The body and the experience of pleasure: Phenomenological notes

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Ariela Battán Horenstein
Universidad Nacional de Córdoba

The aim of this article is to describe the experience of pleasure in the context of the phenomenology of the body and of affectivity. Taking into account the methodological obstacles in perceiving this phenomenon, the article proposes a comparison between pain and pleasure, in order to show their structural similarities and differences. The article identifies four characteristic aspects of the experiences of bodily pleasure: unitary and extended spatiality; pure physicality; disrupted intentionality; and relative intensity and duration. Following Merleau-Ponty and Zeiler, the article considers the lived body as a dedifferentiating force that eu-appears during the experience of bodily pleasure.

Keywords
phenomenology, affectivity, experience, bodily subjectivity

Article Details

How to Cite
Battán Horenstein, Ariela. “The body and the experience of pleasure: Phenomenological notes”. Enrahonar: an international journal of theoretical and practical reason, 2025, vol.VOL 75, pp. 19-39, doi:10.5565/rev/enrahonar.1656.
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

(c) Ariela Battán Horenstein, 2025

Author Biography

Ariela Battán Horenstein, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba

Ariela Battán Horenstein is an independent researcher and member of the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET), and professor at the Faculty of Philosophy and Humanities of the National University of Cordoba, Argentina. She is the director of a research group dedicated to the study of phenomenology and is a member of the international research project Fenomenología del cuerpo y experiencia de gozo (REF-PID2021-123252NB-10, Ministry of Industry, Economy and Competition, Spain). Ariela Battán Horenstein has written several scientific publications on phenomenology of the body, emotions, dance and embodied cognition. She is currently working on a research project on the phenomenological theory of the emotions in the work of Merleau-Ponty.

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