Studies in Contemporary Phenomenology - Böcker

In Self-Identity and Powerlessness, Alice Koubová proposes a conception of human existence that does not essentially depend on the definition of self-identity. The author shows that the philosophical stress on human identity fails to grasp essential aspects of human existence. By emphasizing the moments of Dasein’s powerlessness in Heidegger’s fundamental ontology, she develops — in her analysis of various philosophers, literary examples, and social psychology —an original phenomenology of alternation of existence and affair. How necessary is identity for thinking? Are we capable of philosophical thought even when we have neither ourselves, nor the world under our full control? Is it possible to relax, become powerless, and yet think precisely? These questions are to be answered in this book.

The articles in this volume reflect upon the intersections of corporeity and affectivity in Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology. They illuminate the meaning of his phenomenology regarding corporeity and affectivity from various phenomenological perspectives. Corporeity and Affectivity explores his invaluable contribution in interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary respect, including the humanities, the arts and the sciences.Contributors include: Alexei Chernyakov (†), Jagna Brudzińska, Universität Köln, IFiS PAN Warschau, Nicola Zippel, Sapienza University of Rome, Department of Philosophy, Karel Novotný, Faculty of Humanities, Charles University of Prague, James Mensch, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Humanities, Annabelle Dufourcq, Charles University Prague, Faculty of Humanities, Juho Hotanen, University of Helsinki, Silvia Stoller, Universität Wien, Pierre Rodrigo, Université de Bourgogne, Dijon, Antonino Firenze, University Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Shaun Gallagher, University of Memphis, Department of Philosophy, Kwok-ying Lau, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Monika Murawska, The Academy of Fine Arts, Warsaw, Irene Breuer, Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Mauro Carbone, Université “Jean Moulin” Lyon 3, Faculté de philosophie, László Tengelyi, Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Björn Thorsteinsson, University of Oceland, Institute of Philosophy, Mikkel B. Tin, Telemark University College, Porsgrunn, Tamás Ullmann, ELTE University of Budapest, Institute of Philosophy, Johann P. Arnason, La Trobe University, Melbourne; Charles University, Faculty of Humanities, Prague, Michael Staudigl, Vienna University, Department of Philosophy, Suzi Adams, Flinders University, Adelaide

Phenomenology, Architecture and the Built World is an introduction to the methods and basic concepts of phenomenological philosophy through an analysis of the phenomenon of the built world. The conception of the built world that emerges is of space and time fashioned in accordance with a living understanding of what it is for human beings to exist in the world. Human building and making is thus no mere supplementary instrument in the pursuit of the ends of life, but a fundamental embodiment of the self-understanding of human beings. Phenomenological description is uniquely capable of bringing into view the physiognomy of this understanding, its texture and complexity, thereby providing an important basis for a critique of what constitutes its essence and its conditions of possibility.

What is the relation between our selfhood and appearing? Our embodiment positions us in the world, situating us as an object among its visible objects. Yet, by opening and shutting our eyes, we can make the visible world appear and disappear—a fact that convinces us that the world is in us. Thus, we have to assert with Merleau-Ponty that we are in the world that is in us: the two are intertwined. Author James Mensch employs the insights of Jan Patočka’s asubjective phenomenology to understand this double relationship of being-in. In this volume, he shows how this relation constitutes the reality of our selfhood, shaping our social and political interactions as well as the violence that constantly threatens to undermine them.

This volume, edited by Lucilla Guidi and Thomas Rentsch, establishes the first systematic connection between phenomenology and performativity. On the one hand, it outlines the performativity of phenomenology by exploring its enactment and the transformation of attitude it effects; this exploration is conducted through a number of parallels between phenomenology and the ancient understanding of philosophy as an exercise and a way of life. On the other hand, the volume examines different notions of performativity from a phenomenological perspective, so as to show that a phenomenological understanding of embodied experience complements a linguistic account of performativity and can also offer a ground for bodily practices of resistance, critique, and self-transformation in our own day and age.

John Sallis has been at the cutting edge of the Continental philosophical tradition for almost half a century, and it is largely due to his contributions that we have come to understand “Continental” as designating an original philosophical, not a geographical, tradition. His work, with its uncommon scholarly rigor, has come to define the best of that tradition and to expand its horizons in creative ways through a genuine philosophical imagination. The essays gathered here are dedicated to assessing Sallis’ contribution and to indicating some of the ways in which his works might shape the future of philosophy.

This book explores a radically integrative phenomenology of nature through the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty. By revisiting novel empirical findings in the sciences and advances in scientific methods and concepts, Merleau-Ponty leads us to rediscover a first nature right at the heart of the subject. Alessio Rotundo traces and documents the presence of a double meaning of nature affecting Merleau-Ponty’s analyses across foundational aspects of human experience: sense perception, organic development and behavior, cognition, language, and history. Physical, biological, and psychological processes in nature are not merely scientific data; they provide the evidence for another, more primordial sense of nature.

Event and Subjectivity presents a rich phenomenological analysis of the event in contemporary phenomenology by focussing on the work of Claude Romano and Jean-Luc Marion. Although the event is a major topic of contemporary philosophy, its centrality has not been acknowledged enough in the phenomenological movement. The book starts with the idea that the event cannot find a proper place in Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology and Heidegger’s existential phenomenology.It proposes a phenomenological version of the event that transforms the definition of phenomenon, subjectivity and phenomenology itself in order to do justice to the phenomenality of the event. At the same time, Event and Subjectivity is the first book on Claude Romano’s understanding of phenomenology in English. It also offers a fresh reading of the phenomenology of Jean-Luc Marion by highlighting the phenomenon of the event.

This edited volume offers a comprehensive view of various possible phenomenological approaches of the experience of love, ranging from classical historical perspectives up to contemporary and critical viewpoints. It explores both the crucial importance of the question of love for the history of phenomenology as well as the rich potential of phenomenology for a deeper insight in the experience of love and its various dimensions, such as its affective, relational, but also ethical and religious aspects.