UNIVERSITY OF LATVIA
Ineta Kivle
Summary of the Promotion Paper
Sound, Speech, Voice and Music
in Phenomenological Perspective
Doctoral Thesis to Attain a Doctoral Degree in Philosophy
Subdepartment: History of Philosophy
Rīga, 2008
General Characteristics of the Promotion Paper
The central problems of the promotion paper "Sound, Speech, Voice and
Music in Phenomenological Perspective" are: 1) the way phenomenology treats
such auditory phenomena as sound, speech, voice, and music, 2) the specific
contribution of phenomenology to comprehending sound, speech, voice, and music
and 3) how the development of phenomenology of music should be interpreted
and evaluated today. The problems discussed in the promotion paper are based on
the fundamental principles of phenomenology - auditory phenomena are to be
regarded as given in experience, elucidating the givenness of the phenomena,
their structure, revealing their performance in connection with the internal
temporal consciousness, showing the feasibility of cognizing and experiencing
auditory phenomena, thus revealing the specific features of auditory phenomena
in general.
The promotion paper 1) identifies the field of this philosophical research
indicating that in the paper auditory phenomena are viewed from a specific phenomenological - aspect, emphasizing its many facets; 2) gives a description
of auditory phenomena - sound, speech, voice, and music - showing their
interrelations and distinctions between meaningful perception and audibility;
3) reviews the contribution of phenomenology to the analysis of auditory
phenomena from classical phenomenology (Edmund Husserl's views) to the
views of leading contemporary authors in musical phenomenology.
The Field of Philosophical Research
Phenomenology deals with the immanent processes of how the sound turns
from a physical phenomenon into a meaningful one, how the meaning of an
audible phenomenon is formed, and in what way time peculiar to sound, speech,
voice, and music is constituted, as well as other processes, for instance, listening,
understanding silence, etc. The author discusses speech and voice as language
sonority immanent to human beings and interweaves the phenomenological
position with the findings of hermeneutics and fundamental ontology.
By working out the promotion paper, the author shows that phenomenological
approach, philosophical in nature, differs from psychological, sociological,
linguistic, and musicological investigations that also deal with sound, speech,
voice, and music. Phenomenology discriminates between mathematical
constructive thinking, investigation of physiological senses, description of the
emotions evoked by music and psychological experience, musicological analysis
of the work, and social criticism of culture, and the phenomenological evident
observation of the phenomenon. Phenomenology, unlike psychology, does not
deal with the emotions evoked by sound and music, speech and voice and their
influence on psyche and behaviour. It does not investigate the content of the
musical experience and the form of the work of music the way musicologists do,
it does not analyse the score and the phonetics of language. The promotion work
demonstrates that in phenomenological thinking auditory phenomena are treated
not as objects subjected to calculation and critical analysis but as subjectively
grasped meaningful phenomena. Any description of auditory phenomena
proceeds from such specific grasp of sound, speech, voice and music based on the
phenomenological method.
In the promotion paper, sound, speech, voice, and music are dealt with not as
audible, but as auditory phenomena. The notion "audible phenomenon" is used in
natural sciences, in the fields of information technology, audio industry, etc,
whereas phenomenology reveals how sonority is constituted while it is in the
process of making; therefore, sound, speech, voice, and music are called auditory
phenomena in the promotion paper.
The author of the promotion paper examines several phenomenological
aspects of sound, speech, voice, and music:
1) The phenomenological structure of sound - the objectivity and appearance
of the phenomenon; sound grasped in its intentionality and temporal
consciousness; structures of consciousness; the essence of the sound
phenomenon - sonority. The promotion paper shows how the meaning of
sound is formed, how of sound is constituted. Such view of sound is
subjected to purely phenomenological description based on the position of
Edmund Husserl's phenomenology reflected in his works. Further
elaboration of the phenomenological view of sound reveals its intentional
contiguity with silence, the manifestation of sound in music and voice.
2) Speech and voice are examined in connection with the findings of
existential philosophy, hermeneutics, and fundamental ontology. The
transition from sound phenomenology to an existential approach to voice
demonstrates that speech and voice are typical manifestations of the man's
Being-in-the-world and are immanent to human existence; therefore, the
investigation examines the structures of human existence in connection
with voice and speech in a philosophical sense. The explanation of speech is
based on the aspects of audibility, communication, intersubjectivity, and
existence the way they are treated in phenomenology and existential
philosophy. The author phenomenologically views inner speech and mute
voice as a conversation with oneself, demonstrating that speech and voice
contain silence and that understanding and meaningful activity of the man
manifests themselves in speech and voice.
3) Music is the most complicated of the auditory phenomena examined in the
promotion paper. The classical phenomenological view of music elucidates
the givenness of music as a phenomenon, characterizes music as a
meaningful phenomenon and a temporal object, and highlights the
constitution of musical experience. The promotion paper proceeds to show
the essence of music, the ontological structures of a work of music. In
phenomenology a work of music is examined devoid of everything
accidental and inessential. However, unlike sound, whose purely
phenomenological description can be found in Husserl's phenomenology, a
phenomenological description of music or a work of music accentuates the
principle of historicity, the background of the history of culture. Historicity
and tradition enters phenomenology alongside the hermeneutical method;
thus, phenomenology acquires new features under the hermeneutical view
of music.
Phenomenological hermeneutics views historicity and traditions themselves in
the processes of the meaning of auditory phenomena; it does not describe the
changes music undergoes in historical time as, for instance, the history of music
does. The promotion paper shows that: 1) a composition of music as a meaningful
phenomenon is conditioned by its historical period; 2) it is always open to new
interpretations in future because in every performance of a composition, the
composer's conceptions are interwoven with the intentions of musicians and the
audience; 3) understanding the idea, listening, and empathy are important factors
in every new performance of the composition; 4) music encompasses the
experience of the history of culture that is highlighted in musical compositions.
