
Society is a chaotic group project where everyone has their own plan, but nobody reads the instructions—or agrees what the final grade should be.
Alfred Schutz captured this beautifully when he said something like (I am using my memoery here), “Individuals in society grasp the consciousness of others while living within their own consciousness, which makes societal relationships possible.”
This statement encapsulates a profound truth about human interaction: our ability to relate to others is both our salvation and our limitation.
This concept of intersubjectivity forms the backbone of Schutz’s phenomenological sociology, which seeks to bridge the gap between personal experience and collective understanding.
And yet, reading Schutz today, one wonders: how well does his continental approach hold up in a world increasingly dominated by empirical, data-driven sociology?

Continental vs. Anglo-Saxon Sociology
Continental sociology, rooted in phenomenology and existentialism, emphasizes the role of theory in framing human experience.
Thinkers like Schutz, Bourdieu, and Habermas often begin with abstract concepts, using them to interpret complex social phenomena.
Anglo-Saxon sociology, particularly in the U.S. and U.K., leans heavily on empirical studies, often eschewing theoretical depth in favor of tangible, actionable insights.
For instance, consider Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone, a widely influential book that examines the decline of social capital in the United States.
A continental sociologist might expect Putnam to ground his work in Bourdieu’s theory of capital, yet Putnam scarcely acknowledges it.
Instead, he approaches the issue through data: surveys, statistics, and case studies.
To a continental thinker, this might seem like sociology stripped of its intellectual soul.
Key Differences | Continental Sociology | Anglo-Saxon Sociology |
---|---|---|
Focus | Theoretical frameworks (e.g., intersubjectivity, praxis) | Empirical research, practical applications |
Methodology | Interpretative, qualitative | Quantitative, statistical |
Key Thinkers | Schutz, Bourdieu, Habermas | Goffman, Becker, Putnam |
Strength | Deep theoretical insight | Clear, actionable findings |
Weakness | Risk of abstraction and detachment | Risk of oversimplification and lack of depth |
Schutz’s Phenomenology in Practice: A Simple Explanation
When explaining Schutz to someone unfamiliar with sociology, I often start with the metaphor of a puppet show.
Picture this: you’re sitting in the audience, watching puppets perform.
You can see their movements, hear their voices, but the puppeteers remain hidden.
You can guess what they’re trying to communicate, but you can’t access their thoughts directly.
Schutz argues that life works much the same way.
We don’t interact with other people’s consciousnesses directly; we interact with the “puppets”—their words, gestures, and actions.
By interpreting these, we grasp their intentions, albeit imperfectly.
This process, Schutz says, is what allows society to function.
It’s not perfect understanding, but it’s good enough to get through a conversation, build relationships, and form communities.

Theoretical Depth vs. Practical Accessibility
Anglo-Saxon sociology often sidesteps theory to produce accessible works for a general audience. Books like Evicted by Matthew Desmond or The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander are powerful tools for understanding social issues, yet they rarely engage with foundational sociological theories.
Critics argue that this “atheoretical” approach dilutes the discipline, but proponents see it as a way to bring sociology to the masses.
Why Schutz Matters Today
Even in a world dominated by empirical research, Schutz’s insights remain relevant.
His concept of intersubjectivity is especially useful in understanding phenomena like social media.
Online, our interactions are even further removed from direct experience. We interpret tweets, emojis, and memes to “grasp” the consciousness of others, often with disastrous results.
Schutz’s framework reminds us that these interpretations are always subjective and prone to error.
The Critics
Not everyone buys into Schutz’s optimism about intersubjectivity.
Critics from various philosophical and sociological traditions challenge the feasibility of his ideas:
Critic | Argument |
---|---|
Jean-Paul Sartre | Intersubjectivity fosters conflict, as individuals project their insecurities onto others. |
George Orwell (1984) | Shared understanding can be weaponized, turning intersubjectivity into a tool of oppression. |
Friedrich Nietzsche | Human understanding is fundamentally limited; we remain trapped in our own perspectives. |
Anglo-Saxon Sociologists | Schutz’s theory lacks practical application and is too abstract for real-world use. |
For these thinkers, the idea that we can “grasp” others’ consciousnesses might be more comforting illusion than reality.
Revisiting the Divide
Oddly enough, Schutz himself bridges the divide between continental and Anglo-Saxon sociology.
Though a continental thinker, his ideas laid the groundwork for fields like ethnomethodology, a cornerstone of American sociology.
Harold Garfinkel and Erving Goffman, both deeply influenced by Schutz, applied his ideas to real-world interactions, creating a more empirical approach to intersubjectivity.
If anything, this suggests the divide is not as rigid as it seems. Continental and Anglo-Saxon traditions can complement each other, combining theoretical depth with practical relevance.

