Binswanger & Schapp: Existential Analysis or Narrative Analysis?

Abstract

AbstractBinszuanger's Daseinsanalyse is, first and foremost, an attempt to explain the close links that may exist between how to understand, interpret, and experience. To achieve this goal, it constantly evolves through a to and fro movement between two kinds of thought processes, that is, Husserl's and Heidegger's. It sways around the central question of living connections that take place between the experiences within the intimate "(hi)stories" of one's life and the very same connections between my own experience and that of the other person. Of course, it runs into the problem of misunderstanding, which is typical of that very process and comes back whenever one is confronted by a theory of perception. The present authors question once again such an ontological primacy with reference to Wilhelm Schapp's philosophy. According to the latter, (hi)story and not perception comes first. Things are valid only because they surge within one's (hi)story, and it is (hi)story that holds person's seat. The person thus becomes described as being entangled amidst (hi)stories. The authors show that one can cast a new light on Binswanger's project by following Schapp on a narrative level: Connections living through experiences are connections between (hi)stories. The encounter with the psychiatric patient is understood in terms of mutual "entanglement. " Such a point of view leads the authors to analyze existential analysis through the new criteria of a strictly narrative analysis.