پیچ‌وخم است و من هم هیچ هِر از بِر نمی‌تونم تشخیص بدم؛ پس نقد کنید ولی گیر ندید.
در این مرور روی بخش دومِ کتاب که به کاربردهای پدیدارشناسی می‌پردازد، تمرکز می‌کنم.

مساعدتِ پدیدارشناسی به علوم اجتماعی:
یکی از مسائل حساس و مهم در علوم اجتماعی (مشخصا جامعه‌شناسی و علوم سیاسی)، مسئلۀ کنش جمعی و مشخص‌تر قصدیت جمعی/Collective Intentionality است. مسئله آن‌چنان پیچیده نیست، بحث بر سر این است که چه می‌شود سوژه‌های انسانی، به صورت جمعی یا جمعا، قصد یک فعالیت مشخص را می‌کنند. خیلی ساده فرض کنید شما و دوستتان می‌خواهید همدیگر را ببینید و به واسطه یک فیلم و سینما رفتن، یک برنامه‌ای را تنظیم می‌کند. این قصدِ جمعی شما دقیقا چه ویژگی‌هایی دارد و این قصدیت از چه حیث «جمعی» است؟ رخصت بدهید با مثال‌های جدی‌تر، مسئله‌مندی/پروبلماتیک این مسئله را شرح بدهم.

جنبش‌های اجتماعی و لحظۀ قصدیت جمعی:
ببینید، چه می‌شود که برای نمونه در انقلابات بهار عربی در ۲۰۱۱، به صورت غیربرنامه‌ریزی شده و به شکلی تقریبا ناگهانی، خیل عظیمی از مردم کشورهای مختلفی از جمله تونس و مصر، قصد می‌کنند و به صورت جمعی علیه دیکتاتورهای کشورهای خودشون قیام می‌کنند؟ برای نمونه، آصف بیات (۲۰۲۱) در کتابِ «انقلاب را زیستن» از یکی از جوانان حاضر در اعتراضات خیابانی در تونس، الیسا، نقل می‌کند:

اعتراضات اصلا سازماندهی نشده بود؛ ما و دوستانمان همدیگر را در بارها و کافه‌ها می‌دیدیم و دربارۀ وقایع حرف می‌زدیم و بعد در تظاهرات خیابانی چهره‌های آشنا می‌دیدیم
موقعیت‌های بسیار دیگری را نیز می‌توان در تاریخ برشمرد و تحقیقا تمام جنبش‌ها و انقلاب‌های اجتماعی به نوعی این «لحظه‌»های قصدیت جمعی را در خود دارند.

مشخصا یکی از ایرادهای آصف بیات (۲۰۲۱) در این پژوهش بسیار عالیِ خود، این است که نمی‌تواند به نیکی قصدیت جمعی را توضیح بدهد که اینجا مساعدت‌های تدقیق فلسفی و پدیدارشناختی شاید بتواند مفید واقع شود. به بیان دیگر، با وجود غنای جامعه‌شناختی تحلیل‌های آصف بیات، در توضیح سازوکار شکل‌گیری قصدیت جمعی، جای خالی یک چارچوب پدیدارشناسانه محسوس است؛ به‌ویژه در لحظات گذار که آگاهی‌ها به شکل غیررسمی و غیرسازمان‌یافته به اشتراک گذاشته می‌شوند. بدیهی است که بحث در قصدیت جمعی منحصر در سنت پدیدارشناسی نیست.

تمایز میان قصدیت آگاهانه و قصدیت غیرآگاهانه:
بگذارید یک مطلب را واضح کنیم. در بسیاری از موارد قصدیت جمعی آگاهانه و مبتنی بر یک برنامه است، برای نمونه به صورت جمعی قصد می‌کنید که فلان اثر از بیسار نویسنده را بخوانید؛ سلمنا. این نحو از قصدیت، که آگاهانه و برنامه‌ریزی شده است، توفیری اساسی با انواعی از قصدیت جمعی دارد که وجه‌ممیزه‌های قصدیت جمعی را دارند، اما ماهیت آگاهانه ندارند. احتمالا برای فهمِ بهتر این نحو از قصدیت‌های غیرآگاهانه، آغاز از قصدیت آگاهانه و نشان دادن شروط و ضوابط آن مفید خواهد بود.

البته شاید برای برخی از موارد استفاده از ترکیبِ «قصدیت پیشاتأملی» یا «قصدیت ضمنی» بهتر باشد.

حال پدیدارشناسی در این وسط چیست؟ منابعی برای مطالعه بیشتر:
یک تکمله هم به بحث بزنم که پدیدارشناسی یکی از مسیرهایی است که به واسطۀ آن می‌توانیم لحظۀ قصدیت جمعی را با آن توضیح دهیم؛ مسیری که شاید کافی نباشد، اما عدم توجه به آن قطعا نشانی از نقص بررسیِ ماست؛ چون در پدیدارشناسی می‌توانیم از سوپژکتیویتۀ جمعی، آگاهی جمعی، تجربۀ جمعی، زیست‌جهان و کلی مفهوم مربوط و نزدیک به این بحث استفاده کنیم. برای بحث در قصدیت جمعی حداقل سه منبع می‌تواند محل ارجاع باشد:

اول مدخلِ «قصدیت جمعی» از دانشنامۀ استنفورد؛
دوم کتاب «Phenomenological Sociology Experience & Insight in Modern Society» از Harvie Ferguson؛
سوم هم، فصل پنجم از «دستنامۀ آکفسورد در پدیدارشناسی معاصر» با عنوانِ «اخلاق، سیاست و جامعه‌پذیری» چند مقالۀ خوب دارد.

اینجا هم صرفا برخی از منابع را مورد اشاره قرار داده ام که بعدا یادم باشد چه منابع خوبی در این بحث هست.

بحثی در کاربردی‌سازی پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش پژوهش کیفی:
یکی از مسائلِ جالب در مواجهه با پدیدارشناسی، استفاده از «پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش تحقیق کیفی» در پژوهش‌های علمی است. اول بار با این مورد در کتابِ «روش تحقیق پدیدارشناسی» از حسن بودلایی (۱۴۰۱) مواجه شدم. در این کتاب بودلایی (۱۴۰۱) تلاش کرده است به پدیدارشناسی به عنوان یکی از انواع روش تحقیق کیفی توجه کند و برای نمونه برای ثبت تجربۀ کارفرمایان و کارآفرینان در مطالعات مدیریت از آن استفاده کند. در رشته‌های پزشکی و پرستاری نیز از پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش تحقیق کیفی استفاده می‌شود؛ برای نمونه برای پیاده‌سازی و بررسی ادراکِ بیماران از بیماری و روش درمان خود، از پژوهش‌هایی است که در پزشکی، پدیدارشناسی مورد استفاده قرار می‌گیرد.

دن زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) در بخش پایانیِ این کتاب مقدماتی خود، به «پدیدارشناسی کاربردی» می‌پردازد که در فصل آخر این رسته از متون و پژوهش‌های «پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش تحقیق کیفی» را بیشتر مورد بررسی قرار می‌دهد. زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) چون می‌خواهد فراگیر شدنِ پدیدارشناسی را نشان بدهد و از این مسیر روی زنده و تاثیرگذار بودنِ پدیدارشناسی تاکید کند، چشم خود را بروی نقص‌های عمدۀ این پژوهش‌هایی که به خود برچسب پدیدارشناسانه می‌زنند می‌بندند.

نگاهی انتقادی به «پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش پژوهش کیفی»:
زهاوی در فصل آخر کتابِ خود به کتابی به عنوانِ «Phenomenology as Qualitative Research A critical analysis of meaning attribution» ارجاع می‌دهد. این کتاب را که راتلج به قلم جان پیلی در سال 2017 منتشر کرده است، پژوهشی انتقادی در نقد پژوهش‌هایی است که از پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش کیفی استفاده می‌کنند می‌پردازد.

