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GATE 2022 XH2 (English) – Question 40

Critical Theories and Intellectual Traditions · Theoretical Paradigms: Structuralism, Marxism, feminism, existentialism, poststructuralism, modernism, postmodernism, new historicism, postcolonialism, posthumanism · 1 mark · Multiple select

Which of the following statements is/are correct about Phenomenology?

  1. It is a form of methodological idealism, seeking to explore an abstraction called ‘human consciousness’.
  2. It is a philosophical method associated with Edmund Husserl.
  3. It believes that the act of thinking and the object of thought are internally related, mutually dependent.
  4. Heidegger’s Being and Time is an important phenomenological treatise supporting the stand of Husserl.

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Correct answer: (A) It is a form of methodological idealism, seeking to explore an abstraction called ‘human consciousness’.; (B) It is a philosophical method associated with Edmund Husserl.; (C) It believes that the act of thinking and the object of thought are internally related, mutually dependent.; (D) Heidegger’s Being and Time is an important phenomenological treatise supporting the stand of Husserl.

Explanation

Phenomenology is Husserl's method of studying consciousness. It treats thinking and its object as internally related (intentionality), and Heidegger's Being and Time is a major phenomenological work. Eagleton describes it as a methodological idealism.