Alongside the constitution of the meaning of auditory phenomena, kinesthetic
listening is also constituted. Listening can be directed "outwards", i.e., towards
the way it actually sounds and "inwards" - listening to the phenomena existing in
the mind, in oneself, in one's inner voice. Describing the perception of an auditory
phenomenon, the phenomenon is no longer in sonority; but it is given as an ideal
object of thought - contemplated sonority. The characterisation of auditory
phenomena includes several aspects: hearing, sonority, audibility horizon, a
meaningful world, the overlap and dissociation of the horizons of the visible and
audible.
While viewing sound, speech, voice, and music, fundamental phenomenological
problems are brought to the front: the feasibility of the constitution of essences,
formation of meaning, internal temporal consciousness, the principal feature of
consciousness - intentionality, intersubjectivity and constitution of worlds, human
nature and experience explained from a phenomenological point of view.
Appraisal of phenomenological findings: A phenomenological view
of sound, speech, voice, and music is based on the paradigm that rejects the
subject - object division and attests that we know the objective the way it is
given in subjectivity. Within this paradigm existentialism, hermeneutics, and
separate philosophical trends of language and art develop; therefore, alongside a
phenomenological position, notions of hermeneutics and existential philosophy
are also made use of in the promotion paper. The principal of them are: 1) the
notion of sound in Husserl's teachings; 2) the conclusions of Husserl's philosophy
that he himself did not use in describing sound phenomena but which could be
used in sound, speech, voice, and music phenomena investigation; 3) the views of
Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Maurice Merleau-Ponty which differ
from classical phenomenology and offer a phenomenologically-hermeneutical
explanation of speech; 4) contemporary phenomenological investigations of
sound and music carried out by Don Ihde, Thomas Clifton, Joseph Smith, Bruce
Ellis Benson, and others.
The choice of the phenomenological investigations used in the promotion
paper depends on the following criteria: 1) works which comprise the core of the
philosophical trend and influence every phenomenological approach; 2) works of
the thinkers belonging to the phenomenological tradition which contribute to
further development of the ideas of classical phenomenology and open up new
interpretation possibilities of sound, speech, voice and music; 3) works of
phenomenological philosophers on sound, speech, voice, and music phenomena;
4) phenomenological investigations of Latvian philosophers.
The appraisal of phenomenological findings according to the above-mentioned
criteria embraces a century of philosophical heritage. The promotion paper makes
use of over a hundred of philosophical sources, but the author primarily relies on
the following original works and their translations, as well as appraises their
importance in the interpretation of auditory phenomena:
Husserl E. Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins (1913);
Logische Untersuchungen (1900-1901); Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie
und phänomenologischen Philosophie (Ideen I, 1913; Ideen II, 1952); Meditations
cartesiennes (1931); Die Idee der Phänomenologie: Fünf Vorlesungen (1958); Die
Krisis der europäischen Wissenschaften und die transzendentale Phänomenologie
(1934-1937).
Heidegger M. Sein und Zeit (1927), Holzwege (1926-1946) and other.
Gadamer H. G. Wahrheit und Methode (1960), Die Aktualität des Schonens.
Kunst als Spiel, Symbol und Fest (1977). Merleau-Ponty M. Phenomenology
de la perception (1945), Le Visible et l'invisible (1964). Derrida J. La voix and le
phenomene: introduction au probleme du signe dans la phenomenologie de
Husserl (1967).
Ingarden R. Untersuchungen zur Ontotogie der Kunst (1930-1933). Schutz A.
Making Music Together (1951). Ihde D. Listening and Voice. A Phenomenology
of Sound (1976). Clifton Т. Music as Heard: A Study in Applied Phenomenology
(1983). Smith J. The Experiencing of Musical Sound. Prelude to a Phenomenology
of Music (1979). Benson В. Е. The Improvisation of Musical Dialogue: A
Phenomenology of Music (2003). Kūle M. Phenomenology and Culture (2002).
Making use of the conclusions of the abovementioned authors, evaluating and
interpreting them, a phenomenological view of sound, speech, voice, and music is
formed. Each of the sources examined in the promotion paper contributes to the
development of phenomenological thought and opens up possibilities for new
philosophical interpretations of auditory phenomena even if the particular work is
not directly devoted to sound, speech, voice, and music; therefore, in the promotion
paper auditory phenomena are viewed in perspective. The phenomenological
perspectives highlighted by the author, spotlighted one through the other, form a
phenomenological horizon encompassing views on sound, speech, voice, and
music.
The author of the promotion paper suggests viewing auditory phenomena
from three phenomenological perspectives:
• Edmund Husserl's conclusions, the phenomenological principles he
established is the reference point for sound viewed from the "I" perspective
- from the perception of specific, changing phenomena to the absolute selfgivenness by which we grasp the phenomena; from the grasp of sound to the
a priori given ability to grasp it, showing the direction from the changing to
the undoubtable within the depth of the consciousness where alongside the
grasp of sound and music the structure of internal temporal consciousness,
the intentionality of consciousness, the formation of meaning is highlighted.
This direction of phenomenological perspective grows and develops out of
the question "how?". How do I know that the sound I grasp is sound? How
do I think when I think phenomenologically about the sound I heard?
Phenomenology views sound and music as given in experience showing that
the perception of sound and music illuminates both the essence of the
phenomenon and the feasibility of perceiving it. Phenomenological
questions tend to penetrate into spheres that are beyond the specific through the encountered meaningful experience experiencing itself is
inquired, the conditions constituting the feasibility of experience.
• From the perspective of hermeneutical phenomenology. The findings of
fundamental ontology, hermeneutics, and existential philosophy, though
formed from phenomenology, do not repeat the standpoints of classical
phenomenology in their approach to auditory phenomena; they highlight
questions about hearing and seeing, speaking and keeping silent and show
the internal development of phenomenology from the classical teachings
of Husserl that reveal the essences of the possibility of cognition inherent
to subjectivity to hermeneutical phenomenology, anthropology, and
existential philosophy.
