Transcript 12phenomenology

Phenomenological Sociology
Content
• Schutz’s Phenomenological Sociology
• Peter Berger and Luckmann: Sociology of
Knowledge in Phenomenological Perspective
• Bourdieu on Phenomenology and
Ethnomethodology
• Garfinkel: Ethnomethodology
Schutz: meaningful structure of
the world of daily life
Schutz’s intellectual life was a concern for the meaningful
structure of the world of daily life, the everyday working
world into which each of us is born, within whose limits
our existence unfolds, and which in its massive
complexity, to outline and explore its essential features,
and to trace out its manifold relationships were the
composite parts of his central task, the realization of a
philosophy of mundane reality, or in more formal
language, of a phenomenology of the natural attitude.
The understanding of the paramount reality of commonsense life is the clue to the understanding of the work of
Schute.
Intersubjectivity
• The study of intersubjectivity seeks to answer questions such as
these: How do we know other minds? Other selves? How is
reciprocity of perspectives possible? How is mutual understanding
and communication possible
• Intersubjectivity exists in the “vivid present” in which we speak and
listen to each other. We share the same time and space with others.
“This simultaneity is the essence of intersubjectivity, for it means
that I grasp the subjectivity of the alter ego at the same time as I live
in my own stream of consciousness. And this grasp in simultaneity
of the other as well as his reciprocal grasp of me makes possible our
being in the world together.
• Though both focused on subjectivity, phenomenological
philosophers within the realm of consciousness and Schutz in the
social world.
The common-sense world
• “The common-sense world,” “world of daily life,” “ everyday world ”,”everyday working world”, “ mundane reality”
are variant expressions for the intersubjective world
experienced by man within what Husserl terms the
“natural attitude”. The common-sense world is the arena
of social action; within it men come into relationship
with each other and try to come to terms with each other
as well as with themselves. All of this, however, is
typically taken for granted, and this means that these
structures of daily life are not themselves recognized or
appreciated formally by common sense. Rather,
common-sense sees the world, acts in the world, and
interprets the world through these implicit typifications .
Biographical situation
• Common-sense world is given to us all in historical and
cultural forms of universal validity, but the way in which
these forms are translated in an individual life depends
on the totality of the experience a person builds up in the
course of his concrete existence. The actor’s actual
situation has its history; it is the sedimentation of all his
previous subjective experiences. They are not
experienced by the actor as being anonymous but as
unique and subjectively given to him and to him alone.
• The example of stranger
Stock of Knowledge at Hand
• At any moment in his life the individual has a stock of
knowledge at hand. This stock is made up of typifications of
the common-sense world.
• This “stockpiling” of typifications is endemic to commonsense life. From childhood on, the individual continues to
amass a vast number of “recipes” which then serve as
techniques for understanding or at least controlling aspects
of his experience.
• Finally, the typifications which comprise the stock of
knowledge are generated out of a social structure. Here as
everywhere, knowledge is socially rooted, socially distributed,
and socially informed. Yet its individual expression depends
on the unique placement of the individual in the social world.
Action as the starting point for a
methodology of the social sciences
• Schutz stressed upon action as the starting point for a
methodology of the social sciences. It is an insistence on
the qualitative difference between the kinds of reality
investigated by natural scientists and social scientists. It
is a plea for appreciating the fact that men are not only
elements of the scientist’s field of observation but
preinterpreters of their own field of action, that their
overt conduct is only a fragment of their total behavior,
that the first challenge given to those who seek to
understand social reality is to comprehend the
subjectivity of the actor by grasping the meaning an act
has for him, the axis of the social world.
Knowledge and construct
• All our knowledge of the world, in common-sense as well as in
scientific thinking, involves constructs, i.e., a set of abstractions,
generalizations, formalizations, idealizations specific to the
respective level of thought organization. Strictly speaking, there are
no such things as facts, pure and simple. All facts are from the
outset facts selected from a universal context by the activities of our
mind. They are, therefore, always interpreted facts, either facts
looked at as detached from their context by an artificial abstraction
or facts considered in their particular setting. In either case, they
carry along their interpretational inner and outer horizon. This does
not mean that, in daily life or in science, we are unable to grasp the
reality of the world. It just means that we grasp merely certain
aspects of it, namely those which are relevant to us either for
carrying on our business of living or from the point of view of a
body of accepted rules of procedure of thinking called the method of
science.
