Notes on phenomenology and egological analysis
Exploring Schutz’s sociological egology
What I have been thinking about these days is the relationship between Schutz’s phenomenology of the natural attitude and the uses of egology for sociological analysis.
For Husserl, egology was a fundamental component of his phenomenology, as it served as a basis for both his descriptive and transcendental phenomenology. In essence, the egological approach is an attempt to explore the structure of the human subject and its experience of the world. Husserl put a great deal of emphasis on the need for self-reflection, as well as the need to understand how our experiences are shaped by our interaction with and existence in what he called the lifeworld. As such, Schutz’s phenomenology of the natural attitude can be seen as an extension of this ego-centric approach.
However, Schutz’s use of the egological method is directed towards another purpose. Rather than uncover the transcendental grounds of consciousness, Schutz’s “mundane” phenomenology asks about how the human subject experiences and interacts with the social world. By breaking down concepts such as “groups” and “social relations” to their subjective dimensions (using Husserl’s concept of type and his own concept of relevance), Schutz is able to account for the individual’s orientation to the social world and the ways in which this orientation shapes their experiences, interpretations, and actions in it. In this way, Schutz’s phenomenology of the natural attitude provides a useful bridge between Husserl’s egology and a more concrete understanding of the social world.
There is, nevertheless, a deep incompatibility between phenomenological analysis carried out in Husserl’s egological mode and social analysis proper, which is always an account given from the observer’s point of view. Schutz is well aware of this difference and his use of the phenomenological method has to do with addressing the limitations of interpretive sociology (i.e., one which, following the Weberian tradition, takes the subjective meaning of social actors into account in the explanation of social action). Phenomenology is thus, at base, a bridging exercise between the social scientific observer’s account and her efforts to explain observed patterns by not being neglectful (or by being presumptive) of the subjective meanings the actions have for the actors under question.
This insights points to the limits of phenomenology alone as a tool of social analysis. At base, phenomenology has as its object of analysis the datum of experience. This datum can be anything – experience of the social world being one among the virtually limitless forms and modes of experience one can have of one’s “being the world.” Methodologically, because the datum of experience is only directly available to the experiencing subject, phenomenology has limited application in sociological analysis (which is why as I often insist, for Schutz phenomenology is not another way of doing sociology, contra many later readings). At best, it can serve the observer in the preliminary definition of the universe of shared objectivities of the world, which are checked against empirical observation of actors (who are presumed to share the same objectivities). But because that method works best in situations of empathetic understanding formed in deeply personal and intimate relationships (carried out primarily in ethnographic and other forms of field direct research), it cannot form a routine tool for social analysis that rely on mediated forms of observation, such as that which studies the past activity of long-dead subjects in history, examines the operation of institutions, or records mass opinions via tools such as surveys or social network data.
What Schutz’s discussions do suggest, however, is that phenomenology is instructive of another form of egological analysis, one that can be of tremendous value to social analysis. Rather than Husserl’s constitutive and transcendental egology, Schutz arguably proposes a sociological egology. What this egology does is raise critical awareness of modes of embodied consciousness and structures of pragma that are involved in any intersubjective existence or situation of interaction.
What this means is that Schutzian egology provides the means to construct (as “probablistic” terms) ego-models that serve to describe behavioral schemas of specific groups or sets of social actors. These schemas are described through systems of relevance, i.e., in terms of their thematic, interpretive, and motivational elements. To summarize what Schutz means by these terms: Themes involve the objects and elements which are selected out the total universe of world objects (i.e., those that exist empirically and intersubjectively, rather than as purely mental phenomena); interpretation involves the situations within and judgments through which those objects appear; and motivation accounts for both the choice of objects and the resulting action their interpretation generates.
It is important not to confuse the (proposed) Schutzian ego-model with the notion of personality or personality type. As Schutz is keen to point out, social life involves individuals’ investments of sections or parts of their personality in contexts of group life or of interaction. This analytical splitting of the personality makes the task of constructing ego-models much easier, as well as helps avoid psychologistic reductions into which they can easily fall. Because it is framed around systems of relevance, the ego-model is ultimately a theoretical idealization that is meant to serve an hermeneutic process in social analysis, rather than an effort to faithfully represent what is “inside the head” of any specific social actor. At best, the ego-model approximates as faithfully as possible the types that sets of historically situated actors employ in their own reasoning. As such, the ego-model is also different from the biographical analysis of distinct, named individuals (where one necessarily encounters developmental questions of personality, the influence of intimate relationships, personal “life choices,” etc.).
By what observational means could ego-models be developed? In historical research, documentary sources (of the widest variety) can serve to construct patterns of (past) cultural meaning that reflect in ego-models.
In other qualitative research, consistent observation and recording of the meaning-making processes in observed groupings or contexts of interaction can also serve to generate ego-models. This can be done through the use of different methodologies or sorts of observation, such as participant-observation, grounded theory, or discourse analysis. This sort of approach is particularly suited to aim at the hermeneutic reconstruction of the subjective meanings of social actors.
Through a Schutzian sociological egology, we can begin to understand the ways in which subjective experiences of the lifeworld both shape and are shaped by the social world. In this way, an egological analysis can be an invaluable tool for social analysis, as it can give us insight into the experiences and perspectives of social actors, which can be taken into account in the explanation of social phenomena.
