Maurice Alexander Natanson (November 26, 1924 – August 16, 1996) was an American philosopher "who helped introduce the work of

Jean-Paul Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism (and phenomenology), a French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and lit ...

and

Edmund Husserl , thesis1_title = Beiträge zur Variationsrechnung (Contributions to the Calculus of Variations) , thesis1_url = https://fedora.phaidra.univie.ac.at/fedora/get/o:58535/bdef:Book/view , thesis1_year = 1883 , thesis2_title ...

in the United States". He was a student of

Alfred Schutz Alfred may refer to: Arts and entertainment *''Alfred J. Kwak'', Dutch-German-Japanese anime television series * ''Alfred'' (Arne opera), a 1740 masque by Thomas Arne * ''Alfred'' (Dvořák), an 1870 opera by Antonín Dvořák *"Alfred (Interlu ...

at the New School for Social Research and helped popularize Schutz' work from the 1960s onward. During his career he taught at the

University of Houston The University of Houston (UH) is a public research university in Houston, Texas. Founded in 1927, UH is a member of the University of Houston System and the university in Texas with over 47,000 students. Its campus, which is primarily in s ...

, the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social Research, the

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the multi-campus public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the NC School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referred to as the UNC Sy ...

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

, the

University of California at Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located on Monterey Bay, on the edge o ...

where he helped establish the

History of Consciousness History of Consciousness is the name of a department in the Humanities Division of the University of California, Santa Cruz with a 50+ year history of interdisciplinary research and student training in "established and emergent disciplines and fiel ...

graduate program. He was a visiting professor at the Pennsylvania State University and

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. A captivating speaker, Natanson delivered the inaugural Alfred Schutz Memorial Lecture, "Alfred Schutz: Philosopher and Social Scientist" (1995) and the

Aron Gurwitsch Aron Gurwitsch (russian: Аро́н Гу́рвич; 17 January 1901, Vilnius, Vilna Governorate – 25 June 1973, Zurich) was a Litvak American phenomenologist. Work Gurwitsch wrote on the relations between phenomenology and Gestalt psycholog ...

Memorial Lecture "Illusion and Irreality" (1983) at the annual meetings of the Society for Phenomenology & the Human Sciences in 1995. Natanson was born in Manhattan and raised in Brooklyn. He died from prostate cancer on August 16, 1996, at age 71.

Works

Natanson was the author of numerous works including: *''A Critique of Jean-Paul Sartre's Ontology'' (1951) *''Literature, Philosophy and the Social Sciences'' (1962) *''The Journeying Self: A Study in Philosophy and Social Role'' (1970) *''Edmund Husserl: Philosopher of Infinite Tasks'' (1973) *''Phenomenology, Role and Reason'' (1974) *''Anonymity: A Study in the Philosophy of Alfred Schutz'' (1986) *''The Erotic Bird: Phenomenology in Literature,'' (1998) and editor of ''Essays in Phenomenology'' (1966) *''Phenomenology and the Social Sciences'' (volumes 1 and 2) (1973). Natanson also edited ''The Problem of Social Reality'', volume I of the collected papers of

. The Husserl book won the National Book Award for Philosophy and Religion in 1974. A ''

Festschrift In academia, a ''Festschrift'' (; plural, ''Festschriften'' ) is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during their lifetime. It generally takes the form of an edited volume, containing contributions from the h ...

'' in honor of Natanson, ''The Prism of the Self'', published in 1995 (edited by Steven Calt Crowell), includes contributions from Fred Kersten, Lester Embree, Lewis Gordon, Thomas Luckman, Richard Zaner, Nobuo Kazashi, Michael McDuffie, Gail Weiss, and Judith Butler.

References

External links

Photographs of Maurice Natanson from the UC Santa Cruz Library's Digital Collections
1924 births 1996 deaths 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American philosophers Academics from New York (state) Deaths from cancer in California Deaths from prostate cancer People from Manhattan Phenomenologists University of California, Santa Cruz faculty University of Houston faculty University of North Carolina faculty Writers from Brooklyn Yale University faculty {{US-philosopher-stub