The constructs of the natural science
• It is up to the natural scientists to determine which
sector of the universe of nature, which facts and events
therein, and which aspects of such facts and events are
topically and interpretationally relevant to their specific
purpose. These facts and events are neither preselected
nor preinterpreted; they do not reveal intrinsic relevance
structures. Relevance is not inherent in nature as such, it
is the result of the selective and interpretative activity of
man within nature or observing nature. The facts, data,
and events with which the natural scientist has to deal
are just facts, data, and events within his observational
field but this field does not “mean” anything to the
molecules, atoms, and electrons therein.
Particular structure of the constructs of social sciences
• But the facts, events, and data before the social scientist are of an entirely
different structure. His observational field, the social world, is not
essentially structureless. It has a particular meaning and relevance
structure for the human beings living, thinking, and acting therein. They
have preselected and preinterpreted this world by a series of common-sense
constructs of the reality of daily life, and it is these thought objects which
determine their behavior, define the goal of heir action, the means available
for attaining them- in brief, which help them to find their bearings within
their natural and socio-cultural environment and to come to terms with it.
The thought objects constructed by the social scientists refer to and are
founded upon the thought objects constructed by the common-sense
thought of man living his everyday life among his fellow-men. Thus, the
constructs used by the social scientist are, so to speak, constructs of the
second degree, namely constructs of the constructs made by the actors on
the social scene, whose behavior the scientist observes and tries to explain
in accordance with the procedural rules of his science.
Peter Berger & Luckmann
Sociology of knowledge
• Society is a human product
• Society is an objective reality
• Man is a social product
• People are the products of the very society that
they create
Object of sociology of knowledge
The sociology of knowledge must concern itself with everything that
passes for “knowledge” in society. As soon as one states this , one
realizes that the focus on intellectual history is ill-chosen, or rather,
is ill-chosen if it becomes the central focus of the sociology of
knowledge. Theoretical thought, “ideas,” Weltanschauungen are not
that important in society. Although every society contains these
phenomena, they are only part of the sum of what passes for
“knowledge”. Only a very limited group of people in any society
engages in theorizing, in the business of “ideas,” and the
construction of Weltanschauungen .But everyone in society
participates in its “knowledge” in one way or another. Put differently,
only a few are concerned with the theoretical interpretation of the
world, but everybody lives in a world of some sort. Not only is the
focus on theoretical thought unduly restrictive for the sociology of
knowledge, it is also unsatisfactory because even this part of socially
available “Knowledge” cannot be fully understood if it is not placed
in the framework of a more general analysis of “knowledge”.
Object of sociology of knowledge
To exaggerate the importance of theoretical thought in
society and history is a natural failing of theorizers. It is
then all the more necessary to correct this intellectualistic
misapprehension. The theoretical formulations of reality,
whether they be scientific or philosophical or even
mythological, do not exhaust what is “real” for the
members of a society. Since this is so, the sociology of
knowledge must first of all concern itself with what people
“know” as “reality” in their everyday, non-or pretheoretical
lives. In other words, commonsense “knowledge” rather
than “ideas” must be the central focus for the sociology of
knowledge. It is precisely this “knowledge” that constitutes
the fabric of meanings without which no society could exist.
Object of sociology of knowledge
The sociology of knowledge, therefore, must concern itself
with the social construction of reality. The analysis of the
theoretical articulation of this reality will certainly
continue to be a part of this concern, but not the most
important part. It will be clear that, despite the exclusion
of the epistemological/methodological problem, what we
are suggesting here is a far reaching redefinition of the
scope of the sociology of knowledge, much wider than
what has hitherto been understood as this discipline.
Bourdieu: total anthropology
• Society has an objective structure, but it is no less true
that it is also crucially composed, in Schopenhauer’s
famed expression, of “representation and will”. It
matters that individuals have a practical knowledge of
the world and invest this practical knowledge in their
ordinary activity. Unlike objective science, a total
anthropology cannot keep to a construction of objective
relations because the experience of meanings is part and
parcel of the total meaning of experience.
Topics for a genuine science
of human practice
• A genuine science of human practice cannot be content
with merely superimposing a phenomenology on a social
topology. It must also elucidate the perceptual and
evaluative schemata that agents invest in their everyday
life. Where do these schemata (definitions of the
situation, typifications, interpretive procedures) come
from, and how do they relate to the external structures of
society?
