Abstract
In this essay I address the question, “What is the subject matter of phenomenological research?” I argue that in spite of the increasing popularity of phenomenology, the answers to this question have been brief and cursory. As a result, contemporary phenomenologists lack a clear framework within which to articulate the aims and results of their research, and cannot easily engage each other in constructive and critical discourse. Examining the literature on phenomenology’s identity, I show how the question of phenomenology’s subject matter has been systematically neglected. It has been overshadowed by an unending concern with phenomenology’s methodological identity. However, an examination of recent contributions to this literature reveals that a concern with articulating phenomenology’s subject matter has gradually increased, although such articulations remain preliminary. In light of this, I delineate, define, and illustrate three layers of phenomenological research, which I term “existentials,” “modes,” and “prejudices.” While the delineation of these layers is drawn primarily from classical phenomenological texts, they are defined and illustrated through the use of more contemporary literature. Following the articulation of this subject matter, I briefly consider some of the debates—both foundational and applied—that can be facilitated by the adoption of this framework.
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Notes
These terms are translated from the German: “existential” [Existenzial], “existentials” [Existenzialien], “mode” [Modus], “modes” [Modi], “prejudice” [Vorurteil], and “prejudices” [Vorurteile].
In one text, Zahavi says that the future prospects of phenomenology will depend upon the phenomenologist’s “ability to articulate and strengthen what is common to the phenomenological enterprise instead of getting involved in the sectarian trench warfare that has regrettably plagued the history of phenomenology” (Zahavi 2008, p. 684). I want to stress that when I speak of facilitating and increasing debate within phenomenology, I do not have in mind the kind of “trench warfare” that Zahavi remarks on here—insofar as this analogy brings to mind a debate in which everyone’s positions have been staked out in advance. Rather, my primary concern in this essay is to offer a shared framework that supports constructive debate, driving the discipline forward as a whole.
I do not mean this as a methodological priority. There are many examples in the phenomenological canon where the study of particular meaningful objects or events sheds light on the structure whereby such meaningful objects are disclosed.
I follow Stambaugh in translating Existenzial and Existenzialien as “existential” and “existentials,” respectively (rather than the more awkward “existentiale” and “existentialia” employed in the Macquarrie and Robinson translation).
In the Macquarrie and Robinson translation of Being and Time, Befindlichkeit is translated as “state-of-mind.” This translation is widely accepted as inaccurate and misleading. In light of this, it is common to use alternative translations, including “affectedness” (Crowell 2013), “sofindingness” (Haugeland 2013), and “situatedness” (Guignon 2003). Throughout this essay I use the latter term, modifying quotations from Heidegger’s work where appropriate.
In another case, Heidegger speaks of three modes that, taken together, make up the “existential mode” that he refers to as falling. These are idle talk (a mode of the existential of discourse), curiosity (a mode of the existential of situatedness), and ambiguity (a mode of the existential of understanding). In light of this, it seems that even when the term “mode” is used to refer to a modality of human existence as a whole, it can still be more finely delineated into the modal changes within individual existentials.
This distinction—between existentials and modes—is often missed, in many cases leading to incoherent interpretations of phenomenological texts. One example of this kind is found in an article by Rudi Visker (1994). He argues that, according to Heidegger, certain existentials (specifically, falling and the “they”) can disappear—which seems to be a strange or counterintuitive notion. The trouble with this interpretation, and one that Visker fails to notice, is that falling and the “they” are simply not existentials—they are modes. As such, they are just some of the ways a world can be made available to us, and there is nothing especially intriguing about their absence.
Examples of this kind of preparatory work are found in Sect. 1 of his introduction, where he offers a careful analysis of the concept of “sensation” in philosophy and the sciences (Merleau-Ponty 2012, pp. 3–12), as well as the introductory remarks in the final chapter on freedom (Merleau-Ponty 2012, pp. 458–483).
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Acknowledgments
In working out and clarifying the conceptual distinctions in this article, I benefited from discussions with Kevin Aho, Charles Guignon, and Giovanni Stanghellini. I would also like to thank Josh Bergamin, Simon James, Alex Levine, Harry Lewendon-Evans, Louis Sass, Sarah Wieten, and the members of the Applied Phenomenology Research Cluster at Durham University for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article.
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Fernandez, A.V. The subject matter of phenomenological research: existentials, modes, and prejudices. Synthese 194, 3543–3562 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-016-1106-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-016-1106-0