Phenomenological structure of consciousness issue in Toward a philosophy of the act, by Mikhail Bakhtin

Abstract

This article aims to theoretically discuss one of the most important philosophical relationships established by Russian philosopher Mikhail M. Bakhtin [1895-1975], who, in our view, established a critical and dialogical relationship with Edmund Husserl [1859-1938] transcendental phenomenology. Our interpretively theoretical focus is on some phenomenological aspects present in Bakhtin's posthumously published book, Toward a Philosophy of the Act (1993 [1986]). More specifically, our attention is directed to the problem of consciousness presented in this work. We discuss how Bakhtin proposed his concept of architectonic as a synthetically epistemic definition of phenomenological structure of consciousness. We also highlight how we understand the concept of answerable act as the Bakhtinian version of intentionality in transcendental phenomenology, as a proposal that, at the same time, seems to seek to distance itself from Husserl's transcendentalism, by mainly trying to deal with problems related to consciousness and the condition of human beings from a historically cultural perspective, according to an ethics of human relations in history. To carry out this discussion, we especially follow the analytical guidelines of Brandist (2002) and Sobral (2005; 2019). Initially, we start with a brief specification of the problem of consciousness in Husserlian phenomenology. Then, we dedicate ourselves to discussing the issues already mentioned in the referred Russian philosopher work. We hope to make a minimal contribution to Bakhtinian studies that seek to clarify both the multiple axiological and epistemic relationships established by Bakhtin and the epistemologically philosophical foundations of his theory.