Towards a Husserlian Integrative Account of Experiential and Narrative Dimensions of the Self

The aim of this paper is to outline an integrative account of experiential and narrative dimensions of the self based on Husserl’s genetic phenomenology. I argue that we should discard “strong narrativism” which holds that our experiential life has a narrative structure and, accordingly, that experiential and narrative dimensions of the self coincide. We should also refrain from equating the experiential self with the minimal self, as the former does not simply constitute a formally individuated subject as the latter but a properly individualized one with personal characteristics and habituality. Husserl’s genetic phenomenology offers both a description of the individualized self as experiential, i.e. as pre-reflective and embodied, and as narrative, i.e. as an autonomous linguistic agent. Through Husserl’s concepts of sedimentation and secondary passivity, we can explain the dialectical relationship between experiential and narrative dimensions of the self.