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The Problem of Difference: Phenomenology and Poststructuralism
Beginning with Plato and Aristotle, philosophers throughout history have built their theories around the problem of reconciling a fundamental distinction, as for example, Plato's distinction between knowledge (reality) and opinion (appearance), Descarte's mind/body distinction, and Kant's a priori/a posteriori distinction. This 'problem of difference' is a classic theme in philosophy, and one that has taken especially intriguing turns in recent decades. Jeffrey A. Bell here presents a finely constructed survey of the contemporary continental philosophers, focusing on how they have dealt with the problem of difference. Bell's work centres around three key figures - Husserl, Merleau-Ponty, and Deleuze. He also considers the positions of such thinkers as Foucault, Derrida, and Rorty, who have called for an end to the traditional response to the problem of difference - an end to the search for any ultimate foundations on which our varied and different experiences of the world might be based - and thus, in effect, an end to traditional philosophy. In clarifying the relationship between phenomenology and poststructuralism, Bell analyses the role of paradox in both traditions, in particular the role it plays in accounting for difference. Not only philosophers, but also teachers and students in the area of comparative literary they will benefit from this book.
- GenresPhilosophy
306 pages, Paperback
First published May 16, 1998
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
October 12, 2021
After reading two thirds of this work, I have come to the conclusion that I do not have a problem with 'Difference', the 'Problem of Difference' does not exist for me. I do have a problem though with the few names here which supposedly tackled this problem. Chief among them Husserl, possibly the most overrated thinker of 20th century after his lunatic protege. The man is a ball of confusion, going round and round positing layers and fluxes and intending forms which are supposed to clarify problems whose source are the very chimerical schema he is constantly revising to avoid an infinite regress or many. Bell, as another review here mentions, makes clever connections between concerns of phenomenologists and those of analytical thinkers like Kripke and Frege which highlight just how little they added to resolving those in comparison. Phenomenology has always been parasitic on findings in psychology (particularly Gestalt psychology) and neuroscience nowadays, and as much as they bracket things they make no discovery which was not made without abandoning the 'natural attitude'.
I skipped the brief Deleuze bits in the end of the book. They seemed skimpy which is best when considering the work of an imposture
I skipped the brief Deleuze bits in the end of the book. They seemed skimpy which is best when considering the work of an imposture
April 28, 2017
Although often spoken about as running in the same philosophical circles, the exact relationship between phenomenology and poststructuralism has not always been an entirely straightforward affair. From the puzzles of perception to the limits of language, the intricacies of identity and the dramas of of difference, just where the one begins and the other ends has always been a story of twisted margins and mangled trails. For Jeffrey Bell however, the golden thread which spans the distance between them is in fact ‘the problem of difference’: the ways in which each treats the paradoxes of relation that inhere at the heart of each. Although tracing the genesis of the problem back to the very beginnings of philosophy - Plato’s wrangling over Ideas and their copies, Descartes and his (in)famous mind/body distinction - it’s the writings of Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty (in the phenomenological corner), and Gilles Deleuze (in the poststructuralist corner) which take centre stage here, which together, stake out the contemporary landscape of ‘the problem of difference’ which Bell’s book so carefully charts.
While weaving something of a teleological narrative in which poststructuralism eventually comes out ‘on top’, as it were, Bell nonetheless remains an incredibly sympathetic reader of both Husserl and Merleau-Ponty, the detailed studies of whom in fact comprise the bulk of this book. Throughout, Bell takes it upon himself to track the way in which paradox continually marks the attempts of all three to grapple with their respective problematics, from Husserl’s efforts to ground objective truth in subjective expression, to Merleau-Ponty’s wrangling over the unity and difference of body and world, and finally to Deleuze’s fully fledged ‘philosophy of difference’ in which paradox would become ‘untamed’ for the first time. The ‘taming’ here referring to the way in which while both Husserl and Merleau-Ponty eventually come to recognise the inescapability of paradox, both ultimately end up subordinating paradox to a certain stability, whether it be the ‘transcendental ego’ of Husserl, or the identity of the body and world in Merleau-Ponty.