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پیش‌درآمد پاراگراف آتی:
در ادامه متن (همانطورکه در پاراگراف پیشِ رو قید شده است) میانِ «پدیدارشناسی فلسفی» و «پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش پژوهش کیفی» تمایز قرار می‌دهیم. برای هرکدام به روش زیر سرواژه قرار می‌دهیم:
«پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش پژوهش کیفی/phenomenology as qualitative research»: استفاده از سرواژۀ PQR؛
«پدیدارشناسی فلسفی/philosophical phenomenology»: استفاده از سرواژۀ PP.
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ستیز میانِ پیلی (۲۰۱۷) و زهاوی (۲۰۱۹):
در این جا پیلی (۲۰۱۷) یک دوگانه می‌سازد که هم قابل توجه است، هم بزرگترین ایراد پژوهش اوست؛ او بین «پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش پژوهش کیفی/phenomenology as qualitative research (زین پس PQR)» و «پدیدارشناسی فلسفی/philosophical phenomenology (زین پس PP)» تمایز قائل می‌شود. پیلی (۲۰۱۷) در کتاب خود خطی واضح میانِ PP (که هوسرل، هایدگر، مرلو-پونتی و دیگران نمایندۀ آن اند) و PQR که استفاده کاربردی از پدیدارشناسی است می‌گذارد و بیان می‌کند در کتاب خود قصد ندارد به PP بپردازد و تمرکز خود را بر نقد PQR می‌گذارد. زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) اینجا برداشتی تقریبا اشتباه از کتاب پیلی (۲۰۱۷) به دست می‌دهد که بر اساس آن پیلی (۲۰۱۷) حتی با خودِ PP نیز مشکل دارد و مثلا هوسرل را در برخی موارد «عمدا مبهم» می‌خواند. اما پیلی در این کتاب بیشتر قصد دارد با جداکردنِ PQR از PP، بدون درگیری با PP و فلسفۀ هوسرل، هایدگر و دیگران، به نقد یک روش از «روش‌های تحقیق کیفی» بپردازد. یعنی پیلی (۲۰۱۷) سعی می‌کند خود را در ادبیاتِ روش تحقیق جاگیر کند و نه در جهانِ فلسفۀ پدیدارشناسی. زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) چون می‌خواهد فراگیری پدیدارشناسی را نشان بدهد، چشم خود را بر روی نقص‌های جدیِ پژوهش‌هایی که اسمِ پدیدارشناسی را روی خود می‌گذارند می‌بندند.

برای نمونه، پیلی (۲۰۱۷) در کتاب خود می‌خواهد به نقد روشیِ PQRها بپردازد و از قضی با خودِ PP کار ندارد، اما زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) به نحوی با کتابِ پیلی بر خورد می‌کند که گویی یک تهدید وجودی برای پدیدارشناسی است. نکته‌ای جالب در مقدمه‌ی کتاب پیلی (۲۰۱۷) آن است که نویسنده با ارجاع به ایده‌های کوهن و لاکاتوش در فلسفه و تاریخ علم، تصریح می‌کند که دانش علمی با یک نقد منفرد و مجزا فرو نمی‌پاشد. او با تأکید بر این نکته، روشن می‌سازد که هدف کتابش، نه تخریب بنیان‌های پدیدارشناسی فلسفی، بلکه ارائه‌ی نقدی روش‌شناختی بر کاربردهای پژوهشی آن در روش پژوهشِ کیفی است. به بیان دیگر، پیلی در ابتدای کتاب به‌طور ضمنی هشدار می‌دهد که نباید نقد او را به‌منزله‌ی تهدیدی برای کل سنت پدیدارشناسی تلقی کرد، بلکه آن را باید تلاشی برای شفاف‌سازی مرزهای مفهومی و روشیِ آن در پژوهش کیفی دانست. به بیانِ دیگر پیلی (۲۰۱۷) به‌نحوی نشان می‌دهد که قصد نقد بنیان‌های فلسفی این ماجرا را ندارد و انتظار دارد که مواجهه با کتابش نیز به‌عنوان نقد روشی در فضای تحقیق کیفی تلقی شود، نه به‌مثابه تهدیدی برای پدیدارشناسی فلسفی؛ زهاوی (۲۰۱۹) به نظر می‌رسد این مورد را مورد نظر قرار نداده است.

نقد اصلیِ وارد بر ایده‌های پیلی (۲۰۱۷):
بیشتر از این قصر ندارم در این دعوا چیزی بنویسم، اما به صورت اجمالی، این انفکاکی که پیلی (۲۰۱۷) میان PP و PQR می‌گذارد مهم‌ترین نقدی است که به کتاب وارد است. یعنی نمی‌توان از پدیدارشناسی به عنوان روش تحقیق گفت و آن را نقد کرد، بدون اینکه نظر به بنیان‌ها و آثار اصلیِ فلسفی پدیدارشناسی نیندازیم. چون اینگونه نیست که در استفاده از لفظِ «پدیدارشناسی» در PP و PQR صرفا اشتراک لفظ باشد، و اصحابِ PQR به صورت واضح و مشخص خود را دنباله‌رو اصحابِ PP می‌دانند و تحلیل PQRها منفک از توجه به بنیان‌های آن در PP، چه بسا پژوهش را «به راه بادیه می‌رساند» نه اینکه پژوهش را نابسنده و ناکافی کند. یعنی این انفکاک بسیار ایراد در خود دارد.

احتمالا از کتاب پیلی (۲۰۱۷) بیشتر خواهم گفت آن هم در نقدِ کتاب بودلایی (1401).

دوست دارم با نقد PQRها نشان بدهم پدیدارشناسی چه نیست!

این نکته‌ای هم که سرواژه ساختم با اینکه متن رو از آراستگی انداخت، ولی لازم بود که از تکرار اجتناب بشه.

در نهایت، یک نکتۀ مختصر هم که باید بگم، در اهمیتِ برابرنهادها و ترجمۀ واژگان در پدیدراشناسی است. در رشته‌ها و جای‌جای فلسفه، علوم اجتماعی و ادبیات، می‌توان از اهمیتِ برابرنهادها گفت، اما وضعیت برابرنهادهای فارسی در پدیدارشناسی بسیار اساسی است. دوست دارم به عنوان تمرین در بررسی ترجمۀ لفظِ Ein(s)fühlung یه کارایی بکنم.

دیگر بیشتر از این قصد ندارم در این فرصت بنویسم، اما این تجربۀ بازخوانیِ این کتاب باعث شد بیشتر به منابعِ کتاب توجه کنم و از این مسیر با کلی منبع باکیفیت آشنا شدم.

باقی بقای عمرتان :)
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مرور اول:

دیگری، درد و بدن؛
وقتی امر بدیهی‌انگاشته شده محل سوال قرار می‌گیرد.


در این متن سعی می‌کنم چندتا مورد جالب که از این متن برداشتم رو بگم و قرار نیست خلاصه‌ای چیزی از پدیدارشناسی بدست بدم، چون هم خیلی ممکن نیست، هم کار من نیست.


یک خطیِ پدیدارشناسی چیست؟

در پدیدارشناسی می‌خواهیم با امور همان‌گونه که پدیدارشده اند مواجه شویم. می‌خواهیم "به ابژه‌ها باز گردیم" و با در پرانتز گذاشتن آنها و بدون پیش فرض گرفتن هیچ نظریه و فرضی، صرفا سعی کنیم ابژه‌ها و چیزها همانگونه که پدیدار شده اند خود را به ما نشان بدهند. خیلی انتزاعی و قلمبه سلبمه شد، شاید موقعیتی مثالی از مطالعۀ ادبی و تجربۀ پدیداریِ مواجهه با متن ادبی مفید باشد:

فرض کن می‌خواهی یک متن ادبی را بخوانی. تولستوی، گوگولی، همینگویی و سارتری کسی و چیزی. یک راه این است که قبل از مواجهه با متن ادبی، با کوله‌باری از نظریه، فهمِ پیشین از نویسنده و اثر به سراغ متن بروی (بری جست‌و‌جو کنی و مرور بخونی ازش، متن تفسیری بخونی و...)، اما جوری دیگر می‌توانی خالی‌الذهن و بدون مفروض گرفتن چیزی سعی کنی خود با متن مواجه شوی و سعی کنی متن را همان‌گونه که خود را برای تو نشان می‌دهد (پدیدار می‌کند)، بفهمی. تقریبا من به این نحو از مواجهه می‌گویم "نظریه ذهن وحشی" یعنی چیزی را فرض نگیریم و سعی کنیم متن را بفهمیم ولو اینکه اشتباه باشد، شاید طرحی برانداختیم. البته نباید در اشتباه ماند اما نباید از ترس اشتباه، شجاعت فهم را سلاخی کنیم.


