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Destructed meaning, withheld world, shattered "we"

Michael Staudigl

pp. 135-151

The basic intention of this paper is to approach the phenomenon of violence from the perspective of Jan Patočka's "a‑subjective phenomenology." Violence is a "boundary phenomenon" that has not yet been adequately analyzed within the phenomenological tradition. Its analysis requires a revision of phenomenology. Such a revision can be found not only in recent approaches, but already in Patočka's conception. His basic ideas, deriving from a strong critique of both Husserl's subjectivism and Heidegger's anti-intellectualism, are here reassessed in this sense. In this context, I use Patočka's insights concerning the "phenomenal field" and the "movement of human existence" to develop a phenomenological analysis of the various ways in which violence affects the self: by destroying incorporated patterns of understanding, by oppressing the meaningful frameworks of our pre-given life-world, and, finally, by undermining our initial trust in the other.

Publication details

DOI: 10.1007/978-90-481-9124-6_11

Full citation:

Staudigl, M. (2011)., Destructed meaning, withheld world, shattered "we", in E. Abrams & I. Chvatík (eds.), Jan Patočka and the heritage of phenomenology, Dordrecht, Springer, pp. 135-151.

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