The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World

The Spell of the Sensuous is rooted in phenomenology, a branch of philosophy primarily developed by Edmund Husserl in the early 20th century. Phenomenology focuses on detailed examination of the structures of experience and consciousness from a first-person perspective. It diverges from other philosophical traditions by prioritizing direct experience as the source of knowledge, exploring how things appear in one’s experience without the overlay of interpretations, theories, or assumptions outside that experience. The distinctiveness of phenomenology, as David Abram emphasizes in The Spell of the Sensuous, arises from its focus on direct experience as the primary source of knowledge. By valuing how things appear in one’s immediate experience, phenomenology seeks to grasp the essence of experiences before any conceptual categorization or scientific analysis is applied. This contrasts with other philosophical approaches that emphasize the role of reason and logic, the empirical observation of external objects, or the analysis of language and concepts.

Rationalism, for instance, prioritizes reason and logical deduction, as exemplified by the Descartes method of introspective doubting to find truths. In contrast, phenomenology focuses on the preconceptual essence of experience, seeking understanding through the phenomena of consciousness itself rather than abstract reasoning. Similarly, empiricism asserts that knowledge comes primarily from sensory experience but relies on external observation of phenomena to build theories and often treats experiences as objective data points rather than subjective events imbued with personal meaning. Additionally, structuralism and post-structuralism explore the underlying structures or systems that shape culture, language, and thought. These approaches analyze how structures influence human understanding and social practices, often focusing on language as a system of signs divorced from individual experience. Phenomenology, by contrast, delves into how things appear in one’s immediate experience, aiming to uncover the lived quality of experiences before they are categorized or theorized by such structures.

Central to phenomenology is the concept of intentionality, which suggests that consciousness is always about something: One’s thoughts and perceptions are inherently directed toward tangible objects in the world, imagined scenarios, or abstract concepts. This idea challenges the notion of an isolated, observing consciousness detached from the world, instead presenting consciousness as fundamentally engaged with and inseparable from its objects. In addition, phenomenology references the “lifeworld” (Lebenswelt), or the pre-reflective realm of ordinary experience, before scientific explanations are applied. Husserl argued that the lifeworld is the foundational layer of human existence, grounding all abstract and scientific constructs. This emphasis on the prescientific experience of the world as directly lived foregrounds the importance of sensory, embodied engagement with the environment, which Abram argues has been overshadowed by the written word and abstract thought.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty, another key figure in phenomenology whose work Abram references, extended Husserl’s ideas by emphasizing the embodied nature of perception and consciousness. Merleau-Ponty argued that one’s body is not just a physical object but the medium through which one experiences the world: The body and the world are intertwined; one’s sensory engagement with the world constitutes one’s understanding and knowledge of it. This perspective dissolves the traditional subject-object dichotomy, proposing instead a fundamental interrelation between the perceiver and the perceived.

In The Spell of the Sensuous, Abram applies these phenomenological presuppositions to argue that sensory engagement with the natural world forms the basis of one’s linguistic, cultural, and ecological understanding. He contends that the advent of alphabetic communication and the shift toward a predominantly literate culture distanced individuals from this direct, embodied engagement with the more-than-human world, leading to a sense of alienation from the environment that sustains life. By returning to a phenomenologically informed experience of the world, Abram suggests, one can reawaken a sense of wonder and kinship with the natural world, fostering a more sustainable and life-affirming existence on Earth.