A PRESENCE WITHOUT PRESENT: MAKING SENSE WITH THE OTHER

Marc Richir’s phenomenological work proposes a new type of phenomenology, a non-standard one. To him, a non-standard phenomenology is, first of all, a phenomenology that is crossing the barrier of intentionality (Richir, 2015). In this context, perception has a special role. Firstly, it involves phantasia, and not the imaginary. Secondly, it is a perception of non-intentional objects. Because of these two reasons, the other becomes the Other, namely a non-intentional object that cannot be pinpointed in a definite time / space frame. In this paper, I will try to demonstrate that, starting from this lack of conceptualization that the Other represents, a sense is constructed. It is a sense in the making (sens se faisant), as Richir puts it (Richir 1988, 2015); a sense whose never-ending development gives meaning to someone’s life. In order for this to take place, the effective presence of the Other is crucial. Otherwise, sense stands still and meaning is aborted.

Abstract licence: CC BY-NC-ND

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