A New Way into Phenomenology: The Workshop Approach

Abstract

What I would like to present here is a way of doing phenomenology together which, to my knowledge, has not yet been tried systematically. True, philosophy as such has never been done only by solitary reflection but also in groups, for instance by dialogue, if not by the more formalized techniques of the scholastic disputation. In fact, a special term for philosophizing together, sym-philosophein, occurs in the Ethics of Aristotle, who is otherwise known chiefly as the monological lecturer rather than as the advocate of Platonic dialogue. Husserl himself was fond of using the Greek term when he reached out for others to share his phenomenological quest, only to realize that his longing was in vain and that he had to do his pioneer work by himself. But neither in his seminars, which were usually dominated by his monologues, nor in more intimate conversation did he develop anything like a technique for joint phenomenologizing. There was more give and take in the seminars and colloquia of some of Husserl’s early associates such as Alexander Pfander and Adolf Reinach, and there was a good deal of free exchange in the philosophical societies and discussion circles in Gottingen and Munich before the First World War. But nothing was done to develop such mutual free exchanges into a method of cooperative research.