Phenomenology undergoes change not only as far as the content goes. In
its further development, phenomenology gives insight into the structures
underlying communication and processes in society, art, and the world.
This direction of phenomenological perspective is already marked by the
introduction of the experience of the other, the strange one, intersubjectivity,
life-world, everyday experience and the world given before experience in
Edmund Husserl's philosophy. Phenomenological interests shift from the
search of the essence of the feasibility of cognition to the processes of
everyday life, society, art, and culture; from the structures of consciousness
established in subjectivity to the phenomenological view of life-world and
activity.
• As an adequate description of a phenomenon given in experience. Sound,
speech, voice, and music differ from each other; thus, to give an adequate
description of the phenomenon it is necessary to take into consideration the
way the phenomenon is given in experience, as well as make use of the
phenomenological stances of Edmund Husserl and the conclusions of other
philosophical trends of the XX century. This perspective develops from the
following questions: What is phenomenologically perceived sound, speech,
voice, and music? In what way do these phenomena differ from each other
and in what way are they similar? Why do we regard sound, speech, voice,
and music to be organized and articulated auditory phenomena? Orientation
towards a specific phenomenon causes the branching of phenomenology
not only by the described object but also invites a new phenomenological
thinking that does not emphasise the "I" perspective but observes the
comprehended phenomenon itself.
The aim of the promotion paper is to present an analysis of auditory
phenomena - sound, speech, voice, and music based on phenomenological
conclusions and methods that have expanded and developed in the course of time,
merging with the hermeneutical method, and to show their specific character and
the processes of constitution of structure and meaning.
To achieve the aim of the promotion paper, a number of tasks have been
assigned:
1. to show how phenomenology makes use of the method it elaborated,
coming to the specifically philosophical description of auditory phenomena;
2. to substantiate that the phenomenological view of sound, speech, voice,
and music is rooted in a diversity of phenomenological stances and philosophical
insights; however, keeping in mind that phenomenology views phenomenon as
existing in experience, as something that shows oneself out of oneself;
3. to improve the phenomenological descriptions of sound, speech, voice,
and music with the help of both classical phenomenological methods and the
stances of other philosophies formed on the basis of phenomenology. To show
that in the descriptions of the phenomena light is shed on such basic concepts of
phenomenology as intentionality, sense formation, givenness and essences,
internal temporal consciousness, phenomenologically constituted world and on
the hermeneutical aspects of phenomenology as well as on the fundamental
ontology approach;
4. to give as many-sided descriptions of the auditory phenomena as possible
and show the features they have in common and those that are different. To
substantiate that sound, speech, voice, and music are mutually different
phenomena having one common aspect - audibility; that the phenomenological
approach, describing a phenomenon as given in experience, emphasises the aspect
of audibility; to substantiate that sonority is the unifying factor of all the auditory
phenomena the promotion paper investigates; to substantiate that sonority in
phenomenology is not grasped only in hearing, but is also sonority in thinking,
memory, and imagination.
5. to analyse sound, speech, voice, and music to deepen the understanding of
the man's being in the world and link auditory phenomena with the fundamental
questions of the man's being and existence;
6. to show how phenomenological investigations reveal the structures of the
essence, consciousness and communicative structures of phenomena, providing an
explanation of how communication is achieved both in language and music and
how they open up possibilities for a phenomenological interpretation of culture;
7. to note yet uncovered phenomenological aspects that can be applied to
philosophical interpretations of sound, speech, voice, and music.
The research methods used in the paper:
1) The method of classical phenomenology and its standpoints - the call
"back to things themselves", reduction, and phenomenological reflection;
2) hermeneutical method; 3) the principle of description "let be". The application
of both the phenomenological and the hermeneutical method allows to reveal the
specifics of phenomenology as well as to describe auditory phenomena.
The author acknowledges that using the method worked out by Husserl
ensures a purely phenomenological description, viewing a phenomenon as
grasped in subjectivity, while research based on hermeneutical phenomenology
stances enables viewing phenomena as incorporated in historicity, linguisticity,
and the experience of being. The use of both methods is justified because of the
very nature of the investigated phenomena. Sound, speech, voice, and music have
common features like sonority and audibility, they are temporal objects
immanently possessing time. However, these auditory phenomena have features
that tell them apart. It is possible to investigate sound and separate aspects of
musical phenomena using the methods of classical phenomenology; however,
speech and voice as immanently human qualities will not yield to such pure and
strict phenomenology; in their investigation the stances of existential philosophy
and the hermeneutical method are used. The principle of Heidegger's philosophy
"let be" invites us to view sound from sound and music from music, not from the
opinions on them.
Phenomenology worked out by Husserl is the basis for any phenomenological
description of a phenomenon. Husserl's phenomenology is used: 1) when applying
the phenomenological method as directedness of thought - Husserl's principle
"back to things themselves" and the reduction method facilitate the elucidation of
the essence of sound while reflection allows describing sound phenomenologically;
2) through linking of the descriptions of auditory phenomena with the concepts of
life-world and intersubjectivity, it is possible to view sound and other phenomena
as encompassed in everyday life and incorporated in a common meaningful world.
The description of auditory phenomena based on the stances of Husserl's
phenomenology elucidates the essence of the phenomena. No other philosophy
and science views phenomena as meaningful and intentional, as temporal objects,
as phenomena possessing immanent givenness and essences.
The view of auditory phenomena based only on the classical Husserl's
phenomenology, as it is shown in the promotion paper, is a one-sided interpretation;
it elucidates only a few of the aspects of speech and voice, sound and music. The
source of the sonority of sound may be outside the man, unlike voice, which is the
original sphere of the man's immanence, just like mind and body. However, the
sounds of music are not immanent to the man's nature, they become immanent at
the moment of grasping them.
