Phenomenology

Amelia Knuth, Alex Anderson

Phenomenology:
Definition: a philosophical sociology that begins with the individual and his
or her own conscious experience as the focus of study and attempts to avoid
prior assumptions, prejudices, and other dogmatic forms of thinking while
investigating social behavior.
Micro-oriente sociological theory
Phenomenology studies common sense, conscious experience, and routine
daily life, while seeking to understand the world from the point of view of the
acting subject and not from the perspective of the scientific observer.
Push towards qualitative methods

Phenomenology
The conscious experience of individuals.
Society shapes your consciousness and allows us to believe in social
order and structures.
Phenomenologist break down the small things of the world and ask:
About its structure
How to maintain society.

Edmund Husserl

(Father of

Phenomenology)
(1859-1938)

Background:
Father was a merchant of sufficient means
Sent to finest schools: studied mathematics,
physics, & philosophy at Leipzig University
Finished doctoral work at Vienna where he did his
dissertation on the theory of the calculus of
variations

Husserl Continued

Husserl Continued
Influenced by German tradition
Major influences: Descartes, Hume, and Kant
After reading Descartess Mediations Husserl first conceived of the
possibility of seeking a universally rational science of being by
turning his theoretical focus on an objective world to a reflective
one.
Significant publications: On the Concept of Numbers, Logical
Investigations, and Ideas

Husserls Ideas on Phenomenology

1.Its a doctrine of essence and a doctrine concerned with what things are, not with
whether they are.
2.Its not interested in the metaphysical world. Only through consciousness could a
researcher find the true meaning behind behavior.
3.Phenomenology is what it is because it neither seeks nor accepts evidence other
than that offered by consciousness itself.
4.It is not a science of facts, but a science of essential being, an eidetic science
(meaning an insubstantial empirical science); it is a science that aims at establishing
the knowledge of essence.
5.Husserl viewed phenomenology as a type of science but, above all, as a method and
an attitude of mind.

Scientific Method vs. Natural Thinking

In order to claim empirical authenticity, a science must demonstrate
that it employs objective methods when collecting data. For the
phenomenologist, objectivity is found in the world of individual
consciousness that can be verified by others when objects attain
temporal matter (example: sound).
Natural thinking in science and everyday life is untroubled by the
difficulties concerning the possibility of cognition.
The scientific method is not nearly as important as understanding the
meaning of behavior based on ones consciousness.

Perception and Time Consciousness

Perception: What one sees is a product of past memories and
immediate reflection and interpretation of events... Perception of
current events is tied to past events through current intuitions
Time Consciousness:
1.Events and content of the past do in fact influence ones present
consciousness; they are simultaneously linked.
2.Although present behaviors are influenced by past memories and
recollections, all present acts are subject to modification on behalf of
the actor

Time Consciousness Continued

Self-evident laws:
1.That the fixed temporal order is of an infinite, two-dimensional series
2.That two different times can never be conjoint
3.That their relation is a non-simultaneous one
4.That there is transitivity, that to everything time belongs an earlier
and a later

Alfred Schutz

(1899-1959)

Studied law and social science at the University of Vienna

Academic goal: establish a rigorous philosophical foundation grounded in
phenomenological methodology
Responsible for developing phenomenology as a sociological science
Major Influence: Max Weber
Main work: Der Sinnhafte Aufbau der Sozialen Welt: Eine Einleitung in die
Verstehende Soziologie (Translation: Meaningful Construction of the Social
World)

Schutz Continued
Warm and delightful personality

Worked with Husserl briefly. Turned down assistant job due to personal
reasons

Phenomenology of the Social World

Ones stream of consciousness is in simultaneous relation to others
streams of consciousness. Individuals acts are influences by other
peoples acts.. However the same experience is not necessarily shared.
It is a conscious awareness that the world is both united, through
streams of consciousness, and divided, based on individual experience
and interpretation of events.
Understanding others is possible because we share the same world
and many of the subjective meanings attached to experiences.