هیچ چیز، هیچ‌گاه خود را به تمامه پدیدار نمی‌کند.
البته یکی از مواردی که پدیدارشناسی به ما می‌آموزد این است که پدیدارها هیچ‌گاه به تمامه خود را به ما نشان نمی‌دهند. خیلی ساده، وقتی مکعبی رنگی را می‌بینیم، نسبت به زاویه دید، رنگ محیط و فاصله ما از شی، این شی نوعی خاص خود را به ما پدیدار کرده است. حال این مورد را می‌توانم در امور انتزاعی‌تر دید. عشق خود چگونه می‌تواند به عینه پدیدار شود؟ چه روایتی می‌تواند جنگ را با صورت مطلق نشان بدهد و بیان کند؟ ترسِ در جنگ، شجاعت در جنگ، گریه کودک در جنگ، رذالت در جنگ و چیزهایی از این دست. یعنی باید حواسمان باشد که پدیدارها هیچ‌گاه خود را به تمامه پدیدار نمی‌کنند و اینجا تغییر زاویه دید و کتاب "فاصله‌‌ها" وارد گود می‌شود؛ رد می‌شویم.



بدن‌مندی و لحظۀ اضطراب و ادراکِ بدنِ جمعی!
وارد بخشی دیگر از پدیدارشناسی می‌شویم. آن را به ادبیات بدن‌مندی می‌شناسیم. نمی‌خواهم شرحی از استدلال‌هایی بدهم که در این زمین طرح می‌شود، اما استفاده‌ای از آن را برای تحلیل امور مورد توجه قرار می‌دهم. بریم:

ما معمولا در لحظۀ کنش‌های هر روزهٔ خود التفاتی به این مورد نداریم که بدنی داریم که دارد کارها را انجام می‌دهد، به بیانی وجودِ بدن را مفروض گرفته ایم. اصلا اگر به بدن فکر کنیم، از کار کردن می‌افتیم. مثال مشهورِ هایدگر در چکش زدن اینجا قابل طرح است. ما چکش‌زدن را انجام می‌دهیم و اگر لحظه‌ای بخواهیم ملتفت به این امر شویم، بجای میخ، دست خود را خواهیم زد. مثالی دیگر تنیس یا پینگ پونگ بازی کردن است. ما بازی را انجام می‌دهیم و به بدن خود التفاتی نداریم و اینجا «درد» و اضطراب وارد می‌شود. اگر عصبی درگیر شود، عضله‌ای اسپاسم شود در لحظه به بدن خود ملتفت می‌شویم و صد البته از کار کردن می‌افتیم. اما در این «لحظه اضطراب» به بدنی که داریم التفات پیدا کرده‌ایم، به موردی که تماما آن را بدیهی پنداشته‌ ایم.

هایدگر می‌گوید کار فلسفه این است که سوالات برآشوبنده بپرسد و امور به ظاهر بدیهی را به پرسش بگیرد. کِی این امور به پرسش گرفته می‌شوند؟ وقتی دچار اضطراب شویم، وقتی چیزهایی که هستند را محل توجه کنیم و به قولی «قصدیت» آگاهی و فهم خود را معطوف به آنها کنیم. حال این مورد چه کمکی به ما در فهم جامعه و روابط انسانی می‌کند؟ به بیانی، ادبیاتِ بدن‌مندی چه کمکی فهمِ در وضعیت‌های بیناسوژگی دارد؟ برای نمونه بحران‌های اجتماعی کاری می‌کند که روابط بدیهی‌انگاشته شده اجتماعی و ظلم‌ها و احجاف‌ها را به پرسش بگیریم و سعی در تامل در وضعیت خود کنیم.

خلاصه باید دردمون بیاد تا فکر کنیم.

[Deniz Urs · Rating 4 out of 5]

İnsanın aklı “bilinç” mefhumuna kayınca fenomenoloji nedir ne değildir derken buluyor kendini.. Felsefe tarihi kitaplarından yarım yamalak edinilmiş kıytırık sezgisel bilginin üzerine ekleme ihtiyacı duyuyor haliyle. Bu süreçte nedir diye az çok anlıyor da insan,ne değildir hep muamma...Daha çok felsefi bir akım olarak Fenomenoloji nedir, öncüleri kimlerdir sorularına getirdiği cevapların yanısıra en önemlisi de bu öncülerin metinlerinin kritik noktalarını yalın bir dille ve anlaşılır aktarması açısından çok faydalı bir kitap. Ama en önemlisi de belirttiğim gibi Fenomenoloji ne değildire dair de fikir vermesi açısından daha da faydalıydı benim için. Bilindiği üzere kurucuları kendi metinlerinden okunması oldukça zor düşünürler. Meraklıları için özellikle bu metinlere giriş yapmadan önce okunması çok yararlı olacaktır. Son olarak son bölüm olan Fenomenolojik psikolojiden bahsettiği bölüm,akıma eleştirel yaklaşan cenaha karşı gereksiz bir asabiyet içeriyor gibi geldi ama neyse..bu da magazinel bilgi olsun

[Heleen.A.H · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a good book, understandable and accessible but understanding without evaluation in my opinion is never enough! Hence I’ll stop it right here, and will go into it’s depth later on!
Otherwise phenomenology is one of my favourite methods of analysis and evaluation!

[Drew Pyke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Introduction

Can argue Phenomenology is a response to objectivism and scientific reductionism. Its proponents are Husserl (a Jewish Austrian); Heidegger, assistant to Husserl in the 1920s and infamous for being a national socialist; Sartre who studied Heidegger’s Being and Time when in captivity during WW2 and Merleau-Ponty who took it into the direction of child-psychology. He was also in captivity, like Sartre but majority of his family were killed in the holocaust.

Part 1

Phenomenology posits that “the everyday experience of simple objects can serve as the point of departure”. Not just the physical properties (i.e. the weight, size, colour etc) that you can see, touch and hear, as it also appears in thought. “Objects …are embedded within a large context”. There is always meaning associated with something, beyond it’s material build, and this also includes the perceiver who is in the same spatial location (you can’t be disembodied from the object); “there is no view from nowhere”, within space and time.

This is contrast to science, which aims to inform what objects “truly” are (through scientific empiricism). Phenomenologists though argue that there is no hidden truth behind the appearance of the world (the phenomena).

Consciousness is always directed at something (intentionality) but it is this that creates the subjectivity of how humans experience objects. Same object, but perceived differently because of the intentional nature of consciousness. A photo for example, we “have to transcend what is physically present in front of us”.

Some argue this is wrong; that perception is causal by nature, not intentional. An object “affecting my sensory apparatus, and as a result, this causal impact, a mental representation of the [object] arises in consciousness”. Of course, this is rejected by phenomenologists because people can experience the same thing differently and also objects appear in consciousness without actually being there (through a thought for example) without any causal stimuli. In fact, phenomenologists would say that an object thought is as real as one that is seen. This is the point of Phenomenology, to clarify the relation between the mind and the world, which in this case, “meaning rather than causality plays a fundamental role”.

Similarly, it’s “misleading to regard the world as somehow outside or external to us” and we only deal with “internal representations of the world”. This is why Heidegger used a new term, “Dasein” to put the Self into the world itself” “our very being is to be located in and involved with the world” through a “complex intentional interplay”. This is particularly important for the object also because typically these “do not exist naturally” but “due to a special intentional accomplishment” (i.e. they’ve been created for a human purpose). Also, to understand an object also requires knowing what it means for us (social, cultural etc): “when we investigate appearing objects, we also disclose ourselves as those to whom objects appear”.

“Any understanding of the world is by definition perspectival. Effacing our perspective (objectivism) does not bring us any closer to the world”.

Phenomenologists are obviously against Realism; that “our cognitive apprehension of reality is …a faithful mirroring of a pre-existing world”. Instead, reality exists because we construct meaning to its objects, but this also works vice-versa, that we are a “function of our world-involvement”.