Bourdieu
Correspondence: social structures
and mental structures
• There exists a correspondence between social structures
and mental structures, between the objective divisions of
the social world-particularly into dominant and
dominated in the various fields- and the principles of
vision and division that agents apply to it
• Durkheim and Mauss: the cognitive systems operative in
primitive societies are derivations of their social system:
the underlying mental schemata are patterned after the
social structure of the group.
•
Bourdieu
Genetic link between social divisions
and mental schemata
• Social divisions and mental schemata are structurally
homologous because they are genetically linked: the
latter are nothing other than the embodiment of the
former. Cumulative exposure to certain social conditions
instills in individuals an ensemble of durable and
transposable dispositions that internalize the necessities
of the extant social environment, inscribing inside the
organism the patterned inertia and constraints of
external reality.
•
Bourdieu
Political function by the correspondence
between social and mental structures
• The correspondence between social and mental
structures fulfills crucial political functions. Symbolic
systems are not simply instruments of knowledge, they
are also instruments of domination
•
Bourdieu
Social order is reinforced
by representation of social world
• The conservation of the social order is decisively
reinforced by the orchestration of categories of
perception of the social world which, being adjusted to
the divisions of the established order (and therefore, to
the interests of those who dominate it ) and common to
all minds structured in accordance with those structures,
impose themselves with all appearance of objective
necessity.
•
Bourdieu
Sociology of knowledge
is a political sociology
• If we grant that symbolic systems are social products
that contribute to making the world, that they do not
simply mirror social relations but help constitute them,
then one can, within limits, transform the world by
transforming its representation
• Classes and other antagonistic social collectives are
continually engaged in a struggle to impose the
definition of the world that is most congruent with their
particular interests. The sociology of knowledge or of
cultural forms is eo ipso a political sociology, that is a
sociology of symbolic power.
Bourdieu
Bourdieu on Ethnomethodology
• In contrast with structuralist objectivism, constructivist asserts that
social reality is a contingent ongoing accomplishment of competent
social actors who continually construct their social world via the
organized artful practices of everyday life. Through the lens of this
social phenomenology, society appears as the emergent product of
the decisions, actions, and cognitions of conscious, alert individuals
to whom the world is given as immediately familiar and meaningful.
Its value lies in recognizing the part that mundane knowledge,
subjective meaning, and practical competency play in the continual
production of society; it gives pride of place to agency and to the
socially approved system of typifications and relevances through
which persons endow their “life-world” with sense
布迪厄评论现象学社会学
• 与结构主义的客观主义正相反，建构主义的主观主义认为具有
资格能力的社会行动者通过“日常生活里有组织的、富于技巧
的实践”持续不断地建构他们的社会世界，而社会现实就是这
些“持续不断的权宜行为所成就的”。在这种社会现象学的透
镜里，个人机警自觉，社会就像是从这些个人的决策、行动和
认知中涌现出来的产物；而世界对于这些个人来说，又是那么
亲切熟悉，饱含意义。这种立场的长处在于，它认识到了在社
会持续不断的生产过程中，那些世俗的知识（ mundane
knowledge ）、主观的意义和实践的能力扮演了多么重要的角
色。它强调了能动作用，还强调了“社会认可的类型化与相关
性的体系”的重要作用。正是透过这一体系，人们才赋予他们
的生活世界以意义。
•
布迪厄、华康德：《实践与反思》第9-10页
Habermas on Phenomenology
• Two lines of the analysis of rationality
-Realistic line: it starts from the ontological
presupposition of the world as the sum total of what is
the case and clarifies the conditions of rational behavior
on this basis.
-Phenomenological line: it gives a transcendental twist
to the question and reflects on the fact that those who
behave rationally must themselves presuppose an
objective world.
Phenomenological line of reason
• The phenomenologist does not rely upon the guiding thread of goaldirected or problem-solving action. He does not, that is, simply begin with
the ontological presupposition of an objective world; he makes this a
problem by inquiring into the conditions under which the unity of an
objective world is constituted for the members of a community. The world
gains objectivity only through counting as one and the same world for a
community of speaking and acting subjects. The abstract concept of the
world is a necessary condition if communicatively acting subjects are to
reach understanding among themselves about what takes place in the world
or is to be effected in it. Through this communicative practice they assure
themselves at the same time of their common life-relations, of an
intersubjectively shared lifeworld. This lifeworld is bounded by the totality
of interpretations presupposed by the members as background knowledge.