Phenomenology of the Social World

Assessing someones stream of consciousness is affected by: degrees of
interpretability
We may misinterpret the interactions among other people

Stock of Knowledge
Schutz views individuals as constructing a world by using typifications
(or ideal types) passed onto them by their social group.
When researchers draw upon their own experiences in order to evaluate
a social situation, they are drawing upon their stock of knowledge.
We draw upon our stock of knowledge when interacting in society
because it gives us order to a social situation.
Stock of knowledge comes from our life experiences and education.

Common Sense
Do not confuse stock of knowledge with common sense.
Schutz: even the thing perceived in everyday life is more than a simple
sense presentation. It is a thought object, a construct of a highly
complicated nature In other words, the so-called concrete facts of
common-sense perception are not as concrete as it seems. They already
involve abstractions of a highly complicated nature, and we have to take
account of this situation lest we commit the fallacy of misplaced
concreteness.
Stock of knowledge may include items found within realm of common sense.

Peter Berger

Peter Berger
(1929 - Present)
Background
Was born in Vienna, Austria. He moved to the United Stated when he was a
teenager.
Accomplishments
1949: At Wagner College he received his BA.
1950 and 1954: At the New School for social Research he earned his M.A. and
Ph.D. in New York City.
Understudy for Alfred Schultz
Went on to teach at many a couple of universities and
most recently taught at Boston University.
He is a past president of the Society for
Scientific Study of Religion.

Berger cont.
He wrote many books on the Sociology of Religion.
He ties many the aspects of modern society back to religion.
Controversial Contemporary Issues

Major Influences
Lutheran Theological Divinity School
Yale Divinity School
Max Weber

The Social Construction of Reality

Berger and Luckmann argued that reality is socially
constructed and that the sociology of knowledge must
analyze the processes in which this occurs.
Social reality: the process of looking at society and its
representation by our current information about it.
Culture influences the social reality.

The Social Construction of Reality cont.

3 Processes
1)Externalization
2)Objectivation
3)Internalization

Marriage and The Construction of Reality

The process that interests us here is the one that
constructs, maintains and modifies a consistent
reality that can be meaningfully experienced by
individuals.
One is willing to make changes in their lives
voluntarily and internally, in which individuals have
little control of what goes on around them.

Reification
Internalization
The process of treating outside objects as if they are something other than human
products. Humans forget their position of authority in the world.
Leads to alienation.
The process of forgetting that the products around humans were created by
themselves.
This consciousness is reifying consciousness
and its objects are reifications

Consciousness
First, there is direct and pre-reflective presence to
the world. Secondly, founded on the latter, there is
reflective awareness of the world and ones presence
to it. Thirdly, out of this second level of consciousness
there may in turn arise various theoretical
formulations of the situation.

Social Control and Political Authority

The reality of the social world does not present itself
all at once. It must be constructed and reconstructed
over and over again.

Berger thinks we are prisoners of society.

The Role of Religion in Society

Alteration
The attempt for a person to balance religion and their relation world.
Is God Dead?
Berger says, Gods not dead and that religion is still very well alive and
important in todays society.
Only through the belief in the existence of the supernatural- that is, a
reality that transcends the reality of the natural world of everyday
life- can humans grasp the true proportions of their experience.
Viewed religious experiences as important.

Relevancy - Societal Gain

Insight to daily unacknowledged processes, in which humans
view society.
Insight on:
Perception
Social Structure
Human Behavior

Key Perspectives
Time Consciousness
Stock of Knowledge
Reification and Consciousness

Limitations
Many sociologist distrust phenomenology, especially the
ones who favor quantitative and scientific research.
Critics say that their ideas are vague and subject to
interpretation.
Lack of concrete evidence.

Questions Related to Phenomenology

Define these terms as they are used by phenomenology: time
consciousness, stock of knowledge, reification and consciousness.
Describe how Edmund Husserl defines the relationship between
natural thinking and the scientific method.
Describe the key perspective by which phenomenology views society.
What do sociologists gain by viewing society from the perspective of
phenomenology?
Describe one key limitation to the way that
phenomenologists view society.

References