To understand this dichotomy between mind and world, Phenomenologists use several instruments. One of them is known as epoche (or reduction) which ties in with the mantra of the philosophy, “to return to the things themselves”. It means to “let the objects reveal themselves as what they are. We should focus on the things as they are encountered in experience, not on how we thought they were”. To get closer to reality involves stripping away our presuppositions, thoughts and feelings towards things. Later on though, Zahavi does argue this is an impossible task, but should not be a cause to not attempt it. We are not interested in any analysis of the object or subject, but how the two relate to each other. It can be argued Husserl was quite myopic in this sense (just seeing things for what they are), but later proponents took this further into metaphysics and ontology (what ramifications this has in our sense of being). This is articulated in the Natural Attitude concept, whereby our thoughts of the world “permeate our daily pre-theoretical life”. The meanings we have taken onboard unconsciously make us who we are and so ontologically we are prone to be constructed by social norms at the expense of who we truly are. We project so much on to the world, our intentionality “in order for worldly objects to appear in the way they do”.

Nevertheless, Phenomenology does suggest objectivity can be had (transcendental philosophy) through the pursuit of removing these natural attitudes to leave something core and essential. This can be risky though, “by leaving all of these unquestioned, we feel safe” and “propel us into philosophical questioning”. This is not to be mistaken for positive science though who take a “mind-independent nature of reality for granted” (which Dasein refutes). Instead, Phenomenology uses the “eidetic variation” which is a method where you take away attributes of an object so long as it doesn’t impact on the object itself. For example, stripping away the legs of the table doesn’t make it a table any longer (therefore essential), but changing its colour from brown to green doesn’t impact its integrity as a table and therefore a non-essential attribute. This is Plato’s theory on Forms.

Positive science advocates reductionism (reducing phenomena to material, objectifiable terms), akin to Ockham’s razor, where problems are “reduced to something that can be understood by physics, chemistry, neurophysiology”. Whilst there are always objective elements in an object, it is mainly experienced subjectively. The material world itself is only understood subjectively and cannot be always reduced to formula and maths (e.g. you’ll have to say there was no civil war in Syria if you’re only looking at the tangible, measurable world).

This brings to the fore another of Husserl’s concepts called Lifeworld, which is the world we take for granted and brings together the physical world and the one which we subjectively experience. It’s a concept which strengthens the notion that the world is lived, not separate from us. It is also not just subjective, but constructed by intersubjectivity (relations between people within communities that create social norms). Even science itself “did not fall down from the sky” but has come about from a first-person perspective (the scientist) and within an intersubjective construct (the values of the wider society and the scientific community itself) through natural attitude – “there is no view from nowhere”.

Phenomenology itself has evolved over time. From static (the basic study of intentionality) to genetic (how intentionality evolves over time within an individual) to generative (how intentionality evolves through community of individuals). This last phase results in “the subject’s birth into a living tradition to have constitutive implications” and ultimately the natural attitude.

Merleau-Ponty explains how Phenomenology can be explained away into different directions:
Essentialism (e.g. disclosing the “invariant structures of …consciousness etc”);
in exposing how the mind is not separate from the world;
accounting for the world without the instruments of science being projected onto the world (e.g. measurement of time);
in describing the “origin, development and historicity of the intentional

As stated previously, Phenomenology isn’t realist, but it also isn’t idealist either: “the subject has no priority over the world”. Idealism reduce reality to “a mere product of our constitution” and would “only possess the meaning that we ascribe it”. This for Phenomenologists is also wrong and is resolved by the concept of embodiment. We as beings are embedded in a “social, historical and natural context” within the material world. It is almost like the middle ground between realism and idealism, where the world is as significant as the mind. To investigate the nature of this interrelatedness is impossible, where it “allows us to cut our ties to our world-immersed life in order to survey it from a view from nowhere”. For Zahavi, this is not a defect, but “one of [Phenomenology’s] essential features”.

Part 2 – how philosophical Phenomenology has been applied in specific examples of experience

Subjectivity isn’t new. It is an essential feature in Descarte, Locke and Hume. However, this has only gone as far as “a self-contained and worldless substance”. This is very different from the Phenomenologists interpretation of subjectivity, whereas beings we are “constituted by our relationship to the very world that we inhabit” and why Husserl had to come up with the term Dasein.

The first example in this part is how we interact with space. Dasein describes how a being interacts with the world, not in a cognitive, theoretical sense but a practical way (similar to how we run in a pre-reflective mode, we don’t actually think about how our feet are positioned on the ground or the legs in conjunction with each other). It is only when something doesn’t work that we realise the action in a directed sense. Also, objects themselves are embedded “in a network of references”. An example given is a stamp that is only useful for sending letters with envelopes and a postal service. Nothing is ever isolated in its practical purpose so should always be seen in context. Heidegger consequently “defines the world, not as the sum …of objects, but rather as the familiar context of meaning” which is what we, as Dasein, inhabit. Again, this is a shift from the realist view of objects in themselves but to patterns of meaning from what the person puts on objects and between objects themselves inside the practical world (context).

A clear example of this is returning to space itself again. Things can be described as close using scientific description but actually, people describe things “relative to context”. Travel to India may have been described far away, but is reduced with each year as travel options are increased. Yet technically it is the same distance. The “really real reality is …one that is disclosed ...through Dasein’s being in the world”.

Keeping with space, phenomenologically, the body also acts as an object within the context. As a “stable centre of orientation”, it’s mobility, perception. But strangely we don’t recognise this: “I do not have any consciousness of my body. I am not perceiving it, I am it”. This is because pre-reflection is a state which “is necessary that I lose myself in the world in order for the world to exist”. Another taken-for-granted reality. Another given example, when we write on our laptop, “my movements are not given as intentional objects”. It’s only when the body is disturbed (sickness) that we notice our body.

Next example in this part is intersubjectivity, which is the relationships between the self, others and the world itself.

The first challenge Phenomenology comes up against is “the problem of other minds”. One traditional solution is “argument from analogy” which posits that you can gauge the experience of other people by how you yourself would react to something. Through Phenomenological analysis, this can be discredited when you look at babies who smile. They don’t do react this way the same way adults do so something else is happening here. Also, different people would smile at different things, so you would need a “global perspective”, which this philosophy does not believe exist.

Merleau-Ponty doesn’t go so far to say understanding other people is impossible though. Given that “the body of another is always given to me in a situation or meaningful context” means there is something available to decipher, given you have the context available to analyse. This principle is known as Empathy, or other-understanding but cuts short of really tapping into the brain of another person, because to do so, “the other would cease being an other and would instead become a part of myself”. The closest we can get in experiencing another is when “bodily gestures and actions are expressive of his or her experiences”.

Other Phenomenologists argue though this is short sighted. Intersubjectivity should instead look at how we “encounter others in a worldly situation” which comes in a network of meaning and contexts. A good example of this comes from Sartre, how “utensils incontestably refer to a plurality of bodily others by whom they have been manufactured and by whom they are used”. Intersubjectivity is everywhere, not just the prior focus on between two parties. Whenever we use a tool, “that was manufactured by others for an anonymous consume, i.e. for a sheer ‘someone’, I forfeit my own individuality” – “making myself into ‘anyone’”.

Life itself can be argued phenomenologically, as intersubjective, because we “participate in a communal tradition” where “normal life” is generative, constructed life. Conversely, individuals also construct the social norms that they’re bound by also. This is through acknowledgement of the other person, whereby “we are dealing with communicative acts through which a higher interpersonal unity – a we – can be established”.

Part 3 – How Phenomenology has influenced other disciplines, namely Sociology and Psychology:

It is argued that Phenomenology provides “a fundamental account of human social existence” which in turns provides the framework for which the “social sciences operate”.

Alfred Schutz (considered the founder of phenomenological sociology) sought to explore the social world by how it “reveals and manifest itself in …intentional experiences”, that is social agents (not as objects that can be observed through stimulus-response). He rejects the reductionist approaches (e.g. positivism and behaviourism) for the same reason, that sees people as reacting to their environment (with little or no understanding). Schutz believes agents are “experiencing, interpreting and acting individuals”.

He does concede however that people navigate the world through assumptions of others, in a process he terms Typification. These are general terms which are “socially derived and socially accepted”. An example given is a postmen, who you typically “done think of them as a particular individuals, but …as ideal types” and conversely, “I try to make myself the typical ‘sender of a letter’”.

[ word count limit ]

[Hossein · Rating 4 out of 5]

کتاب خیلی روان و خوبی بود. می‌خواستم پیش از خوندنِ «پدیدارشناسی ادراک»ِ مرلوپونتی یه متن مقدماتی درباره‌ی پدیدارشناسی بخونم و این دقیقاً همون چیزی بود که می‌خواستم. ترجمه هم خیلی دقیق و تمیز بود تا جایی که مقایسه کردم.

