Phenomenology 2010

Volume 5, Issue Part 1, 2010

Selected Essays from North America Part 1

George Heffernan
Pages 95-121

From Violence to Evidence? Husserl and Sen on Human Identity and Diversity
Toward a Postcolonial Phenomenology of Humanity

In The Crisis of the European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology (1936) Edmund Husserl describes how the crisis of the European sciences represents a crisis of European humanity, which in turn involves a crisis of human identity. In Violence and Identity: The Illusion of Destiny (2006) Amartya Sen explains how some human beings get others to see themselves in terms of a singular unique identity instead of in terms of their disparate but shared identities. This paper investigates Husserl’s and Sen’s approaches to human identity and diversity and explores their respective applications to and implications for humanity, rationality, and solidarity.