Phenomenology is the study of structures of consciousness from a first-person point of view. It studies how people experience phenomena through concepts like perception, memory, and judgment. The central focus is on intentionality and how experiences are directed at objects. Phenomenology was introduced by philosophers in the 18th century and defined by Edmund Husserl in the early 20th century as the science of the essence of consciousness. There are different types of phenomenological approaches that focus on topics like existence, history, and realism.

1. Dr. P. Samuel
Arakkonam

2.  Phenomenology is a word derived from
phenomenon.
 It is the study of structures of consciousness
as experienced from the first-person point of
view.
 It is the study of structures of experience, or
consciousness.
 The central structure of an experience is its
intentionality and directed towards
something, as it is an experience of or about
some object.

3.  Phenomenology as a discipline is distinct
from but related to other key disciplines in
philosophy, such as
ontology – the study of being or what is
epistemology – the theory of knowledge
logic – the study of valid reasoning
ethics - moral principles ( right or wrong)
Phenomenology - is the study of our experience

4.  Studies the various types of experience
Thought
Memory
Imagination
Emotion
Desire
Volition to bodily awareness
(Keywords: Essence, Consciousness,
Human experience, Lived Experience)

5.  The Latin term “Phenomenologia” was introduced
by Christoph Friedrich Oetinger in 1736. Then by
Johann Heinrich Lambert, a follower of Christian
Wolff, Immanuel Kant and Johann Gottlieb
FichteIt.
 In 1807, G. W. F. Hegel wrote a book
titled Phänomenologie des Geistes
 By 1889 Franz Brentano used the term to
characterize what he called “descriptive
psychology”
 From there Edmund Husserl took up the term for
his new science of consciousness

6.  Husserl defined phenomenology as “the science of the
essence of consciousness”,
 We may say phenomenology is the study of
consciousness
 Husserl’s work was followed by a flurry of
phenomenological writing in the first half of the
20th century
 7 types of Phenomenology (1) Transcendental
constitutive (2) Naturalistic constitutive phenomenology
(3) Existential (4) Generative historicist (5) Genetic (6)
Hermeneutical phenomenology (7) Realistic

7.  Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), who sought to
make philosophy “a rigorous science” by
returning its attention “to the things
themselves”
 Phenomenology varies with each object with
its imagination and discovers what is
universal in it.
 Human consciousness conceived not just as
the empirical experience of particular people,
but as the very deep structures of mind itself.

8.  ‘Phenomenology' is to gain a deeper
understanding of the nature or meaning of
our everyday experiences.
 Phenomenological Criticism in an attempt to
apply the phenomenological method to
literary works.
 Husserl argues that phenomenology was not
an art but a science of sciences.