To elucidate the concept of rationality the phenomenologist must then
examine the conditions for communicatively achieved consensus; he must
analyze “ mundane reasoning”
Habermas
哈贝马斯论现象学立场的合理性
• 现象学家没有简单地从客观世界的本体论前提出发，而是把这个本体
论前提当作问题，加以询问；对于交往共同体的成员而言，客观世界
构成同一性的前提究竟有哪些。世界之所以具有客观性，是因为对于
具有言语能力的和行为能力的主体所组成的共同体而言，它永远都是
同一个世界。抽象的世界概念是交往行为的主体相互之间就世界中已
经存在或应当存在的一切达成共识的一个必要条件。通过这种交往实
践，交往行为的主体同时也明确了他们共同的生活语境，即主体间共
同分享的生活世界。生活世界的界限是由所有的解释确立起来的，而
这些解释被生活世界中的成员当作了背景知识。所以，要想解释清楚
合理性概念，现象学家就必须对通过交往达成共识的条件加以研究，
必须对“世俗理性”（mundane reasoning）加以研究：
哈贝马斯：《交往行为理论》第一卷，第12-13页
Defining Ethnomethodology
• The study of the body of common-sense knowledge and the range of
procedures and considerations by means of which the ordinary
members of society make sense of , find their way about in, and act
on the circumstances in which they find themselves (Heritage)
• In contrast with Durkheim, Ethnomethodology treats the objective
reality of social facts as the accomplishment of members- as a
product of members’ methodological activities.
• For Ethnomethodology the objective reality of social facts, in that ,
and just how, it is every society’s locally, endogenously produced,
naturally organized, reflexively accountable, ongoing, practical
achievement, being everywhere, always, only, exactly and entirely,
members’ work, with no time out, and with no possibility of evasion,
hiding out, passing, postponement, or buy-outs, is thereby
sociology’s fundamental phenomenon (Garfinkel)
• Ethnomethodology is concerned with the organization of everyday
life., “ immortal, ordinary society”, or it is the extraordinary
organization of the ordinary (Pollner)
Key points of Ethnomethodology
•
•
•
•
Contingency
Situated
Indexity
Accountability and reflexivity
Points of Ethnomethodology
• Ethnomethodologists do not focus on actors or individuals, but
rather on “members”. However, members are viewed not as
individuals, but rather “strictly and solely, as membership activitiesthe artful practices whereby they produce what are for them largescale organization structure and small-scale interactional or
personal structure.
• One of Garfinkel’s key points about ethnomethods is that they are
“reflexively accountable.” Accounts are the ways in which actors
explain (describe, criticize, and idealize) specific situations .
Accounting is the process by which people offer accounts in order to
make sense of the world. Ethnomethodologists devote a lot of
attention to analyzing people’s accounts, as well as to the ways in
which accounts are offered and accepted (or rejected) by others.
Breaching experiments
• In breaching experiments, social reality is violated in
order to shed light on the methods by which people
construct social reality. The assumption behind this
research is not only that the methodical production of
social life occurs all the time but also that the
participants are unaware that they are engaging in such
actions. The objective of the breaching experiments is to
disrupt normal procedures so that the process by which
the everyday world is constructed or reconstructed can
be observed and studied.
Indexical expression
• 1) Whenever a member is required to demonstrate that an account
analyzes an actual situation, he invariably makes use to the practices
of “et cetera,” “unless,” and “let it pass” to demonstrate the
rationality of his achievement. 2)The definite and sensible character
of the matter that is being reported is settled by an assignment that
reporter and auditor make to each other that each will have
furnished whatever unstated understandings are required. Much
therefore of what is actually reported is not mentioned. 3) Over the
time for their delivery accounts are apt to require that “auditors” be
willing to wait for what will have been said will have become clear 4)
Like conversations, reputations, and careers, the particulars of
accounts are built up step by step over the actual uses of and
references to them. 5) An account’s materials are apt to depend
heavily for sense upon their serial placement, upon their relevance
to the auditor’s projects, or upon the developing course of the
organizational occasions of their use.
References
• Yu Hai: Western Social Theory
- No. 28. Schutz: Common-Sense and Scientific Interpretation of
Human Action
- No. 29. Peter Berger and Luckmann: Object of Knowledge
Sociology
- No.31. Garfinkel: What is Ethnomethodology?
• Bourdieu and Wacquant: An Invitation to Reflexive
Sociology, Part One.
• Habermas: The Theory of Communicative Action,
Volume 1, Chapter 1.