Phenomenology of Perception
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Cover of the first edition
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| Author | Maurice Merleau-Ponty |
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| Original title | Phénoménologie de la perception |
| Translator | Colin Smith (1st translation) Donald Landes (2nd translation) |
| Country | France |
| Language | French |
| Subject | Perception |
| Published |
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| Media type | Print (Hardcover and Paperback) |
| Pages | 466 (1965 Routledge edition) |
| ISBN | (2012 Routledge edition) |
Phenomenology of Perception (French: Phénoménologie de la perception) is a 1945 book by French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty, in which Merleau-Ponty expounds his thesis of "the primacy of perception". The work established Merleau-Ponty as the pre-eminent philosopher of the body, and is considered a major statement of French existentialism. The relationship between Phenomenology of Perception and Merleau-Ponty's late, unfinished work has received much scholarly discussion. An English translation by Colin Smith was published in 1962; another English translation, by Donald Landes, was published in 2013.
Merleau-Ponty begins by attempting to define phenomenology, which according to him has not yet received a proper definition. He asserts that phenomenology contains a series of apparent contradictions, which include the fact that it attempts to create a philosophy that would be a rigorous science while also offering an account of space, time and the world as people experience them. Merleau-Ponty denies that such contradictions can be resolved by distinguishing between Edmund Husserl's views and those of Martin Heidegger, commenting that Heidegger's Being and Time (1927) "springs from an indication given by Husserl and amounts to no more than an explicit account of the 'natürlicher Weltbegriff' or the 'Lebenswelt' which Husserl, toward the end of his life, identified as the central theme of phenomenology, with the result that the contradiction appears in Husserl's own philosophy".
Following the work of Husserl, Merleau-Ponty attempts to reveal the phenomenological structure of perception. He writes that while the "notion of sensation...seems immediate and obvious", it is in fact confused. Merleau-Ponty asserts that because "traditional analyses" have accepted it, they have "missed the phenomenon of perception." Merleau-Ponty argues that while sensation could be understood to mean "the way in which I am affected and the experiencing of a state of myself", there is nothing in experience corresponding to "pure sensation" or "an atom of feeling". He writes that, "The alleged self-evidence of sensation is not based on any testimony of consciousness, but on widely held prejudice." Merleau-Ponty's central thesis is that of the "primacy of perception." He critiques of the Cartesian stance of "cogito ergo sum" and expounds a different conception of consciousness. Cartesian dualism of mind and body is called into question as the primary way of existing in the world, and is ultimately rejected in favor of an intersubjective conception or dialectical and intentional concept of consciousness. The body is central to Merleau-Ponty's account of perception. In his view, the ability to reflect comes from a pre-reflective ground that serves as the foundation for reflecting on actions.
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