[مهسا · Rating 3 out of 5]

بعد از هزاران سال از یه کتابی خوشم اومد که کارش «مرور کردن» و «همه چیز گفتن» دربارۀ یک موضوعه. در آخر، مرگ بر سارتر.

[Golriz Nafisi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall it was good but a bit brief for such an abstract philosophical concept which made me realize that i have to definitely read Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty's actual works if i want to ever understand what phenomenology is.

[Marc Nash · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice, clear, accessible overview of phenomenology.

[Ethan Zimmerman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Without a doubt, phenomenology is one of the most interesting and exciting things I discovered in studying philosophy and may be the main reason I'm pursuing philosophy professionally. This is a great introduction! Clear, concise, wide-ranging, and conciliatory regarding internal factions.

[Rahul Singh · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an academic text I read for a course on philosophy of social sciences. I remember first being introduced to phenomenology in my undergraduate class. However, it was a very preliminary introduction to the school of thought. I only realised its immensity right now as I took this course for the semester. Dan Zahavi’s introduction to the school of thought rightly unveils the crux of phenomenological philosophy highlighting works and contributions of some of the key thinkers who have laid down the foundation of phenomenological thought. From Husserl, to Heidegger to Merlau-Ponty; the book ropes in excerpts from some of their renowned texts to construct an ontological understanding of the philosophy. Of course, there still remains a lot more to explore and navigate but I can say that I understand what phenomenological thinking is like at the basic level because of Zahavi’s simple language and use of vivid examples to acquaint me with this complex mode of thought.

[Moderated · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Perceptual experience consequently involves an interplay of presence and absence. When we perceive an object, we always experience more than what is intuitively presented."

Even if we initially are only confronted with a very limited perspective on the object, we rarely remain satisfi ed with a fi rst glimpse. As Husserl points out, the object beckons us to explore further:
"There is still more to see here, turn me so you can see all my sides, let your gaze run through me, draw closer to me, open me up, divide me up; keep on looking me over again and again, turning me to see all sides. You will get to know me like this, all that I am, all my surface qualities, all my inner sensible qualities."

"When first looking at the front of the alarm clock and then moving around to observe its back, the front might gradually disappear from sight, but not from mind. Our familiarity with the alarm clock increases because we are able to retain that which we have seen in the past. When executing a change of perspective and position, we do not fi rst experience the front of the alarm clock and then its side and then its back as if we were viewing three distinct snapshots. If we pick up the alarm clock and turn it around in our hand, we experience how its appearance changes gradually, rather than abruptly. But for the alarm clock to appear in this manner, our stream of consciousness cannot be a series of instantaneous and disconnected perceptions, but must have a particular temporal structure and confi guration, must somehow be temporally and experientially unifi ed."

"In much of the philosophical tradition, the phenomenon has indeed been defi ned as the way the object appears to us, as seen with our eyes (and thought with our categories), and has been contrasted with the object as it is in itself. The assumption has then been that if one wishes to discover and determine what the object really is like, then one has to go beyond the merely phenomenal. Had it been this concept of phenomenon that phenomenology was employing, phenomenology would have been the study of the merely subjective, apparent, or superfi cial. But this is not the case. As Heidegger points out in section 7 of Being and Time , phenomenology is drawing on and employing a very diff erent and more classical conception of phenomenon, according to which the phenomenon is that which shows itself, that which reveals itself. 3 Phenomenology is, consequently, not a theory about the merely apparent, as Heidegger also pointed out in a lecture course given a few years before Being and Time :
It is phenomenologically absurd to speak of the phenomenon as if it were something behind which there would be something else of which it would be a phenomenon in the sense of the appearance which represents and expresses [this something else]. A phenomenon is nothing behind which there would be something else. More accurately stated, one cannot ask for something behind the phenomenon at all, since what the phenomenon gives is precisely that something in itself. "

"When we see, hear, remember, imagine, think, hate, or fear, our seeing, hearing, remembering, imagining, thinking, hating, and fearing is about something. Consciousness has a directedness to it, it is a consciousness of something, it is characterized by intentionality . Consciousness is not concerned or preoccupied with itself, but is, rather, by nature self-transcending. For the phenomenologists, “intentionality” is the generic term for this pointing-beyond-itself proper to consciousness."

"That something like a conscious appropriation of the world is possible does not merely tell us something about consciousness, but also about the world. But, of course, this way of discussing consciousness, as the constitutive dimension that makes any worldly manifestation possible, as the “place” in which the world can reveal and articulate itself, is quite diff erent from any attempt to treat it scientifi cally as merely yet another (psychical or physical) object in the world."

"On one interpretation, the return to the things themselves is a turning away from theories, interpretations, and constructions. What we have to bracket is our preconceived ideas, our habits of thoughts, our prejudices, and theoretical assumptions. Rather than arriving at the scene with a lot of theoretical baggage, the task of phenomenology is to eff ectuate an unprejudiced turn towards the objects. We should arrive at the scene with an open mind, in order to let the objects reveal themselves as what they are. We should focus on the things as they are encountered in experience, not on how we thought they were, and then base our defi nitions on careful descriptions. On this reading, phenomenology is very much a descriptive rather than deductive or speculative enterprise, the core of which is its rigorous intuitive method."

"The proper way to interpret the epoché is to see it as involving not an exclusion of reality, but rather a suspension of a particular dogmatic attitude towards reality, an attitude that is operative not only in the positive sciences, but also permeates our daily pretheoretical life. Indeed, the attitude is so fundamental and pervasive that Husserl calls it the natural attitude . What is the attitude about? It is about simply taking it for granted that the world we encounter in experience also exists independently of us. Regardless of how natural and obvious it might be to think of reality as a self-subsisting entity, if philosophy is supposed to amount to a radical form of critical elucidation, it cannot simply take this kind of natural realism for granted. If philosophy is to deserve its credentials as a form of radical questioning, it cannot simply prejudice the answer beforehand. On the contrary, if we are to adopt the phenomenological attitude and engage in phenomenological philosophizing, we must take a step back from our naive and unexamined immersion in the world, and suspend our automatic belief in the mind-independent existence of that world. By suspending this attitude, and by thematising the fact that reality is always revealed and examined from some perspective or another, reality is not lost from sight, but is for the fi rst time made accessible for philosophical inquiry."

"If we move from Ideas I to Being and Time , we will fi nd Heidegger arguing in a somewhat similar manner. For Heidegger, everyday existence is characterized by self-forgetfulness and self-objectifi cation. We all tend to let our own self-understanding be guided by and, therefore, covered over by our commonsensical understanding of worldly matters. Phenomenology can be described as a struggle against this levelling self-understanding. This is why Heidegger in Being and Time writes that the phenomenological analysis is characterized by a certain violence, since its disclosure of the being of Dasein is only to be won in direct confrontation with Dasein’s own tendency to cover things up. In fact, it must be wrested and captured from Dasein. Heidegger also talks of how our ordinary life is a life led according to conventional norms and standards. Everything is already understood and interpreted by others, and we all tend to uncritically take over prevailing judgments and valuations. By leaving all of these unquestioned, we feel safe and at home, and have no real incentive to start asking fundamental and unsettling questions. But certain events – for instance, being overwhelmed by anxiety – can make everyday familiarity collapse, can make even the most familiar of places unfamiliar and uncanny. In such situations, it will be impossible to simply continue to rely on conventional interpretations of the world. To that extent, anxiety can be seen as a happening that might rupture our natural thoughtlessness and propel us into philosophical questioning."

"For both Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger, positive science takes certain ideas about the mind-independent nature of reality for granted and seems to consider such ideas exempt from critical scrutiny. But the aim of phenomenology is to question such objectivism..."

"Initially, the claim was that the form, size, and weight of an object, i.e., those features which can be described quantitatively with mathematical precision, are objective properties, whereas the colour, taste, and smell of the object are subjective phenomena that lack any mind-independent reality. This classical distinction between the primary and secondary qualities have over the years been radicalized and eventually led to the idea that it is not merely certain properties of the appearing object that lack objectivity, but everything that appears. The entire world of experience is a subjective construct, an illusory depiction of a hidden physical cause. If science is to disclose the true nature of reality, it consequently has to move beyond everything phenomenologically given. The world we live in, the world we are familiar with from experience, is quite diff erent from the world of science, and only the latter deserves to be called real."

