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Dr. Erik Norman Dzwiza-Ohlsen

Dr. Erik N. Dzwiza-Ohlsen studied philosophy, psychology, and theology at Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (2007–2012) and completed his PhD at Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (2013–2018), published as Horizons of the Lifeworld (Fink, 2019). After a Suhrkamp Fellowship at the German Literature Archive Marbach, he has been at the University of Cologne—at the a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities Cologne (2016–2021), and since 2022 at the Husserl Archives. He is a founding member of et al. – a Blog for Phenomenological Philosophy (2017), editor of the Schriften zur Phänomenologie und Anthropologie (since 2020), co-founder of the network Phenomenology of Dementia and Aging (since 2021), and of the research group New Medical Humanities Cologne (since 2023). His research focuses on phenomenology, psychopathology, philosophical anthropology, expression and language theory, and medical humanities. Since 2024, he leads the DFG project Situational Expressivity in Dementia: From Hexis to Deixis, since 2026 the DFG-Network Movement in Dementia: Exploring the Embodied and Embedded Mind, and is currently completing his habilitation, Philosophy of Dementia: Phenomenological, Psychopathological, and Anthropological Perspectives.

E-Mail: edzwiza[at]uni-koeln.de

Habilitation Project | Philosophy of Dementia: Phenomenological, Psychopathological, and Anthropological Perspectives

Dementia—an umbrella term for numerous age-related, chronic, progressive and incurable diseases—is among the greatest medical and societal challenges of today and the future. It challenges modern medicine and sociopolitical systems as well as fundamental human self-understandings of reason and dignity. Because dementia affects the whole person within their socio-cultural lifeworld, it requires theories that match this complexity. As a step toward inter- and transdisciplinary dementia research, this book offers a philosophical investigation of Alzheimer’s dementia, the most common form. It brings three traditions into dialogue and is structured in three parts:

  1. The first part surveys key philosophical approaches to dementia in recent decades, focusing on self and personal identity. It highlights embodied habits as a form of long-term memory that remains a crucial resource as higher cognitive functions decline.
  2. The second part develops a phenomenological psychopathology of Alzheimer’s dementia based on lived experience, analyzing the interplay of its three core symptoms: progressive loss of orientation, language, and memory. In the spirit of Jaspers’ General Psychopathology, it offers the first development of its kind, critically engaging empirical research across medicine, psychiatry, linguistics, sociology, psychology, and related fields.
  3. The third part connects prevention, therapy, and care through the lens of embodied and embedded existence, proposing two strategies: a context-specific approach that activates bodily resources in design, architecture, and gaming, and a situation-specific approach that strengthens communicative resources in face-to-face interaction.

DFG-Project | Situational Expressivity in Dementia: From Hexis to Deixis

The project advances care and therapy for people with dementia through philosophical conceptual and theoretical work. Its central question examines the potential of deixis to improve interaction and communication in dementia. It pursues three goals: 

  1. developing a taxonomy of deixis distinguishing verbal (e.g., pronouns), corporal (e.g., pointing gestures), and medial (e.g., arrows) forms;
  2. exploring therapeutic and care applications of deixis in the context of progressive loss of orientation, memory, and language; and
  3. deepening understanding of human situatedness and situated expressivity.

Over the past three decades, a rich philosophical discourse on dementia has developed around self and personal identity. Two main approaches can be distinguished: a deficit-oriented view, which emphasizes identity erosion, and a resource-oriented view, which stresses the persistence of personal identity even in advanced dementia. This project aligns with the latter, aiming to improve care and therapy. It bridges positioning theories, which analyze indexical expression in conversation, and embodiment theories, which understand habitual (Hexis) expression as embodied long-term memory.

By combining these approaches, the project addresses two key areas in dementia research. First, it highlights embodied expression in light of language decline, filling gaps in conceptual work on corporal deixis. Second, although (neo-)phenomenological research has advanced understanding of medial deixis, its application to dementia remains underexplored, despite significant potential in art, design, architecture, and technology for mitigating orientation and language loss.

In sum, the project expands deixis beyond language to include two non-verbal modes: corporal deixis, supporting face-to-face communication, and medial deixis, aiding spatial orientation. It fosters dialogue across philosophy, cognitive science, and life sciences, and aims to translate conceptual insights into practical implications for nursing and therapy as well as generate hypotheses for future empirical research.

