The Discipline of the 'Norm:' A Critical Appreciation of Erwin Strauss

As a practicing physician (psychiatrist), scientist (neurologist) and philosopher, Erwin Straus developed a body of writing which, falling within the phenomenological tradition, is highly original and insightful. His unusual combination of work from these three areas constitutes one of the most important attempts to provide what has been called “a new Paideia.” Regarding this unique blend of perspectives and concerns as quite natural, he conceived his work variously as a “medical anthropologyrdquo; or “phenomenological psychology.” In the end, he was both a pioneer and a rebel: starting from psychiatry, he proceeded boldly straight into phenomenological philosophy, illuminating significant aspects of human life: if we would understand the “norm,” we must begin with the disruptions, as failures of existential projects; that is, as forms of human life - which was ultimately at the heart of his life-long epistemic and therapeutic concerns.