Self and Agency: Phenomenological Approaches

Presentation: This year the topic of the seminar is the relationship between the self and agency. The aim of the seminar is to clarify the content of the phenomenology of action  - what it is like to be an agent – as a distinctive phenomenology of first-person agency. The first focus of debate concerns what an agentive content is. Does it exist something like an experience of oneself as an agent?  What is the structure (and components) of agentive experience? What is the importance of agentive experience in order to give an account of our own experience? What is the relation between agency and phenomenal consciousness?

A second focus concerns the place of the self in agentive awareness as a knowledge that we have of ourselves as subjects of action. If the experience of oneself as an agent implies the concept of self, how is the self agentively represented? How does first-person reference succeed in agent’s self-conscious thought? Finally, what kind of knowledge is the knowledge of oneself as an agent?

 The phenomenology of action and agency can be approached from many views and by several fields: moral psychology of the self, the constitution of agency, normativity and practical reason, first-person authority in action, authenticity and inauthenticity of the self.

The phenomenology research seminar is part of the activities of the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research (NFSR) Doctoral School (www.fnrs.be). Organized over a whole week, it aims at stimulating collaborative research and it is open to original contributions from national and international researchers, and from senior academics and graduate students alike.

Organizing Committee: F. Boccaccini (Liège), G. Cormann (Liège)

Further information: F. Boccaccini: federico.boccaccini[at]ulg.ac.be

The seminar is free of charge and open to the public without registration.

Practical details

The seminar will take place from April 22 to 25, at the University of Liège (Belgium).

Registration is not required for attendance. At the participant's request, the Philosophy Department will issue a certificate which can be used for doctoral certification (ECTS).

The languages of the seminar are French and English.