As should be clear by now, Phenomenology and Poststructuralism is a throughly academic work, one profoundy steeped in the debates and problems which animate its trajectory. Indeed, Bell’s own scholarship is impeccable in its depth of research, with some of the book’s most insightful moments being interventions into ‘local’ disputes over - for example - the role of ‘perceptual noema’ in Husserl and exact status of the ‘Flesh’ in Merleau-Ponty. Particularly wonderful too are Bell’s attempts to draw connections between the problems explicated here and those in realm of ‘analytic philosophy’: paring Gottlieb Frege with Husserl on the question sense, and Saul Kripke with Merleau-Ponty on the question of language, and finally C. S. Peirce with Deleuze on the nature of perception, Bell makes small but valiant attempts to draw close two traditions whose practitioners are often at loggerheads with one another.
Indeed, if there’s a failing to be found, it’s in Bell’s comparatively light treatment of Deleuze which rounds out the book. Approached primarily through a comparison of Deleuze and Merleau-Ponty’s treatment of cinema (and hence perception), Bell’s reading of Deleuze does more to point in the direction of further study than it does to really treat him on his own terms. Luckily, this is exactly what Bell will go on to do in his ‘Philosophy at the Edge of Chaos', which is perhaps one of the more remarkable books in the cottage industry that ‘Deleuze studies’ has now become. Still, although the narrative weight here falls on the side of phenomenologists, the fact remains that Phenomenology and Poststructuralism goes a long way in illuminating a relation whose obscurity has at times made easier fodder for polemics than it has serious study. More than just a revision of intellectual history though, this book makes clear - in a way that precious few do - just what’s at stake in the many grapplings of ‘difference’ that mark the contemporary horizon of philosophy today.
While weaving something of a teleological narrative in which poststructuralism eventually comes out ‘on top’, as it were, Bell nonetheless remains an incredibly sympathetic reader of both Husserl and Merleau-Ponty, the detailed studies of whom in fact comprise the bulk of this book. Throughout, Bell takes it upon himself to track the way in which paradox continually marks the attempts of all three to grapple with their respective problematics, from Husserl’s efforts to ground objective truth in subjective expression, to Merleau-Ponty’s wrangling over the unity and difference of body and world, and finally to Deleuze’s fully fledged ‘philosophy of difference’ in which paradox would become ‘untamed’ for the first time. The ‘taming’ here referring to the way in which while both Husserl and Merleau-Ponty eventually come to recognise the inescapability of paradox, both ultimately end up subordinating paradox to a certain stability, whether it be the ‘transcendental ego’ of Husserl, or the identity of the body and world in Merleau-Ponty.
As should be clear by now, Phenomenology and Poststructuralism is a throughly academic work, one profoundy steeped in the debates and problems which animate its trajectory. Indeed, Bell’s own scholarship is impeccable in its depth of research, with some of the book’s most insightful moments being interventions into ‘local’ disputes over - for example - the role of ‘perceptual noema’ in Husserl and exact status of the ‘Flesh’ in Merleau-Ponty. Particularly wonderful too are Bell’s attempts to draw connections between the problems explicated here and those in realm of ‘analytic philosophy’: paring Gottlieb Frege with Husserl on the question sense, and Saul Kripke with Merleau-Ponty on the question of language, and finally C. S. Peirce with Deleuze on the nature of perception, Bell makes small but valiant attempts to draw close two traditions whose practitioners are often at loggerheads with one another.
Indeed, if there’s a failing to be found, it’s in Bell’s comparatively light treatment of Deleuze which rounds out the book. Approached primarily through a comparison of Deleuze and Merleau-Ponty’s treatment of cinema (and hence perception), Bell’s reading of Deleuze does more to point in the direction of further study than it does to really treat him on his own terms. Luckily, this is exactly what Bell will go on to do in his ‘Philosophy at the Edge of Chaos', which is perhaps one of the more remarkable books in the cottage industry that ‘Deleuze studies’ has now become. Still, although the narrative weight here falls on the side of phenomenologists, the fact remains that Phenomenology and Poststructuralism goes a long way in illuminating a relation whose obscurity has at times made easier fodder for polemics than it has serious study. More than just a revision of intellectual history though, this book makes clear - in a way that precious few do - just what’s at stake in the many grapplings of ‘difference’ that mark the contemporary horizon of philosophy today.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews