ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I present my attempt at revising the Schutzian concept of ‘finite province of meaning’, and overcoming several difficulties encountered so far. Particularly, I present a systematic view of the problems that I found in the Schutzian theory – due either to incomplete development or to inconsistent application of his own epistemological premises – and I begin elaborating and developing further a ‘rewritten’ version of Schutz’s model. For this purpose, I introduce several concepts that help us understand and overcome these difficulties, such as conditions, resources, and methods of experience. The Schutzian concept of epochè of the natural attitude enjoys in this chapter a more thorough treatment, as it needs to be analysed in its various aspects and connected with similar approaches in other disciplines, such as literary studies and psychology. Under the heading of ‘Life-World resources,’ I discuss the problem of the three-dimensional organisation of the world, which is inspired from the Schutzian view of the lifeworld as deployed across space, time, and sociality, and whose structuration can differ fundamentally from one finite province of meaning to another.