With the diversification of phenomenology, new possibilities of explanation
of sound and speech, voice and music appear and new methods differing from
those of classical phenomenology can be used. In the description of auditory
phenomena, Martin Heidegger's philosophical conclusions are used in a number
of aspects: 1) Heidegger's explanation of phenomenology, the central concepts
being phenomenon and logos; 2) the man's Being-in-the-world (In-der-WeltSein); 3) understanding of the 'thing', "letting the thing be"; 4) hermeneutical
approach; 5) listening.
In the description of auditory phenomena the author makes use of two of
Maurice Merleau-Ponty's philosophical concepts that he develops from Husserl's
phenomenology: 1) the man is a mind-body unity; 2) the way perception works in
grasping a meaningful world.
Under the influence of the Hans-Georg Gadamer's hermeneutical method the
author of the promotion paper views speech, voice and music in a number of
aspects: 1) speech is connected with linguisticity, and the man speaks already being
incorporated in language; 2) in the aspect of dialogue and mutual understanding;
3) music as a play and a transformation into a formation; 4) work of music as
incorporated in history and tradition.
In their interpretations of sound, voice, and music, the XX century sound
and musical phenomenologists Don Ihde, Joseph Smith, Thomas Clifton,
and Ellis Brace Benson rely on the theoretical and methodological bases of the
philosophies of Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, and Gadamer when
describing auditory phenomena. The opinion of musical phenomenologists is not
limited to the influence of any particular XX century classical philosopher. The
views of each of the abovementioned musical phenomenologists are formed on
the basis of conclusions of a number of philosophers. None of them can be
regarded as developing the ideas and following the teachings of only Husserl or
Gadamer. Roman Ingarden's ideas about a musical composition are an exception.
He makes use of the Husserl's ideas on intentional structures of consciousness,
intersubjectivity, the teachings on the internal temporal consciousness and
transplants them into the ontological characterisation of a work of music, thus
creating a phenomenological description of music. Noteworthy is the musicologist
Joseph Smith's innovation - he calls the trend of phenomenology which regards
organized sound and music "acumenology" and an organized sound "acumen".
The Basic Content of the Promotion Paper
The phenomenological aspects of sound, speech, voice, and music are
examined in succession in the four chapters of the promotion paper.
Chapter 1: The Significance of Phenomenology as a Philosophy and a
Method in Viewing Sound, Speech, Voice, and Music: 1) Separating
Phenomenology from Other Sciences and Philosophies; 2) "Back to Things
Themselves", "Let be", Reduction, and Phenomenological Reflection; 3)
Understanding the Phenomenon: Sound, Speech, Voice, and Music.
Chapter 1 is the methodological and philosophical basis for the further
chapters of the dissertation. This chapter shows the specifics of phenomenology
and its distinction from other sciences and philosophies. The chapter reveals the
main philosophical approaches to be used in describing sound, speech, voice, and
music, the phenomenological method and its importance in the description of
auditory phenomena, and the concepts characterizing the phenomenological
method: phenomenological, eidetic, transcendental reduction; phenomenological
reflection; bracketing (epoche); evidence, direct grasping; contemplative direct
comprehension; empathy, eidos, ideation, and others. The phenomenological
understanding of the phenomenon is characterised..
Chapter 1, first, supplies the basis for philosophical interpretations of sound
and speech, voice and musical phenomena; second, demonstrates the specific
character of phenomenological thinking; third, characterizes the conceptual
apparatus of phenomenology; four, demonstrates the contiguity between
phenomenology as a method and philosophy, characterizes the phenomenological
method and the directedness of the phenomenological thought, reduction, and
phenomenological reflection.
The view of sound and music making use of the stances of classical
phenomenology forms a purely phenomenological description; descriptions of
speech and voice phenomena penetrate into hermeneutics and existential
philosophy; however, a complete separation of a purely phenomenological
description from an interpretation of the phenomenon is impossible.
Phenomenology describes such auditory phenomena as sound, speech, voice, and
music as given in experience, directly grasped, and alongside the description of
the phenomena the man's essence and the feasibility of grasping are elucidated. In
the first chapter the author explains that the use of the phenomenological method
in description of auditory phenomena is characterized by two principles: Husserl's
"Back to things themselves!" and Heidegger's "Let be". The view based on the
standpoints of Husserl's phenomenology demonstrates how sound turns from a
physical phenomenon into a meaningful one, how the meaning of music and the
time of experiencing are constituted. The descriptions of auditory phenomena
based on Heidegger's philosophy elucidate the hermeneutics of the phenomena
and the man's existence in the world. Husserl and Heidegger's approaches are
inseparable, they overlap and supplement each other and deepen the understanding
of both the auditory phenomena and the man.
Chapter 2: The Basic Stances of the Phenomenological View: 1) The
Givenness of Sound; 2) Sound - a Meaningful Phenomenon; 3) Sound - a
Time Object; 4) Sound, World Constitution and Worldliness.
Chapter 2 analyses the basic standpoints of classical phenomenology to be
used in the description of auditory phenomena. These basic standpoints regard
questions of givenness and essences, immanence and transcendence, sense
formation, the structures of intentional consciousness and internal temporal
consciousness, time of experiencing, worlds, horizons, etc.
Husserl regards sound as an example of a temporal object - the immanent
time that sound possesses is the most characteristic feature that distinguishes
sound from the phenomena that do not possess immanent time. At the moment
the sound is grasped both its immanent time and the time of experiencing it are
being constituted. However, the author of the promotion paper also shows other
phenomenological aspects of sound: sound is regarded as a meaningful
phenomenon, the essence of sound is constituted not while hearing the sonority of
the sound, but while thinking of the sound in the phenomenological directedness
of thought. The essence of the sound phenomenon and the ontological structures
are characterized by objectivity and appearance immanent to the phenomenon,
intentionality, internal time, and sonority.
