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Existential phenomenology

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Existential phenomenology is Martin Heidegger's brand of phenomenology.[1]

Overview

In contrast with his former mentor Edmund Husserl, Heidegger (in his Being and Time) put ontology before epistemology and thought that phenomenology would have to be based on an observation and analysis of Dasein ("being-there"), human being, investigating the fundamental ontology of the Lebenswelt (lifeworld, Husserl's term) underlying all so-called regional ontologies of the special sciences. In Heidegger’s philosophy man is thrown into the world in a given situation, but he is also a project towards the future, possibility, freedom, wait, hope, anguish.[2] In contrast with the philosopher Kierkegaard, Heidegger wanted to explore the problem of Dasein existentially (existenzial), rather than existentielly (existenziell) because Heidegger argued Kierkegaard had already described the latter with "penetrating fashion".[citation needed]

Development of existential phenomenology

Besides Heidegger, other existential phenomenologists were Hannah Arendt, Karl Jaspers, Emmanuel Levinas, Gabriel Marcel, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Frantz Fanon, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Enzo Paci [it] and Samuel Todes.

Other disciplines

Existential phenomenology extends also to other disciplines. For example, Leo Steinberg's essay "The Philosophical Brothel" describes Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon in a perspective that is existential-phenomenological. It has also impacted architectural theory, especially in the phenomenological and Heideggerian approaches to space, place, dwelling, technology, etc.[3]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (1998): "Phenomenological movement: 4. Existential phenomenology.
  2. ^ Farina, Gabriella (2014). Some reflections on the phenomenological method. Dialogues in Philosophy, Mental and Neuro Sciences, 7(2):50–62.
  3. ^ This is evident in the works of Christian Norberg-Schulz, as for example is the case with his book: Genius Loci, Towards a Phenomenology of Architecture (New York: Rizzoli, 1980), or more recently with the numerous papers of Nader El-Bizri such as his paper: 'On Dwelling: Heideggerian Allusions to Architectural Phenomenology', Studia UBB Philosophia Volume 60 (2015): 5–30. This is also felt with the practices of architects in the Phenomenology (architecture) movement