"Ultimately, Husserl would consider the subject’s birth into a living tradition to have constitutive implications. It is not merely the case that I live in a world which is permeated by references to others, and which others have already furnished with meaning, or that I understand the world (and myself) through a traditional, handed-down, linguistic conventionality. The very meaning that the world has for me is such that it has its origin outside of me, in a historical past."

"What is disclosed by a phenomenological refl ection is, consequently, not a self-enclosed mind, a pure interior self-presence, but an openness toward otherness, a movement of exteriorization and perpetual self-transcendence."

"Husserl’s dictum “to the things themselves” is interpreted by Merleau-Ponty as a criticism of scientism, and as an attempt to disclose a more original relation to the world than the one manifested in scientifi c rationality. It is a call for a return to the perceptual world that is prior to and a precondition for any scientifi c conceptualization and articulation. Scientism seeks to reduce us to objects in the world, objects that can be exhaustively explained by objectifying theories like those of physics, biology, or psychology. It argues that the methods of natural science provide the sole means of epistemic access to the world, and that entities that cannot be captured in terms accepted by natural science are non-existent. As Merleau-Ponty insists, however, we should never forget that our knowledge of the world, including our scientifi c knowledge, arises from a bodily anchored fi rst-person perspective, and that science would be meaningless without this experiential dimension. The scientifi c discourse is rooted in the world of experience, in the experiential world, and if we wish to comprehend the performance and limits of science, we should investigate the original experience of the world of which science is a higher- order articulation. The one-sided focus of science on what is available from a third-person perspective is, for Merleau- Ponty, consequently both naive and dishonest, since the scientifi c practice constantly presupposes the scientist’s fi rst-personal and pre-scientifi c experience of the world."

"The world is, as Merleau-Ponty writes, wonderful. It is a gift and a riddle."

"In section 12 of Being and Time , Heidegger emphasized the need to distinguish sharply between the existential “Being-in” of Dasein and the categorial “being in” of things. Dasein is not in the world in the same way that water is in a glass or a t-shirt is in a closet – that is to say, as one extended entity contained within another extended entity. In fact, given that Heidegger defi nes the world, not as the sum or totality of objects, but rather as the familiar context of meaning and signifi cance that Dasein inhabits, it is no wonder that only Dasein, according to Heidegger, is characterized by being-in-theworld. Other types of entities, by contrast, are “innerworldly” or “belong to the world”, but the world is not “there” for them, they have no world. 4 Still, the fact that the spatiality of “being-containedwithin” does not apply to Dasein does not entail that Dasein has no spatiality."

"Heidegger points out that Dasein’s being-in-the-world always has a certain directedness (perspective, interest). Our concernful dealings with the world are never completely disoriented. Or, rather, to the extent that a temporary disorientation is a possibility, this is because Dasein is as such characterized by orientation and directedness."

"Despite the direct and immediate character of empathy, there will always, and by necessity, remain a diff erence between that which I am aware of when I empathize with the other, and that which the other is experiencing."
"Empathy targets foreign experiences without eliminating their alterity. Rather than blurring the distinction between self and other, rather than leading to some kind of fusion or some sense of merged personal identities, the asymmetry between self-experience and other-experience is on this account crucial for empathy."

"As a philosophical endeavour, phenomenology isn’t primarily interested in contributing to or augmenting the scope of our positive knowledge. Its task is not to uncover new empirical knowledge about diff erent areas of the world, but rather to investigate the basis of this knowledge and to clarify how it is possible. As Heidegger once remarked, “to philosophize means to be entirely and constantly troubled by and immediately sensitive to the complete enigma of things that common sense considers self-evident and unquestionable”. 1 Indeed, according to one reading it is precisely this domain of ignored obviousness that phenomenology seeks to investigate, and its ability to do so is premised on its adoption of a specifi c philosophical attitude."


"Sartre eventually voiced a harsh criticism of Heidegger’s approach. To downplay or ignore the face-to-face encounter and to emphasize the extent to which our everyday being-with-one-another is characterized by anonymity and substitutability – as Heidegger puts it, the others are those among whom one is, but from whom “one mostly does not distinguish oneself” 28 – is, according to Sartre, to miss out on what is actually at stake in intersubjectivity: The encounter and confrontation with radical otherness . Sartre’s highlighting of the alterity and transcendence of the other was subsequently radicalized by Levinas, who also attacked Heidegger for off ering a totalizing account that failed to respect and appreciate the alterity and diff erence of the other. 29 In his own work, Levinas went on to argue that my encounter with the other is an encounter with something that cannot be conceptualized or categorized: “If one could possess, grasp, and know the other, it would not be other”. 30 The encounter with the other is an encounter with an ineff able alterity. It is an encounter that is not conditioned by anything in my power, but which has the character of a visitation, an epiphany, or a revelation. In a characteristic move, Levinas then argued that the authentic encounter with the other, rather than being perceptual or epistemic, is ethical in nature."

"Berger and Luckmann reject any attempt to view social reality as a self-standing natural entity, as a non-human or supra-human thing . As they write, the social order is a product of human activity; it is neither biologically determined, nor in any other way determined by facts of nature: “Social order is not part of the ‘nature of things’, and it cannot be derived from the ‘laws of nature’. Social order exists only as a product of human activity”. The task of social theory is to provide an account of how human beings, through manifold forms of interaction, create and shape social structures and institutions, which may fi rst have the character of a common, intersubjective reality, but eventually become “externalized” and achieve objective reality."

"When I am naturally attuned, the entire system of practical knowledge or “know-how”, to which my typifi cations belong, remains in the background, as it were. This is obviously connected to my everyday practical focus: I have letters to send, groceries to buy, children to take to school, and so on. These activities and the various projects of which they form part guide my interests and priorities. My practical knowledge, including the various typifi cations, are tools that I employ so naturally and immediately that I rarely pause to refl ect on them. As Schutz often puts it, I take them for granted , without questioning their validity, and without subjecting them to scrutiny. 15 Like Husserl, Schutz calls this unquestioning and uncritical stance the “natural attitude”.

"Our background knowledge, however, is not immune to revision. As long as my typifi cations help me achieve my aims and objectives, they will remain in force; but if they are repeatedly defeated, I will typically revise them. As Schutz puts it, our background knowledge is taken for granted, but only “until further notice”. 16 If, for example, I repeatedly experience that the addressees do not receive my letters, I will revise some of my assumptions concerning typical postal workers and their typical motives. On the other hand, I can only deal with such a situation by relying on other assumptions and typifi cations. I may fi le a complaint with the Royal Mail, for example, thereby tacitly assuming that certain offi cials will react in certain typical ways (say read my complaint, rather than shredding it unread). Alternatively, I may decide that from now on I will use emails only, thereby assuming typical courses of action on the part of my Internet service provider, and so on. Thus, even if individual typifi cations are only taken for granted “until further notice”, it would be practically impossible to abandon them unless other typifi cations and assumptions at the same time remained in operation. Schutz accordingly concludes that it is within the context of a world taken for granted that I can question and doubt individual cases. The lifeworld itself, by contrast, is the undoubted “foundation of any possible doubt”.

"Already from early on, quite a number of important psychiatrists also became interested in and infl uenced by phenomenology. Given its subject matter, this development was to some extent quite natural. If we consider some of the central experiential categories that are affl icted in diff erent psychopathological conditions, such as the structure of temporal and spatial experience, the demarcation between self and non-self, the experience of one’s own body, the unity and identity of self, and the character of social engagement, the relevance of the phenomenological resources is obvious."

[Henrik Maler · Rating 4 out of 5]

What stood out, positively or negatively?
- It seems like a complete and very well informed overview of the essentials of phenomenology.
- It did inspire and surprise me. The elaborations on the relation between world and mind and the acclaimed objectivity of science emphasise the fundamental premise of phenomenology: reality is a relation between mind and world, not mind-independent for subjects to grasp or not to grasp.

Can I recommend it?
Dan Zahavi is an expert in the field, and since he is a good writer, too, I don't think you can go wrong with this book, if you want a comprehensive introduction to phenomenology!

What did I learn from this book, besides some views or concepts?
It reinforced the value I place on experience, not only for life itself, but also for going about life by doing science and philosophy, taking care not to neglect the phenomenological dimension.