The author shows that sounds appear as given differently every time, that they
are in a different sonority, depending on the musical instrument or the person who
speaks, plays, and sings; however, the sound always retains its objectivity, which
distinguishes it from other phenomena. Sound as a meaningful phenomenon does
not lose its quality of being given as an object and, proceeding from it, shows
itself in the appearance of being given. The phenomenon of sound that we grasp
with mind-body resounds from its objectivity.
The author shows that the essence of sound is constituted in the correlation
of "I" and the sound, starting from the "I" perspective. The entrance of the world,
especially the life-world, into Husserl's philosophy widens the interpretation of the
sound phenomenon. The author demonstrates that sound is not only a phenomenon
that is grasped in the "I" consciousness but that the everyday experience and a
meaningful horizon is also constituted together with the grasping of sound,. The
worldliness of the Heidegger's world, which enables to view sound within the
horizon of being, is also applicable to interpretations of sound. The problems of
existence, the existent, being, and the world, discussed by Heidegger show the
transition from the description of the sound phenomenon to the explanations of
speech and voice.
In connection with the concept of the world, the promotion paper discusses
important aspects of auditory phenomena: in phenomenology the concept world
means the man's inclusion in a definite, meaningful horizon; auditory phenomena
are not in an isolated horizon, they overlap with the visible and the visually
grasped. The world that is constituted during a concert includes the sounds of
music as well as the visually grasped objects, the ongoing activity, and other
people. The content of the constituted worlds varies; however, both Husserl's
constitution of the world and Heidegger's possibility of the worldliness of the
world are a priori. Constitution and worldliness of the world are humanised
activities - if in the centre of Husserl's philosophy there is "I" who constitutes
the world, and it is an intermittent constitution of the world in subjectivity and
intersubjectivity, then in Heidegger's fundamental ontology Being-in-the-world
is viewed as existent in the network of the world, and the world is an event in
Being-in-the-world. The author shows that the constituted world is not a separate
phenomenon of cognition, but a meaningful complex phenomenon always open
to the future;thus, to new phenomenological interpretations.
The promotion paper shows that the horizon comprising only auditory
phenomena is a horizon constituted by way of phenomenological reduction that
"brackets" everything that does not refer to sonority and hearing. However, the
author in her phenomenological interpretations of sound and music underscores
that a more complete description of auditory phenomena includes a world in
which sound, music, and voice are not only heard, but also grasped visibly,
kinesthetically, as well as shows that sonority is linked to silence. Speech includes
muteness of language; sound is intentionally connected with silence. Sound,
speech, voice, and music mark the horizons of audibility, whose border is where
the unheard comes into being. The unheard is thought of as silence; however, the
audibility horizon is changeable and open; it widens and narrows depending on
what we are listening to and what sounds. Hearing and seeing are indivisible.
Correlations forming between the heard and the unheard intermittently form new
horizons.
Chapter 3. Further Expansion of the Phenomenological View: Sound, Speech,
Voice: 1) From Sound Phenomenology to Existential Voice: a Philosophical
Understanding of Language, Speaking, and Listening; 2) The Man as a Mind-Body
Unity; 3) Hearing and Seeing, Grasp of the Fundamental Cultural Phenomena;
4) The Intentional Aspects of Sound and Silence.
Chapter 3 discusses such auditory phenomena as sound, speech, and voice
from the points of view of hermeneutical phenomenology and existential
philosophy that are based on the philosophies of Martin Heidegger, Maurice
Merleau-Ponty, Hans-Georg Gadamer; it also shows the transition from sound
phenomenology to an existential voice.
In the promotion paper speech and voice are regarded in connection with the
understanding of the man, the phenomenological view of language, hearing and
seeing, saying and listening. The author emphasises that the man's understanding
is of importance in phenomenological interpretations of speech and voice: the
man is regarded as subjectivity, Ego, mind-body unity, Being-in-the-world. The
man as a mind-body unity is the centre of experience for any world perception,
and the manifestation of language in voice is both the activity of the mind and
the body. The man is a listener and a spectator, open to the world and to others.
Speech and voice form a direct communication with other people; we address each
other, listen to each other, and form a shared meaningful world. While listening to
music, we do not address each other directly, but the sounds of music unite
listeners and musicians through mediation, forming a shared meaningful world.
The phenomenological view of sound, speech, voice, and music together with
ontological characterisations of auditory phenomena elucidate hearing and seeing.
Listening, unlike seeing, which is directed outwards of the seeing subject, includes
a dual discourse: listening to oneself and listening to others; hearing one's inner
voice and the voice of another. Seeing differs from phenomenological
contemplation, purely phenomenological contemplation is directed towards the
phenomenal world, the world of subjective grasp, i.e., I contemplate in myself my
contemplation.
Further expansion of the phenomenological view of sound shows that such
concepts as intentionality, essence, etc, characterise not only subjectivity but also
the essences of the phenomena grasped in subjectivity - sound possesses
intentionality and is intentionally linked with silence and other phenomena.
Viewing the contiguity of sound and silence, noise, light, and rhythm, it is
affirmed that it is phenomenologically possible also to describe the fundamental
phenomena of culture. The author shows how sound turns from a meaningful
phenomenon grasped in subjectivity into a phenomenon fundamental for being.
One of the ways of phenomenological characterization of culture is describing
fundamental phenomena present in any culture. The descriptions of fundamental
cultural phenomena are connected with seeing and hearing, observation and
listening. Western culture has developed trusting "the eye". It is confirmed by the
philosophical ideas of Hannah Arendt, Wolfgang Welsh, Martin Jay, and others.
Examination of auditory phenomena shows that listening is as important a way of
elucidating truth as seeing. The promotion paper takes into account the
conclusions of philosophers that Western thinking and culture has predominantly
been viewed in the dimension of observation where trust in "the eye" is by far
greater than trust in "the ear".