Publications

Books

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2019): Die Horizonte der Lebenswelt: Sprachphilosophische Studien zu Husserls ‚erster Phänomenologie der Lebenswelt‘, Paderborn: Fink. ISBN: 978-3-7705-6463-7. Reviewed by
  1. C. Ferencz-Flatz (2020) in Studia Phaenomenologica 20, 398-402. DOI. 10.5840/studphaen20202022
  2. D. D`Angelo (2021) in Husserl Studies 37(3), 303-304. DOI: 10.1007/s10743-021-09294-x
  3. M. Grafigna (2021) in Phenomenological Reviews
  4. M. N. Guerrero (2021) in Investigaciones Fenomenológicas 18, 248-255, available at https://repositorio.uca.edu.ar/handle/123456789/15851

Papers in Journals

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2024): Deixis and dementia: Insights from phenomenological philosophy, in: Language Sciences 106, 101663. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2024.101663
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. & Kempermann, G. (2023): The Embodied Mind in Motion: An Interdisciplinary Perspective on the Prevention, Therapy and Care of Dementia, in: A. N. Wendt & C. Gutland (eds.), Frontiers in Psychology, Special Issue: The Challenges of Consciousness Research in Light of the Variations of Conscious Experience. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1174424.
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2022): ‘Going Home Alone’? – On Disorientation, Unfamiliarity, and Mistrust in Alzheimer’s Dementia, in: S. M. Lisco, S. Aurora & L. Tranas (eds.), Metodo, Special Issue: Familiarity and Togetherness. Available at researchgate 
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2021): Deixis – Grundzüge einer phänomenologischen Anthropologie des Zeigens, in: R. Becker, C. Bermes & D. Westerkamp (eds.), Zeitschrift für Kulturphilosophie, Belonging/Zugehörigkeit 2, 113–132. 
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2021): Dementia as Social Disorder – A Lifeworld Account, in: V. Bizzari, O. Bader, & T. Fuchs (eds.), Phenomenology and Mind, Special Issue: Phenomenology of Social Impairments 21, 74–87. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17454/pam-2106.
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2021): Verloren sein – Der Verlust der lebensweltlichen Orientierung in der Alzheimer-Demenz aus phänomenologisch-psychopathologischer Sicht, in: Inter Cultural Philosophy, Journal for Philosophy in its Cultural Context. DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/icp.2021.1.84400.

Papers in Edited Volumes

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2025): Feeling Home in Habits? On Embodiment, Narrativity, and Affectivity in Dementia, in: H. G. Melchiar, P. Schmidt-Boddy, T. Fuchs, & C. Tewes (eds.), Phenomenology of Emotion: Embodiment and Vulnerability. Perspectives from Philosophy, Psychopathology, and Psychotherapy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Matiashvili, L. & Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2025): Phenomenology of Acoustic Deixis: Signs of a Transformed Lifeworld in Disability, in: E. N. Dzwiza-Ohlsen (ed.), Deixis – Zeigen – Pointing. Ansätze zu einer phänomenologischen Anthropologie. Darmstadt: WBG.
  • Winniewski, R., Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E.N. (2024). The Lived Body in E-motion: A Transdisciplinary Approach to Dementia Diseases, in: Brencio, F. (eds) Phenomenology, Neuroscience and Clinical Practice. Contributions to Phenomenology 131. Berlin: Springer. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-66264-5_10
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2023): Positionierung & Orientierung: Über die Vulnerabilität von Sprache und Leib in der Alzheimer-Demenz, in: C. Tewes (ed.), Leiblichkeit und Verletzlichkeit: Ihre Bedeutung für Demenzerkrankungen und Personalität.
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2022): Stay in Touch! – Phänomenologische Überlegungen zum Einsatz von Robotik und KI in der Pflege bei demenziellen Erkrankungen am Beispiel von PARO, in: L. Nehlsen & M. W. Schnell (eds.), Begegnungen mit künstlicher Intelligenz: Intersubjektivität, Technik, Lebenswelt. Weilerwist: Velbrück Wissenschaft. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748934493-220
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2021): Zwischen Erlebnis und Ausdruck. Zur Möglichkeit einer phänomenologischen Psychopathologie am Beispiel der Demenzerkrankung, in: F. Neufeld, C. Pasqualin, A. K. Rønhede & S. Wu (eds.), Leben in lebendigen Fragen. Im Spannungsverhältnis zwischen Geisteswissenschaften. Freiburg/München: Karl Alber. Available at Nomos
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2021): Verstummter Geist, verstummtes Leben? – Zur therapeutischen Bedeutung lebensweltlichen Ausdrucks bei Alzheimer, in: B. Schellhammer (ed.), Zwischen Phänomenologie und Psychoanalyse. Im interdisziplinären Gespräch mit Bernhard Waldenfels. Baden-Baden: Nomos. DOI:https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748909330-181
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, Erik Norman (2021): A Lifeworld Account of Personal Identity, in: C. Tewes & G. Stanghellini (eds.), Time and Body: Phenomenological and Psychopathological Approaches, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Dzwiza, E. N. (2018): The Situationality of the Lifeworld. Reflections on Key Terms Concerning Human-Animal Relations, in: T. Breyer & T. Widlok (eds.), The Situationality of Human-Animal Relations. Perspectives from Anthropology and Philosophy. Bielefeld: Transcript. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839441077-002