My Notes
- Ethnomethodology: investigates how social agents structure their environment in meaningful ways
- Depth Phenomenology: the investigation of phenomena that are more difficult to study, because they tend to escape our “objectifying grasp” (p. 62) and thus remain hidden. Also called the “phenomenology of the invisible” by Michel Henry.
- Realism/Objectivism: “reality is what it is completely independently of any experiencer, and that our cognitive apprehension of reality is, at best, a faithful mirroring of a pre-existing world” (p. 29)
- Naturalised phenomenology/Neurophenomenology: Incorporating the lifeworld into scientific theories of consciousness.
- “If cognitive science is to accomplish its goal, namely to provide a truly scientifc theory of consciousness, it cannot and must not ignore the phenomenological dimension , since it well then be disregarding a crucial part of the explanandum.” (p. 129)
- “To put it differently, if our aim is to have a comprehensive understanding of the mind, then focusing narrowly on the nature of the subpersonal events that underlie experience without considering the qualities and structures of the experience itself will just not take us very far.” (p. 129)
- Being-in-the-world (In-der-Welt-sein): term by Heidegger to express the embeddedness of mind in the world and their interdependence
- Being-with (Mitsein): term by Heidegger to express the strong impact others have on our thinking
- Constitution: “The subjective process through which something (typically an object) is revealed, disclosed, or brought to manifestation.”
- Dasein: term by Heidegger for the intentional subject (comparable to consciousness)
- Facticity: “The contingency of human existence, nature, history”
- Sedimentation: “The way in which that which is acquired in experience settles down, becomes habitualised, and informs, enables, and constrains future experiences.”

What is phenomenology?
- the study of that which appears to us, understanding
-> “how [phenomena] can appear as what they are
-> and with the meaning they have” (p. 26).
- the study of the subject to which the object appears, leading to the “experiental structures that these modes of appearance are correlated with” (p. 26)
- It has three goals:
1. epochè/bracketing: a specific philosophical attitude that breaks with common-sense assumptions about apparent self-evidences, penetrating one’s tacit core assumptions and prejudices to see objects and experiences of them in a new light, particularly “our assumption about the existence of a mind-independent world” (p. 65). The reflection cannot be absolutely reductive, because one cannot cut through every conception, and thus must be performed repetitively instead of once and for all.
2. eidetic reduction: finding the essences of things, investigating the “basis of this knowledge and clarify how it is possible” (p. 103), examining e.g. our stream of consciousness, embodiment, perception
3. “doing justice to our pre-sctientific experience of space, time and world.” (p.65) while being “a strictly scientific philosophy” that is “accounting for our lifeworld”.

What are phenomena?
- “one cannot ask for something behind the phenomenon at all, since what the phenomenon gives is precisely that something in itself” (Heidegger, 1985: 86)
- two modes of manifestation: at a superficial glance (regular daily experience) and under the best of circumstances (science)
- already possesses all the reality and objectivity
- Phenomena do not cause intentionality, rather it is through the meaning the objects come to be intentional objects of our consciousness.
- The intentional object and the intentional subject are different, but they are essentially related. Mind and world stand in a highly intimate relation with eacher, consciousness both constitutes the world, and is “nothing but a project of the world” (p. 30, Merleau-Ponty, 2012: 454) at the same time. They are interdependent and unseparable from each other.
- Self, others, and world cannot be understood in isolation, but only in their interconnection. (p. 58).
- Our world “should not be understood as the mere totality of positioned objects, or as the sum total of causal relations, but rather as the context of meaning that we are constantly situated within.” (p.66, Zahavi paraphrasing Merleau-Ponty in his preface of Phenomenology of Perception)
- “Subjectivity is necessarily embedded and embodied in a social, historical, and natural context. The world is inseperable from subjectivity, and intersubjectivity, and the task of phenomenology is to think world, subjectivity, and intersubjectivity in their proper connection.” (p. 67)

Which claims revolve around the objectivity and realism of science?
- Believes in the two-world doctrine, one world of subjective appearances and one “real” world behind them
- Three scientific accounts about reality:
-> Only if an appearance can be reduced, it is real (reductionism).
-> Appearances are not real, because they do not even exist (eliminativism).
-> Scientific naturalism/Scientism: Only that which can be measured with mathematical precision (primary qualities) is real, while secondary qualities, “The entire world of experience is a subjective construct, an illusory depiction of a hidden physical cause.” (p. 50)

Which criticism do phenomenologists level against the supposed objectivity of science?
- Science is dependent on subjectivity
-> There is no view from nowhere, thus even science is subjective as it relies on subjects planning and setting up the experiments, reading the measuring instruments, interpreting, comparing, and discussing the results and theory-modelling.
-> “to claim that the moon, a neuron, a deck of cards, or a communal ritual have a unfathombale and hidden true being, that what they really are is something completely divorced fom any context of use, network of meaning, or theoretical framework, and that whatever experiential and theoretical perspective we might adopt on them is consequently bound to miss its target, is not only a deeply obfuscating claim, but also one that is epistemologically naive.” (p.28).
-> “Even though scientific theories in their precision and abstraction supersede the concrete and intuitively given lifeworld, the latter remains a constant source of reference.” (p. 51)
-> Science would be meaningless without the first-person perspective, its experiential dimension (p. 66).
-> “Objectivity” comes about through subjectivity and intersubjectivity.
- Science cannot provide an exhaustive account of reality.

Science in relation to phenomenology
- “To seek to impose the same exactness and precision that we find in geometry to matters in the lifeworld is to do violence to the latter.” (p. 46)
- Not “any domain that cannot be analysed with mathematical exactitude is less valuable or even less real.” (p. 47)
- “[Harold] Garfinkel wanted to emphasize to what extent our various activities are contextual. Our understanding of any situation, action, or phenomena is context-dependent and this dependency cannot be surmounted or suspended using idealised or standardizd concepts, but must be recognized as a basic feature of human understanding. Our understanding can never be entirely explicated, but will always draw on a horizon of tacit assumptions.” (p. 114)

So, what is science then?
- “Science is a distinct relation to the world, a particular theoretical modification of the natural attitude. […] It is a tradition, a cultural formation. It is knowledge that is shared by a community of experiencing subjects and which presupposes a triangulation of points of view or perspectives.” ( p. 53f.)
- Science is a higher-order articulation of original experience (p. 66)

[Christopher Blosser · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent survey of the subject. This would be well recommended for any introductory college course, insofar as it also covers the chief points in the thought of Husserl, Scheler, Merleau-Ponty, Heidegger (and even Edith Stein to a small degree), but does not presuppose an extensive, first-hand knowledge of the source texts themselves on the part of the reader. The concepts of each are clearly articulated and (in my opinion) readily "digestible". My one caveat was that the last chapter on the application/utilization of phenomenology within the schools of sociology and psychology, though again well explained, was not particularly interesting to me. But on the whole I really enjoyed this as an introduction.

[William Adams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Getting the history and main philosophical issues of phenomenology into a 150-page book is an amazing accomplishment. Zahavi covers all the difficult topics, from defining phenomena, to intentionality, the lifeworld, embodiment, intersubjectivity, time-consciousness, and generative phenomenology. He summarizes the sprawling literature from Hegel, Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Sartre, and others in incredibly succinct paragraphs.

I am no expert in this field but I have dabbled, in English only. From what I know about phenomenology and the authors covered in this volume, Zahavi can be trusted to get it right (in my understanding) nearly all the time.

He comes up short in a few discussions, particularly around intersubjectivity. He uses phrases like “direct access” to my own consciousness as if that were self-explanatory. It’s contrasted to how I know your consciousness (by inference? by empathy?). He does not seem aware of the absurdity of the phrase “direct access” in this context. “Access” is a wrong idea for how we experience our own consciousness. We are it. We do not “access” like a homunculus. As for “direct” (presumably meaning unmediated by the intellect), how would that work? Without conceptualization, you could be conscious, but not self-conscious. “Direct access” to consciousness is an oxymoron.

That’s an example of poor language and unexamined assumptions that lurk in the book. Others are around discussions of embodiment, spatiality, and ontology. Such criticisms are perhaps unfair for such a short book. Zahavi is just using the confused terminology that prevails in the field. Even so, for a an instant overview of a huge field of study, this is the book to get.