Chapter 4: Phenomenological Interpretations of Music: 1) Understanding
of Music in Philosophy and the Specifics of Musical Phenomenology; 2) The
Essence of Music: Figure, Hyle, Eidos, Logos, Play; 3) The Ontology of a
Work of Music: the Problem of Essence and Interpretation; 4) Music as an
Intersubjective Phenomenon.
In the promotion paper the complex nature of the phenomenon of music is
viewed in connection with other auditory phenomena, such as sound, noise, and
voice, illuminating both the common and the distinctive features. This chapter
also highlights the various understandings of music in the history of philosophy
that exist since the very origins of philosophy. The author demonstrates that every
thinker's understanding of music is rooted in his philosophical views and that the
essence of music is explained using the concepts of figure, eidos, hyle, play; that
a work of music is characterized by intentionality, the givenness of objectivity and
appearance, ideal- real, and time. The objectivity of a musical composition is the
score, the composer's included intentions, and sonority. During the performance
the objective givenness of music turns into givenness of appearance when the
intentions of the composer intermingle with the intentions of the performer
and the listeners. Musical phenomenology uses the concepts of intentionality,
intersubjectivity, experiencing time, and the world to characterize a musical
phenomenon. Phenomenology enables viewing music in interrelations - being
and the existent, essence and appearance; music dwells in the work of music;
while it is being performed, music becomes existent.
The promotion paper also elucidates the hermeneutical aspect of music.
Music is a complex auditory phenomenon, and its discussion includes questions
about art and historical tradition. The author views the essence of a work of music
from two aspects: 1) the essence of a work of music is in the work itself and
2) the essence and the identity of the work of music is conditioned by the totality
of historical processes and future expectations that encompass the composition,
the author, its performers and listeners. The work of music is viewed as subjected
to a variety of interpretations, open to the future and new interpretations, included
in an intersubjective meaningful time and space.
Topicality of the research: A research in which a century-long heritage of
phenomenology is analyzed in connection with auditory phenomena has not been
carried out in the philosophical thought in Latvia up to now. The author of the
promotion paper, analyzing literature available in different foreign languages,
establishes the fact that up to now such an extensive research in which the auditory
phenomena such as sound, speech, voice, and music are viewed together from a
phenomenological standpoint has not been written (or at least is not available).
Thus, the promotion paper can be characterized as novel, its novelty lying in:
1. its specific approach that views sound, speech, voice, and music together,
determining their structures as auditory phenomena;
2. phenomenological description of hearing and seeing, saying and listening
that are characterized as meaningful acts with a structure of their own;
3. new standpoints concerning musical ontology;
4. a critical evaluation of contemporary standpoints of musical phenomenology.
The promotion paper confirms a new tendency in contemporary philosophical
research — viewing historically accumulated ideas in connection with significant
processes in society, art, and culture, in this particular case with music.
The promotion paper attests that the phenomenological view of auditory
phenomena does not remain in one narrow sphere, but solves fundamental
philosophical problems, opens up new horizons for philosophical understanding
of language, art philosophy, and contemporary explanations of music.
Phenomenological interpretations of auditory phenomena are especially important
in musical education; they enable discovering music from points of view that
differ from musicological analyses and offer the possibility of new investigations
in the field of the art of music. For that reason the problems discussed in the
promotion paper can be of interest to musicians, educationalists, the mass media;
understanding of these problems educates listeners, enriches everyone's horizon
with phenomenological conclusions and enables discovering music in a
philosophical aspect. Contemporary intensified interest in the culture of hearing
and the philosophical conclusions that the culture of seeing is being replaced by
the culture of hearing and that the man has greater trust in "the ear" than in "the
eye" all testify to the fact that interest in auditory phenomena is growing in
society as a whole.
Conclusions
1. The phenomenological perspectives discerned by the author of the
promotion paper, which elucidate different aspects of sound, speech, voice, and
music, including the immanent, constitutive, intersubjective, hermeneutically
interpretative, ontological, allow viewing auditory phenomena in interconnection.
The phenomenological perspectives discussed in the promotion paper are interlaced
and elucidated one through the other by describing auditory phenomena. It is the
interweaving of these dimensions that allows viewing auditory phenomena from
different phenomenological aspects and revealing the specifics and development
of phenomenological thinking.
2. Phenomenological descriptions of sound, speech, voice, and music differ
depending on which philosophies are used as the theoretical basis: Husserl's
early phenomenology, phenomenology solving the problems of intersubjectivity,
phenomenology developing the idea of life-world, existential philosophy, body
phenomenology, philosophical hermeneutics, and others.
3. Descriptions of auditory phenomena are subdivided into a) purely
phenomenological descriptions based on Edmund Husserl's classical
phenomenology (mainly The Phenomenology of Internal Time-Consciousness)
and b) interpretative descriptions based on Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg
Gadamer's philosophies in which auditory phenomena are viewed in their
interrelations, making use of the ideas of phenomenology, hermeneutics, and
existential philosophy. Husserl's philosophy verifies that the feasibility of
cognition, sense formation, temporal consciousness, and essences are elucidated
through the grasp of the phenomenon; Heidegger's philosophy attests that being
emerges from the disguise in the existent - truth reveals itself and is elucidated in
poetry and works of art; Gadamer's philosophy examines how in a work of art the
play of art "transforms into a formation".
4. Speech, voice, and music have a number of aspects in common: they are
auditory, organized and articulated phenomena as well as temporal objects.
Temporal object, audibility horizon, and understanding of the essence of the
phenomenon are the common aspects to be used in describing auditory
phenomena. The meaning of an auditory phenomenon is constituted in internal
time; the understanding of noise also possesses immanent time. However, sound,
speech, voice, and music differ from such an auditory phenomenon as noise.
There is no special term to designate unorganized noise. Unlike noise, the sounds
of music are fixed in notes, the words pronounced - in written speech. Sound,
speech, voice, and music manifest themselves in sonority.
