I am professor of philosophy and hold the chair of practical philosophy at TU Darmstadt. My work centers on issues in the fields of phenomenology, political and legal philosophy, and ethics, as well as transcendental philosophy and philosophy of mind. I am particularly interested in theories of intersubjectivity, alterity, and plurality, as well as the connection between experience, normativity, and justification.
My last book from 2018 (paperback 2020) was awarded the Edward Goodwin Ballard Book Prize and investigates the philosophy of Hannah Arendt which I conceive mainly as a phenomenology of plurality. You can find a review here: [Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews]
Currently I am working on two book-projects: a philosophical introduction to Hannah Arendt (in German, under contract with UTB/Fink) and a monograph on “Public Experiences. On Being, Appearing and Acting in Public” (in English, under contract with Routledge) which develops a phenomenological theory of the public realm.
Before coming to Darmstadt, I worked as a visiting professor at the philosophy department of the University of Kassel (Germany) (2016-2018) and was an assistant professor at the philosophy department of the University of Vienna (Austria) (2011-2016), where also most of my education (M.A., PhD) took place. Research and study abroad have brought me to the New School of Social Research in New York, St. Denis University in Paris, the Husserl-Archives in Leuven, and the Center for Subjectivity Research (CFS) in Copenhagen.
I have also been a “Recurrent Visiting Professor” (2020-2025) at the CFS, affiliated with the ERC-project “Who are we? Self-Identity, Social Cognition and Collective Intentionality” (opens in new tab). Between 2023-2025, I served as the president of the German Society of Phenomenological Research (DGPF (opens in new tab)).
As of 2026, I am co-spokesperson of the DFG Research Training Group “Aesthetics of Democracy” (opens in new tab) and co-editor of the journal “Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie” (opens in new tab). I also co-edit the Phenomenology series published by Alber/Nomos. Since 2025, I have been hosting the radio program “Philosophiecafé” for the Austrian radio station Ö1, which is broadcast four times a year.
Research Profile
- Phenomenology and existential philosophy
- Political philosophy, philosophy of law, ethics, social philosophy, social ontology
- Transcendental philosophy, philosophy of mind, classic epistemology
Current Research
- Phenomenology of the public realm and publicness
- Intersubjectivity, alterity, plurality (esp. Husserl, Levinas, Arendt); phenomenological approaches in ethics and social philosophy
- The political and political theories of action/agency, subjectification and subjectivity in the context of first-, second-, and third-person-perspective
- Experience, normativity, and justification (epistemic and normative)
- Existential dimensions of law: experiences and structures of rightlessness
- Phenomenological conceptions of personal identity
- Intentionality and consciousness, mind-world-relation, conceptual and non-conceptual experience
- Transcendental philosophy and transcendental idealism (esp. Husserl and Kant), theories of new realism
Office Hours
Wednesdays from 3 – 4 p.m., Room: S315/201 (Schloss/Glockenbau). Please schedule via E-mail.
Team
Staff Members
Luis Basler (2022-2024)
Gerhard Thonhauser (since 2019)
Philipp Schmidt (2018-2021)
Christian Sternad (2018-2019)
Visiting Researchers
Carlos Almeida, PhD candidate at the Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos (UNISINOS). Dissertation project: „The Origins of Hannah Arendt. Phenomenology and the Crisis of Philosophy“, PDSE (CAPES) program. (Sept 2025 – May 2026)
Prof. Dr. Lucas Barreto Dias, Instituto de Educação do Ceará / Universidade do Estado do Ceará, Fortaleza. Research project: „Being-of-the-world and reconciliation with the world: an investigation through Hannah Arendt's political phenomenology“. (June 2025 – February 2026)
Anto Varghese, PhD candidate at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, India. Dissertation project: „Dialogue and Sociality. A Contemporary Phenomenological Reading“. (Nov. 2023 – March 2025)
Giovanni Battista Armenio, PhD candidate at the University Federico II, Neapel. Dissertation project: “Phenomenology and Practice of Dwelling in Heidegger's Thought”. (April – Dezcember 2024)
Tristan Hedges, PhD Fellow at the Centre for Subjectivity Research (University of Copenhagen) in the ERC-Project “Who are we?” Dissertation project: “Us and Them: A Phenomenological Approach to Collective Identity”. (April 2023 – June 2023)
Nayana Bibile, PhD (University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia)
Future Talent Short-Term Scholarship by TU Darmstadt (May 2022 – July 2022)
Jing Zhang, PhD candidate at Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China. Dissertation project: “Adolf Reinach‘s Phenomenology of Law“. Research stay (Oct. 2019 – April 2021)
Adrian Bueno Junquero, PhD candidate at U.N.E.D University, Madrid, Spain. Dissertation project: “A phenomenology of Property“. Research stay (Aug. 2018 – Jan 2019)
Doctoral Candidates and Graduates
Simon Geest (since 2025): „Zwischenmenschlichkeit bei Hannah Arendt und Emmanuel Levinas“
Michael Grooff (since 2025): „A political-phenomenological critique of anarchist theory based on the works of Arendt and Merleau-Ponty“
Luis Basler (since 2025): „Grundsätzliches Darstellen. Zum form-anzeigenden Verfahren der Kritik der reinen Vernunft“
Pezhman Golchin (since 2024): „Soma. An Introduction to the definition of the body as an abstract object drawing from Aristotle’s work De Anima and Merleau-Ponty’s notion of the body subject”
Letizia Konderak (since 2023): “Primitive Accumulation and the Consumption of the Common World. A reading between Arendt and Marx”
Mareike Thies (since 2023): „Das Sich und das Subjekt. Die unendliche Leere des Individuums als Voraussetzung für Subjektivation“
Marlin Mayer (since 2023): „Perspektivität“
Cengiz Kotan (since 2021): “‘Neighbourhood’: A contribution to Heideggerian social ontology”
Yan He (since 2020): “Eine Analyse der personalen Habitualität in der Phänomenologie Edmund Husserls”
Margarita Varava (2018-2026): „„Via negativa. Protest in Democracy“
Student Assistants
Matthias Heß (2021-2023)
Luis Basler (2021-2022)
Sven Thomas (2018-2021)
Julia Zaenker (2018-2021)