Zahavi, Dan (2019). Phenomenology: The Basics. New York: Routledge, 158 pp

[Andrew Earnshaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is very good. I don’t think you could find a better introduction to phenomenology. It gives you a history of the major thinkers on the subject and then also shows you how Phenomenology can be and has been applied to different areas outside of phenomenology.

However, I do have two criticisms. First, while the writing style is concise and clear, the book does share a problem of a few in its genre. While the book markets itself as an introduction to a philosophical idea, it, like many in its genre, can’t help but also be an introduction to philosophy in general and while that is laudable it means that sometimes the meaning, the core idea which they are trying to explain, gets lost in self-indulgent, overly-philosophical whimsy. The result is that sometimes it is enjoyable to read but difficult to comprehend what the author actually means.

Second, and closely related to my previous point, is an apparent fear on the part of the author of being too explicit. It would be good if the author was too end each chapter with a summary of the core points he has been trying to make in that chapter. This would allow the book to become easier to search and use as a reference as well as cutting through some of the whimsy I described above without removing the personality that comes from said whimsy.

[Saul Walt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Even if it purports to suspend judgements about truth and ontology, phenomenology is confronted with the individuation and categorization of experiences, qualities, identities, and objects, which already implicates it in doing universalistic metaphysics, insofar as the thisnesses or quidities or "given" essences of things are either the truth itself, or already part of a particular sign regime and logos.

Sure, as a method phenomenology could have its uses. But as a navigational tool it does not offer much on top of merely applying some critical thinking whilst engaged in describing and ontologizing with the vocabulary of common everyday language, which can make use of intentionality and causality and rationality and holons and metaphor and folk theories and scientific vocabulary... Which is why when we come to the truth of things, the phenomenological method feels like cutting your hands off because your language’s rules are too limited, because it seems like trying to explain the appearances without involving any necessary explanatory connections to mechanics and concepts and semantic resources that are not already available in the current theory and its finite vocabulary.

[Daniel]

After reading Sokolowski's Introduction to Phenomenology I believed I was ready to tackle Husserl and went straight into reading Ideas I. I wasn't ready.

Now I decided to give another introduction a go. Unlike Sokolowski, Zahavi sticks closer to what each thinker has written instead of the broader shared conceptual toolbox. It was a nice complement. Some of it was a reinforcement of what I've read before, but Zahavi does a good job of clarifying how Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty might agree more than what's commonly believed and points out where they actually differ.

The discussions on embodiment and intersubjectivity got me excited to give the primary sources another go. But beyond that, the applied phenomenology sections in the end were what really triggered my curiosity. Phenomenological sociology sounds fascinating and I'm glad to have been introduced to Schutz via Zahavi.

I feel that a more in depth discussion of the ideas themselves would be more fruitful in a review of those primary sources once I get to them.

[Mark Poulsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very well written, clear and concise language, and an absolute joy to read for both experts and newcomers alike. Zahavi provides a short but precise basic overview of phenomenology; he traces the philosophy from its roots and inception to its later application in, and relation to, other fields of research (honing in on sociology and psychology). The book is then a contemporary look at phenomenology by a leading expert, and he ultimately argues for the continued relevance of the ideas presented within.

[Ziyad Hasanin · Rating 4 out of 5]

مقدمة لطيفة للفلسفة الظاهراتية وأهم أسسها ومنظّريها وأفكارها، ومن ثم بعض تطبيقاتها وأثرها في علم الاجتماع والعلم والطب النفسي.
الفلسفة الظاهراتية من أحب مجالات الفلسفة لي وقد كنت بحثت في علاقتها بالمعمار أثناء دراستي، وأرى أنها جانب فلسفي مهم بالنسبة لنا في العالم العربي. فكما كان فرانز فانون متأثرًا بالظاهراتية والتي ساهمت في تشكيل نظرته للأهلية والعنصرية ونقد الاستعمار فنحن في أمس الحاجة لهذه الأفكار التي تمكننا من إعادة الاعتبار للفرد واختياراته وتجاربه ولنا كشعوب وأمة في مواجهة العالم وأفكاره.

[Aljoša Toplak · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just as it says on the back, this is a concise and engaging introduction to one of the dominant philosophical movements of the 20th century. It's true, it is concise and engaging. I would recommend this to anyone who wanted to learn about phenomenology completely from the start, both its historical development (Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty) and its contemporary applications (philosophy, sociology, psychology).

[Luke Heberle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpful especially as it shows the boundaries and applications of phenomenology, such as the chapter on lifeworld and science, and the chapters on sociology and phenomenological psychology. This is by far the most concise book on phenomenology I’ve seen, Zahavi does not waste the reader’s time. On the other hand, I felt the language was still fairly esoteric, despite it also being one of the most accessible texts on phenomenology.
Highly recommend to anyone interested in phenomenology.

[Hugh Wheaton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty decent introduction to phenomenology, but I feel there was just something lacking when it came to really discussing what exactly phenomenology is. I just don't feel that after having read this book I could really tell you what phenomenology is. Admittedly I didn't expect this book to give me a full rundown and I intended to read the classical phenomenologists myself anyway, but I still feel there was something lacking in this book.

[Jesse]

A great introduction to the field of phenomenology and the core concepts within it. The chapters on neurophenomenology and the applications of phenomenology with psychology and qualitative research are very thought-provoking and relevant to the modern era. The glossary towards the end of the book is very brief and has good explanations of the concepts as well.

[Ønoffo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Leído el libro de mi profe que al parecer es tremenda personalidad en la filosofía internacional. Increíble presentación de las bases fenomenológicas adaptadas al presente. Me va a costar no aplicar muchos de los procedimientos fenomenológicos a partir de ahora (hasta que me bautice en el neo-realismo y neoplatonismo que tengo pendiente de leer)

[sadra jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

اگه به پدیدارشناسی هوسرل و هایدگر و مرلوپونتی علاقه مندید اولین کتابی که میخونید این باشه.
بهترین کتاب برای شروع کاره که قشنگ شما رو میاره تو فضای پدیدارشناسی و خوبیش اینه که خلاصه ای از مسائل انضمامی این فلسفه مثل ورودش به جامعه شناسی و روانشناسیو هم میگه که سطح توقعتون از این فلسفه رو تنظیم کنید.
ترجمه خوب و روونی هم داره.

[Thiago Da silva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great intro to a hard topic. Classic and contemporary themes are explained in the most simple language possible (phenomenology is a hard topic). Husserl seems to be the main reference for Zahavi, but also Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger (not much Sartre) appear here to help the reader understand the question raised.

[Mohammad Mirzaali · Rating 4 out of 5]

مدخلی روشن و خواندنی به پدیدارشناسی بود. دَن زَهَوی در کنار نقل مهم‌ترین آموزه‌های پدیدارشناسان بزرگ، یعنی هوسرل، هایدگر و مرلو–پونتی، سعی داشت کاربردهای روشی پدیدارشناسی برای تحقیق و البته ارتباط پدیدارشناسی با برخی از علوم اجتماعی و طبیعی را هم معرفی کند. به‌روزبودن کتاب در این راستا مفید بود. ترجمه و کیفیت نسخه‌ی چاپی هم عالی بودند.

[Socrates · Rating 5 out of 5]

用现象学的眼，是不可思议的幸福，长久我的生活是两个世界，一个世界迎接生活，一个世界倒退回cogito，分成两半的精神，原来是一，站在形而上学的余烬上，你中有我，我中有你，我终于逃脱了冷酷不止的质问，被容许心安理得的享受平凡生活，体验即是真理所在。但，叹息吧，追问剥夺幸福，虽然更大的幸福被允诺。体系的展开，现象学始于constitution，康德哲学始于analytic/synthetic distinction（不知道康德读到休谟之前，有没有隐隐用过这个区分，如果只在琢磨Hume时想出来，作为起点写进CPR，又能和之前思想合成一体，那这个区分一定不是他一切思想的前提，只是事后反思寻出的一个撬动他体系的支点）

[Konrad · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent introduction into the basics of phenomenology. Dan Zahavi does an excellent job explaining the basics, the history, concepts and contemporary uses of phenomenology without getting too bogged down in detail. If your curious about phenomenology I recommend this book.

[Dávid Pieš · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5/5*

A great introduction to phenomenology. Really good theoretical background. Great practical application of phenomenology to examples.

Personally, I would have appreciated one or two case studies that systematically used phenomenology as a tool presented in support of a general claim. Ideally with a reference to space.