Existential phenomenology is a diffuse and diverse school of thought concerned with understanding processes whereby meanings and knowledge are produced, rather than with unravelling ultimate truths. It was first developed by French philosopher Jean Paul Sartre (1966). Sartre studied the writings of Danish philosopher, Kierkegaard, the founder of existentialism (Adorno, 1989), and German philosophers Husserl (1999)26 and Heidegger (1996).
Proponents of existential phenomenology reject the subject-object distinction of Descartes, which had long influenced Western scholars, and which is reflected in the terminology of scientific method (Husserl, 1999). Scientific terminology and methods have not served older women well, given the contribution of normative methods to cultural ageism and medicalisation of the life course discussed in Chapter 9.
Basic tenets of existential phenomenology are that human beings have no predefined meaning or purpose and define themselves, or come into being, in response to challenges imposed by their existence in the world, including through their relationship to the reflective consciousness of an ‗other‘. Existential
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phenomenological researchers regard consciousness as intentional and ideas as the product of experiences of real-life situations, hence a phenomenological study of older women‘s discourses about living alone is considered to produce new knowledge and new ideas grounded in the experiences of participants. A phenomenological approach creates space for questioning and relinquishing widely held assumptions and prejudices about what growing older means, and what being an older woman who lives alone means by eliciting the views of those who are experiencing these phenomena.
Husserl (Ricouer, 1967), regarded as the founder of phenomenology, questioned traditional Western philosophy and, in the interests of introducing scientific rigour into philosophy argued that all philosophy could or should be is a description of experience. However Heidegger (1996) took a radically different approach, taking existential phenomenology further by questioning traditional understandings of human existence as rational. Heidegger believed that ontology (the study of the origins and meaning of being or existence) preceded epistemology (the study of the origins and meaning of knowledge). Hence, in order to contribute to
knowledge about the housing of older women, one must first seek to understand their experiences and meanings.
A sense of time, or the temporal nature of experience, is central to existential phenomenology, along with a preoccupation with questions of language and meaning. Heideggerian hermeneutics, also referred to as interpretation theory, arose from the application of his theory and practice of interpretation to the study of biblical texts, whereby the emphasis moved from interpretation to existential understanding (Gaddamer, 1994). That is to say, any text or utterance that is the focus of existential phenomenological research is believed to be constrained by its location in a particular time and space and to be in part shaped by the language that is used to describe the phenomena of interest. Hence my emphasis on how language is used and my qualification that the findings refer to a particular time and place and to a particular philosophical position and theoretical framework that I have used to observe, analyse and interpret these phenomena.
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For Heidegger (1996), the essence of being human was to maintain the quality of open-ness to experience; whereby phenomenology, or the study of phenomena, involve observation and analysis that come from ‗dasein’ or ‗being there‘.
Heidegger‘s concept of ‗being there‘ has been further extended by Merleau-Ponty (1994), who criticised Heidegger for not adequately addressing the human body. This further development is referred to as embodied subjectivism (Low, 2009). For Merleau-Ponty (1964) existentialism's key question was `man's relationship to his natural or social surroundings‘; where existence is expressed as ‗a phenomenal milieu rather than an objective realm of things or a subjective domain of
consciousness‘; and where to exist means to live as embodied, inter-subjective, expressive beings who find significance in all their acts (Low, 1994). Hence, in an existential phenomenological study of older women‘s housing experiences I need to enter and interact with study participants in their own social milieu; as a participant in their social world; meeting them face to face as individuals and experiencing their firsthand accounts of the places and communities where they live.
Merleau-Ponty‘s approach has been criticised for being relativistic. However, in response he has argued that an active perception is in contact with and can
understand nature‘s objects and species, including the human species (Low, 1994). However, he qualifies this by grounding knowledge in a ‗perceptual field‘ and attaching this grounding to ‗an open-ended perceptual and linguistic
corroboration‘ (Low, 1994). Hence, in seeking to contribute to knowledge about older women‘s housing experiences, rather than assuming that the findings are absolute or final, the approach to inquiry is dialectical.
Other key proponents of existential phenomenology are Ricoeur (1967), Gadamer (1994) and British psychiatrist R. D. Laing (1967, 1960) whose work on the
experience of schizophrenias has influenced my personal approach. Laing made a significant although often overlooked contribution to sociological theory through his detailed analyses of how identity is achieved and performed in relationship to
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others (Scott and Thorpe, 2003). This has provided me with a conceptual map for understanding and interpreting human behaviour and perceptions.
Interpretation theory, also referred to as contemporary hermeneutics (or
sociological hermeneutics, when practised by sociologists), draws on Heidegger‘s legacy in applying theories of interpretation to all texts and systems of meaning held by people who exist within particular socio-cultural contexts, including the transcripts I have prepared of conversations with older women living alone in Southern Tasmania in the first decade of the new millennium. This contemporary approach to interpretation emphasises historical situated-ness and involves an ongoing interrogation of one‘s own biases (Grondin, 1994), and accepts that a person can never fully step outside of their own tradition (Gaddamer, 1994).