Reflections on the Relationship of “Social Phenomenology” and Hermeneutics in Alfred Schutz. An Introduction

Abstract

In its first part this introductory essay provides a sketch of the relationship between phenomenology and hermeneutics in Alfred Schutz’s thought. The author holds that hermeneutics is not an incidental addition to Schutz’s phenomenology of the social world but rather a constitutive part of it. Moreover, he argues that this productive intertwining of phenomenology and hermeneutics paves the path for applied phenomenological analyses concerning the social world, its meaningful constitution, and its limits. The second part of this essay offers an overview of the contributions to this volume which address this productive intertwining in a variety of contexts.