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Watsuji’s Phenomenology of Aidagara: An Interpretation and Application to Psychopathology

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Tetsugaku Companion to Phenomenology and Japanese Philosophy

Part of the book series: Tetsugaku Companions to Japanese Philosophy ((TCJP,volume 3))

Abstract

I examine Tetsurō Watsuji’s philosophical discussion of self and embodiment in his Rinrigaku (“A Study of Ethics”). Specifically, I consider how these themes inform his analysis of aidagara, or “betweenness”—one of Watsuji’s central philosophical contributions. First, I develop a phenomenological reading of aidagara. I argue that the notion can help illuminate aspects of our embodied subjectivity and its interrelation with the world and others. Along the way, I also indicate how the notion can be fruitfully supplemented by different sources of empirical research. Second, I put aidagara to work in the context of psychopathology. I show how disruptions of aidagara in schizophrenia not only affirm the foundational role it plays in organizing our experience of self and world in everyday life. Additionally, I suggest the notion can, in this context of application, potentially enhance our understanding of and empathy for those living with schizophrenic disorders.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For discussions of Watsuji’s ningen in its Buddhist context, see Odin 1992; Shields 2009; Kalmanson 2010; McCarthy 2011; Sevilla 2016.

  2. 2.

    See Odin 1992 for an extended comparative discussion of why this way of thinking about the self is not necessarily unique to Japan.

  3. 3.

    This mutual dependence of self and world is a direct appeal to the Buddhist notion of the “co-dependent origination” of all phenomena. See LaFleur 1978: 244–245.

  4. 4.

    For critical discussions of Watsuji’s critique of Heidegger, see Arisaka 2001 and Mayeda 2006.

  5. 5.

    This is what Merleau-Ponty seems to mean when he writes that “To say that my body is always near to me or always there for me is to say that it is never truly in front of me...that it remains on the margins of all my perceptions, and that it is with me” (Merleau-Ponty 2012: 93). Similarly, Sartre tells us that “the body is present in every action though invisible...The body is lived and not known” (Sartre 1956: 427)

  6. 6.

    Although individuals with schizophrenia often exhibit difficulty constructing and maintaining a narratively structured self (Gallagher 2007).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Exeter, Exeter, UK

    Joel Krueger

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  1. Joel Krueger
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Humanities and Human Sciences, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan

    Shigeru TAGUCHI

  2. FISPPA-Department, University of Padova, Padova, Italy, Department of Philosophy, China University of Political Science and Law, Peking, China

    Andrea ALTOBRANDO

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Krueger, J. (2019). Watsuji’s Phenomenology of Aidagara: An Interpretation and Application to Psychopathology. In: TAGUCHI, S., ALTOBRANDO, A. (eds) Tetsugaku Companion to Phenomenology and Japanese Philosophy. Tetsugaku Companions to Japanese Philosophy, vol 3. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21942-0_11

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