Phenomenology of the Cultural Other

Abstract

This dissertation examines the idea of a “phenomenology of the cultural Other” in its two sides: the phenomenological and cultural sides. To address the phenomenological side, this dissertation critically examines phenomenologies of the Other in Hegel, Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty, along with their prominent commentators. This group of philosophers has produced works that constitute a category of philosophical literature that may be referred to as a “phenomenology of the Other." To address the second, cultural side, a cultural aspect is added to the phenomenology of the Other. To cover the two sides of the question on the phenomenological appearances of the cultural Other, my study of will have three phases, that are presented in three chapters. In each chapter, I will look at the specific type of relations that are discussed in the phenomenologies of the Other within the philosophical traditions I mentioned above, and accordingly, I will describe a cultural phenomenon which reflects the attitude of the self toward the Other. In chapter one, the Other appears as the negation of the self and vice versa. In chapter two, the Other appears as the opposite pair of the self, and, in the final chapter, the Other appears as the co-existing pair of the self. For these three phenomenological appearances of the Other, I will suggest three considerations of the cultural Other respectively: the dehumanized Other, the Orientalized Other, and the cosmopolitan Other.