5. It is demonstrated in the promotion paper that the objectivity of auditory
phenomena is elucidated or appears in sonority; that the sonority of sound differs
from the sonority of voice in the way they are given; and that the sonority of
voiced utterance is a different kind of sonority in comparison with the sonority of a
musical tone. The promotion paper shows that constituting the essence of sonority
is not hearing sonority; sonority is grasped in the phenomenological directedness
of thought as an ideal thought object, and it is only sonority grasped in thought
that allows constituting the essence of the phenomenon. Any phenomenological
view of sonority starts from a direct grasp of the sound.
6. Any auditory phenomenon marks the horizon of audibility. The horizon of
audibility is a world constituted in subjectivity with the phenomena inside it. In the
constituted meaningful world the auditory and the visible are entwined showing
that pure horizon of audibility is constituted only in a phenomenologically directed
thought - i.e., implementing the phenomenological method. However, musical
phenomenologists stress that an adequate description of auditory phenomena
encompasses the world in which sound, music, and voice are not only heard but
also connected with the visible, and that sonority is linked with silence.
7. In general musical phenomenology is characterized by three aspects:
a) a phenomenological approach is an attentive listening to what is given, not
constructing the given; b) the grasp of music, sound, and voice is kinesthetic,
c) sound, speech, voice and music are grasped not only in the ideality of the mind
but also show that a bodily grasp is meaningful, d) a phenomenological view of
music starts from experiencing music directly, taking into account the fact that
music is incorporated in the historical background.
8. Musical phenomenologists Thomas Clifton, Joseph Smith, Ellis Bruce
Benson, and others characterize music using the concepts of logos, time, rhythm,
hyle, figure, and play. Roman Ingarden's phenomenology views music mainly in
connection with understanding a work of music as a phenomenon. The ontological
structure of a work of music is characterized by the relationship ideal-real, pure
intentionality, and internal time. Music, unlike sound, contains an internal history;
every performance of a composition is incorporated in historical experience and
tradition.
9. Phenomenological investigations show that it is erroneous to identify music
with mental experience because the essence of music is "beyond" or "above"
mental experience and presents structures common to every composition, no
matter who has created it, who has performed it and listened to it. From the point
of view of hermeneutics, a work of music is a totality of meaningful constitutive
possibilities that are created during the existence of the composition irrespective
of the hermeneutical distance from the moment of its creation. A work of music
possesses an ability to resound in a different historical tradition than in the period
of its creation; therefore, approaching the originally created meaning is not to be
regarded as the only adequate interpretation.
10. A direct influence of Husserl's phenomenological method is visible in
Roman Ingarden's ontological investigations of musical composition, in the
characterization of the intersubjective nature of Alfred Shutz' music, in Joseph
Smith's view on sound and music phenomena, in Don Ihde's characterization of the
auditory and visible horizons, and in Thomas Clifton's musical phenomenology.
Some authors tend to criticize Husserl for solipsism, for a philosophy too
Cartesian, for his one-sided logical explanation of language, etc; nevertheless, an
original voice phenomenology is formed even out of a critical attitude towards
him, as the views of Jacques Derrida confirm
11. The XX and XXI century philosophy develops the theme of intersubjectivity. The man is viewed as incorporated in a "We-unity" in which a shared
meaningful experience of the heard and said is constituted. "We-unity"
incorporates people who are present, for instance, at a concert: musicians,
listeners, etc, the composer of the piece is also indirectly included in the "Weunity" through the intentions realized in the composition. In such an aspect of
social phenomenology, ideas develop about music as a shared creation, grasping
of auditory phenomena as a constitution of a shared meaningful world.
12. In Martin Heidegger's analyses of Being-in-the-world (Dasein) the
historicity context appears that displays a noticeable distancing from Husserl's
pure "I", the transcendental Ego. Being-in-the-world (Dasein) is not subjectivity,
but being the existence itself, it is included in being, from where it speaks,
understands, is in a particular mood and a state of concern. Heidegger especially
examines speech as existentiahty. Being-in-the-world elucidates the continuum of
spatial temporality in which Being-in-the-world is attentively listened to and heard.
Heidegger's philosophy emphasizes the aspect of listening in the descriptions of
auditory phenomena based on the principle of his "let be" philosophy. Making use
of Heidegger's views on the worldliness of the world, sound is viewed not from
the "I" perspective but from Being-in-the-world existence, the world surrounding
the work of art. However, both Husserl's constitution of the world and Heidegger's
worldliness of the world are given a priori.
13. Hans-Georg Gadamer's view of the man as incorporated in tradition and
linguisticity opens up new possibilities of the descriptions of auditory phenomena.
Music is viewed in the context of historicity and hermeneutically, and the ontology
of art and language is elucidated. Alongside descriptions of auditory phenomena
problems of communication, attentive listening, mutual understanding, and the
inheritance of traditions are solved. The experience of speech, voice, and music
shows that hearing and seeing, speaking and listening are important activities for
the formation of shared sense and horizons of understanding and a dialogue.
14. Phenomenological descriptions of speech, voice, and music attest to the
contiguity of phenomenology and ontology, elucidating both the ontological
structures that grasp phenomena and the ontological structures of the phenomena
themselves. Sounds and musical phenomena appear as ontological structures
inherent to any sound, any work of music. The contiguity of phenomenology and
ontology is characteristic of both Husserl's views and the views of his followers.
Roman Ingarden uses the structures elucidated in classical phenomenology in
characterization of the ontology of a work of music - ideal, real, pure
intentionality; the structures of the organization of society viewed in Alfred
Schutz's social phenomenology are carried over to a shared creation of music, and
the intersubjective structures of music and shared experiencing time are
elucidated; Bruce Ellis Benson characterizes music as a play, a unity of ergon and
energeias under the influence of Gadamer.
15. In the phenomenological interpretations of auditory phenomena, the
conjoined existence of the heard and unheard, the visible and invisible, being and
entity, existentiahty and existence, a priori and grasped in experience is elucidated.
