Personality of Higher Order: Husserlian Reflections on the Québec Problem

Abstract

There is a very strong sense in Québec that there are two things in life which are worthy of genuine passion: ice hockey and politics. The difference between these two major spectator sports is that the hockey season has been expanded to last only eight months; whereas politics is front page news 365 days a year. Given this pervasive quality, it might be expected that a phenomenologist living in one of the most politicized environments imaginable would encounter few problems describing political life as it appears in Québec. How one answers the phone, the paper one reads, where one shops, these are not just considered acts of personal preference or expressions of personal identity—these and all sorts of “everyday” acts are frequently attributed a profound political significance. But this very omnipresence of the political means that it is very difficult to conduct some form of phenomenological reflection upon it; very difficult indeed to turn away from the empirical self-interest that every Québecois(e) has invested in the political life of the province.