On the value of phenomenology across disciplines and traditions,

Robyn R. Gaier

pp. 269-273

in: Human Studies 30 (3), 2007.

Abstract

Philosophical phenomenology has often been regarded as having more to do with subjective psychology and exegesis than with contemporary problems facing analytical cognitive science. Dan Zahavi, in his book Subjectivity and Selfhood, strongly challenges this understanding of phenomenology by focusing upon the relations among experience, self-awareness, and selfhood and, thereby, providing an account of the self that has significance for cognitive scientists and analytical philosophers of mind, as well as for phenomenologists. Although the subjective element of consciousness or, rather, the phenomenal first-person perspective has enjoyed greater attention in recent years, Zahavi claims that the utility of philosophical phenomenology stretches beyond its usual limits of analyzing the nature of consciousness. Phenomenology, Zahavi writes, “can also offer a conceptual framework for understanding subjectivity that might be of considerably more value than some of the models currently in...

Cited authors

Zahavi Dan