These double-sided relations are not double-layer relations where one overlays
the other, but both the layers are originally given in an intertwined form. The
phenomenological view encompasses the principle of syncretism or chiasmus:
subject and object, experience and the experienced, immanence and transcendence
occurring together; one's appearance through the other; elucidation of essences
through the phenomena in one's experience, elucidating the experience itself.
16. Phenomenological view of sound, speech, voice and music warrants new
investigations in philosophy, accentuating seeing and hearing as intentional
activities of the man, underscoring the significance of auditory phenomena in
contemporary explanations of culture, and deepening the understanding of sound,
music, speech, and voice. Creative processes of art are linked with the fundamental
phenomena of culture - sound, noise, silence, light, darkness, and rhythm.
Approbation of the Results of the Promotion Paper
Ineta Kivle's publications on the theme of the promotion paper and in
connection with the results of the research:
1) Constitution of Meaning of Sound and Music // Dilemmas of Values and
Contemporary Life-world. - Rīga: FSI, 2007, pp. 96-110.
2) Mocarts un mūzikas pārdzīvojums fenomenoloģijas kontekstā // Dzirdēt
Mocartu. (Mozart and Experiencing Music in Phenomenological Context // To
Hear Mozart) -Rīga: JVLMA, 2007, pp. 69-85.
3) Atgriešanās pie lietām Huserlam un lietas lietišķums Heidegeram (Back to
Things in Husserl and the Thingness of the Thing in Heidegger) // Filosofija:
Almanahs 6. -Rīga, FSI, 2007, pp. 81-97.
4) Mūzikas būtības fenomenoloģisks skatījums (Phenomenological View of the
Essence of Music) // LU Zinātniskie raksti. Filosofija. (LU Scientific Papers.
Philosophy) No.713, 2007, pp. 133-143.
5) Citādības pieņemšana Latvijas kultūrā mūsdienās (Acceptance of Otherness in
Latvian Culture Nowadays) // Letonikas 1. kongress "Modernitāte, filosofija,
kristīgās vērtības, mutvārdu vēsture Latvijā" (Letonica 1st Congress
"Modernity, Philosophy, Christian Values, Oral History in Latvia"). - Rīga,
LZA, 2006, pp. 279-289.
6) Skaņa fenomenoloģiskā skatījumā (Phenomenological View of Sound) accepted for publication in the Collection of scientific papers of the UL:
"Observer and Society. Phenomenological Solutions".
7) Mūzikas fenomenoloģiskā perspektīva Latvijā (Phenomenological Perspective
of Music in Latvia) - accepted for publication in the Letonica 2nd Congress
Collection.
8) Mūzikas darba ontoloģija: jautājums par būtību un interpretācija (Ontology of a
Musical Composition: the Problem of Essence and Interpretation) - accepted
for publication in the scientific papers of JVLMA.
The author of the promotion paper Ineta Kivle has delivered reports on the
contents of the paper at international conferences:
1) Reflections on the Phenomenology of Sound // Latvian-Italian philosophy
seminar "Contemporary European Values", section: Phenomenology Today,
Rome, Pontifical Lutheran University, December 3, 2007.
2) Mūzikas darba skatījums 20. gadsimta filosofija (View on Musical
Composition in the XX Century Philosophy) // Letonica, 2nd Congress,
section: Traditional and Contemporary in Latvian Music. - Rīga, October 30,
2007.
3) Mūzikas fenomenoloģijas perspektīva Latvijā (Perspective of Musical
Phenomenology
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
9)
in Latvia) // Letonica 2nd Congress, section: European Values in Latvia. Riga, October 31, 2007.
Constitution of Meaning of Sound and Musical Education // the 56th
International Phenomenological Congress: Rethinking Education in the
Perspective of Life. -Daugavpils, August 24-26, 2006.
Constitution of Meaning of Sound and Music // Human Being in the
Contemporary World: from Every-day Consciousness to the Highest Values. Rīga, December 14-15, 2006.
Skaņas struktūras fenomenoloģisks skaidrojums (Phenomenological
Explanation of the Structure of Sound) // Observer and Society: Social
Dimension in the Phenomenological Thinking of the Baltic Region States, Rīga,
September 29-October 1, 2005.
Acceptance of Otherness in Contemporary Latvian Culture // Letonica 1st
Congress, section: European Values in Latvia. - Rīga,October 24-25, 2005.
Mind, Body and Perception of Sound // Baltic States between East and West. Vilnius, International Conference of Lithuanian / Latvian philosophers, May 23, 2005.
J-J. Rousseau's and F. Nietzsche's views on Language and Music // Language
as Identity. - Rīga, May 14-15, 2004.
The most important reports at the UL and JVLMA (Jāzeps Vītols Latvian
Academy of Music) Scientific Conferences:
1) Dzīvespasaules konstituēšanas perspektīva (Perspective of Constitution of
Lifeworld) // The 65th Conference of UL, section: Ethics and Lifeworld. Rīga, April 13, 2007.
2) Es esmu tas, ko es saku (I am what I Say) // The 65th Conference of UL:
General Philosophy section. Rīga, February 7, 2007.
3) Alfrēds Šics par mūziku un Mocartu: fenomenoloģisks skatījums (Alfred
Schutz on Music and Mozart: Phenomenological View // Mozart and the Era of
Enlightenment). -Rīga, January 27, 2006.
4) Skaņa un dzīvespasaule (Sound and Lifeworld) // The 64th Conference of UL:
Philosophy Doctorate Section. - Rīga, February 6, 2006.
5) Mūsdienu filosofija par skaņu un klusumu (Contemporary Philosophy on
Sound and Silence) // The 63rd conference of UL: Philosophy Doctorate
Session. - Rīga, February 10, 2005.
6) Spēle I. Kanta "Spriestspējas kritikā" (Play in Immanuel Kant's Critique of
Judgement). Immanuel Kant - 280, section: Kant's Aesthetics. - Rīga, April 2223, 2004.