My First Flight and the Unspoken War (personal story ahead)
I remember my first flight. Not in the way you’re supposed to, all wide-eyed and filled with that innocent wonder. Nah. It was a fucking disaster from the start. I was twenty-four, and the thought of getting on a plane was less about excitement and more about feeling like a goldfish in a fishbowl, but with wings.
They told me to buckle up. The voice over the intercom was some smooth corporate drone, but I couldn’t hear it over the sound of my own pulse in my ears, and the sweat that crept down the back of my neck like it had somewhere important to be.
The plane began to hum, like some massive insect preparing to devour the earth. I wanted to say something to the guy next to me, but he looked like he could’ve been a serial killer.
Or worse, a businessman. You know, the kind who thinks a hard handshake can kill an idea. So I kept my mouth shut.
As we lifted off, I could see the city shrinking below, the tiny ants in their tiny cars, living tiny lives.
I pressed my face to the window, like it would change something. I kept waiting for the inevitable crash, because that’s what my brain told me would happen.
I couldn’t help it. It was a pattern I was used to: things get good, and then they fall apart. Same thing with people. You try to talk to someone and they don’t hear you, or worse—they think they do, but they don’t. It’s like trying to shake hands with a ghost.
A few minutes in, I noticed the guy sitting next to me—somewhere in his mid-forties, wearing a suit that looked too tight for someone with a neck that thick.
He was staring straight ahead, not at the window, just locked in some thought. He had the kind of look that said don’t talk to me and, believe me, I didn’t want to.
I wasn’t sure what it was about him, but he gave off that desperate, high-stakes, “I’m juggling life and I need this flight to go smoothly or I’ll explode” energy.
The kind of guy who’d break your nose over a parking spot, and then buy you a drink at the bar like nothing happened.
He kept tapping his foot. One of those frantic, nervous taps, like he was trying to outrun something. I wasn’t in the mood to ask, but I couldn’t stop looking at him. I tried to ignore him, focus on the mess of thoughts inside my head, but he kept tapping—louder and louder.
It was like his foot was a metronome marking the rhythm of a world that didn’t give a shit about what we were doing.
Finally, I snapped. I looked at him, said something stupid like, “You good?”
He glanced at me, then back at the seat in front of him, like I had just dropped a bucket of piss on his lap. “Yeah. Just—work stuff, you know?”
His words came out in bursts, like he was talking more to himself than to me. “Just gotta get this one deal through, or it’s all over. You know what I mean?”
I nodded like I understood. I didn’t. I didn’t care either. I didn’t want to know what kind of deal he was stuck in, or if it would fall through. I was just trying to survive my own internal mess.
But he needed to talk, and I didn’t have the balls to shut him down.
As he spoke, I realized something. This guy was here, but he wasn’t. He was physically sitting next to me, but he wasn’t living in this moment. His mind was miles away, on some phone call or email or meeting that I wasn’t a part of.
I could feel the distance between us, like a chasm. He was speaking words, but his mind was locked in a war with the world, and it was obvious.
He wasn’t engaging with me or anyone else. He was fighting something bigger than both of us.
Schutz’s theory hit me like a brick. We grasp the other person’s mind, but only through our own distorted lenses.
This guy and I were both in the same space, but we weren’t. He was trapped in some imaginary battle over business deals, while I was drowning in my own swirling thoughts.
The weird thing was, we were both just pretending to get the other person. He wasn’t hearing me, and I wasn’t hearing him. The air was thick with unspoken words, two people side by side but miles apart.
It made me wonder: Are we all just like this? Locked inside our own heads, trying to decipher a world that doesn’t make sense, but never truly listening to the people around us? Or worse—do we think we get each other, but we’re just too scared to admit that we never will?
The flight ended. We landed, both of us escaping whatever it was that had been weighing on us. But I didn’t feel like I’d escaped. I felt like I’d just watched two lives pass by each other, like ships in the night—briefly lit up by the glow of the same broken system, then fading into the black.
And the whole time, we were just pretending to be understood, when all we were really doing was trying to hold onto the pieces of a world that no longer cared about connecting.
We were faking it—and that’s all we could do.

Final Words
At the heart of Schutz’s work is a question that haunts anyone who wrestles with nihilism: is human connection real, or are we just projecting our own meanings onto the void?
Schutz’s answer is deceptively hopeful: it doesn’t matter.
Whether our understanding of others is “real” or not, the act of trying creates the relationships that sustain society.
It’s a fragile, imperfect system, but it’s the only one we’ve got.
Yet, as I sit here typing, I can’t shake the feeling that we’re all just characters in a Kafka novel, fumbling through a maze of misunderstandings.
Schutz doesn’t promise a way out.
But he offers a reminder: even in the darkest corners of human interaction, there’s a spark of reciprocity.
It’s that spark—however faint—that keeps us from succumbing to the abyss.
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