Editorships

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (Hg.; 2025): Deixis – Zeigen – Pointing. Ansätze zu einer phänomenologischen Anthropologie, in: T. Breyer (ed.), Schriften zur Phänomenologie und Anthropologie, Volume 7, Darmstadt: WBG. Open Access PDF-Link: https://www.herder.de/wissen/shop/p8/93785-deixis-zeigen-pointing-open-access-pdf/
  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. & Speer, A. (ed.; 2021): Philosophical Anthropology as an Interdisciplinary Praxis: Historical and Systematical Perspectives, Paderborn: Mentis.

Articles in Encyclopedias and Manuals

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (expected 2026): ‚Sichtbarkeit‘; ‚Distanz‘; ‚Licht‘; ‚Phänomenologie‘, in: O. Müller & R. Zill (Hg.), Blumenberg-Handbuch. Leben – Werk – Wirkung, Stuttgart: Metzler.
  • Breyer, T. & Dzwiza, E. N. (2019): Phänomenologie. Leibliche Fundierung und lebensweltliche Artikulation des praktischen Selbst- und Weltbezugs, in: T. Bedorf & S. Gerlek (Hg.), Philosophien der Praxis: ein Handbuch, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.

Peer Reviews

  • Dzwiza-Ohlsen, E. N. (2019): Hans Blumenberg. Phänomenologische Schriften. 1981–1988, in: Studia Phaenomenologica 19, On Conflict and Violence, Zeta Books: Bucharest.
  • Dzwiza, E. N. (2018): A. Arudpragasam, The Story of a Brief Marriage, auf: et. al – ein Blog für Phänomenologische Philosophie.

Translations

  • Dzwiza, E. N. (2020), Zeno van Duppen, Selbst- und Intersubjektivitätsstörungen in der Schizophrenie, in: T. Breyer & T. Fuchs (ed.), Selbst und Selbststörungen, Schriftenreihe der DGAP, Volume 8, Freiburg/München: Karl Alber.

Videos

Projects

DFG-Project | Situational Expressivity in Dementia: From Hexis to Deixis

The project explores how different forms of “pointing” (deixis) — verbal, bodily, and media-based — can improve communication and care practices for people with dementia through philosophical analysis.

DFG-Network | Movement in Dementia: Exploring the Embodied and Embedded Mind

MOVIDEM is an interdisciplinary research network dedicated to rethinking dementia through a movement-based framework. As dementia remains one of the greatest global societal challenges with no current cure, the network addresses the urgent need for holistic, non-pharmacological perspectives that move beyond traditional brain-centered paradigms.

Cologne Lecture Series in New Medical Humanities

The lecture series brings together interdisciplinary perspectives to explore how philosophical approaches can inform and enrich practices of care, particularly in the context of dementia.

Transdisciplinary Approaches to Dementia and Aging

This lecture series explores dementia through inter- and transdisciplinary lenses, focusing on the lived experience of socially and culturally situated individuals in order to bridge theory and practice beyond a purely biomedical perspective.