Putting Plural Self-Awareness into Practice: The Phenomenology of Expert Musicianship

TY - JOUR

T1 - Putting Plural Self-Awareness into Practice

T2 - The Phenomenology of Expert Musicianship

AU - Salice, Alessandro

AU - Høffding, Simon

AU - Gallagher, Shaun

PY - 2019/3/15

Y1 - 2019/3/15

N2 - Based on a qualitative study about expert musicianship, this paper distinguishes three ways of interacting by putting them in relation to the sense of agency. Following Pacherie (Phenomenology the Cognitive Sciences 13:25–46, 2014), it highlights that the phenomenology of shared agency undergoes a drastic transformation when musicians establish a sense of we-agency. In particular, the musicians conceive of the performance as one single action towards which they experience an epistemic privileged access. The implications of these results for a theory of collective intentionality are discussed by addressing two general questions: When several individuals share an intention, does this fact secure plural self-knowledge? And is it possible to have non-observational knowledge about a collective action? It is claimed that the results drawn from the study about expert musicianship supports negative answers to both questions.

AB - Based on a qualitative study about expert musicianship, this paper distinguishes three ways of interacting by putting them in relation to the sense of agency. Following Pacherie (Phenomenology the Cognitive Sciences 13:25–46, 2014), it highlights that the phenomenology of shared agency undergoes a drastic transformation when musicians establish a sense of we-agency. In particular, the musicians conceive of the performance as one single action towards which they experience an epistemic privileged access. The implications of these results for a theory of collective intentionality are discussed by addressing two general questions: When several individuals share an intention, does this fact secure plural self-knowledge? And is it possible to have non-observational knowledge about a collective action? It is claimed that the results drawn from the study about expert musicianship supports negative answers to both questions.

KW - Faculty of Social Sciences

KW - Joint action

KW - Practical knowledge

KW - Shared intention

KW - Pre-reflective self-awareness

KW - Expert musicianship

U2 - 10.1007/s11245-017-9451-2

DO - 10.1007/s11245-017-9451-2

M3 - Journal article

SN - 0167-7411

VL - 38

SP - 197

EP - 209

JO - Topoi

JF - Topoi

IS - 1

ER -