ArticleSocial practices fromthe viewpoint of trans-subjective existentialismDimitri GinevUniversity of Konstanz, GermanyAbstractThe principal aim of this article is to examine the capacity of existential analytic to suggestalternatives toentrencheddichotomies anddilemmas inpracticetheory, andmoregenerally, in social theory. In this regard, the doctrine of trans-subjective existentialismis developed. The underlying aim is to inform hermeneutic engagement with social prac-tices potentiality-for-being in order to illuminate a possible existential ontology of prac-tices. Itisarguedthattheconceptof chronotopeshouldbecentral inthisontology.Thus, thepossibilityof hermeneuticrealismabout social practicesbecomesopentoscrutiny.Keywordscharacteristichermeneuticsituation, practical appropriationofpossibilities, projectionof horizon, trans-subjective existentialismPractices and possibilitiesThequestionofhowtosituatepracticetheoryinthegeneraltypologicalspaceofthesocial theorys versions continues to be at stake in recent epistemological and methodo-logical debates. Thesedebates werefueled, inparticular, bytheattempts todrawademarcationlinebetweenepistemologicallyclassicalversionsandpost-Cartesianver-sions of social theory. Thus, Andreas Reckwitz (2002) made the case on the pages of thisjournal that practice theory belongs together with cultural mentalism, intersubjectivism,and textualism to a family of theorys versions that are to be distinguished from classicalCorresponding author:Dimitri Ginev, Zukunftskolleg, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany.Email: dimiginev@yahoo.comEuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory2014, Vol 17(1)7794 TheAuthor(s)2013Reprintsandpermission:sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.navDOI: 10.1177/1368431013505013est.sagepub.commodern versions of social theory associated with the idealizations of homo economicusandhomosociologicus. What unites thefour versions of this family(makingthem,according to Reckwitz, variants of cultural theory) is their persistent calling into ques-tionof theCartesianassumptions of classical social theory. Approachingdiscursiveformations, unravelingunconsciousstructures, andreconstructingcognitive-symbolicorders are devices that revise significantly traditional Cartesian assumptions.Structuralist-semioticmentalism, discursiveintersubjectivism, andsocial-constructivisttextualism have come to prominence with revisions of this kind. In contrast to the otherthree versions,however, practice theory (especially its variants basedon hermeneuticphenomenology) not only challenges traditional assumptions and distinctions, trying torecast themintermsofanon-subjectivist andnon-representationalist epistemology.It aims rather at undoing the modern methodological and epistemological dichotomiesinaradicalmanner.Practicetheoryisneitheramentalistnorananti-mentalistenter-prise since it deals withthe constitutionof meaningwithin-the-world-of-practiceswhich precedes and fore-structures the formation of the opposition between mental andnon-mental. Furthermore, the variants of this theory based on hermeneutic phenomen-ologyareneithersubjectivistnoranti-subjectivist,buttrans-subjectivist.ItisthelastclaimthatIamgoingtoaddressinwhatfollows.Practicesaresomethingmore thansociallyrecognizedformsof activity. Bythesame token, a particular practice is something more than a normatively organized con-duct to which the members of a certain collective conform. The growing diversificationof theories of practice(s)in the past two decades was prompted in the first place by theattempts to answer the question of what this something more should be. On the predo-minant way of addressing this question, the answer must be sought in practices intrinsicresources togovern(inareflexivemanner) their ownproductionandreproduction.(Reflectingontheseresourcesprovides,supposedly,thepointofdepartureinthecon-struction of a theory of practices.) What lies beyond the scope of the essentialist theoriesof practices is not a residuum that remains after carrying out a procedural objectificationofpracticesasnormativelyorganizedformsofactivity.1Beyondthisscopeonefindsrather the negative partner of what is positively given in the empirical domains of theessentialisttheoriesofpractices.The aim of this article is to approach the reality of social practices which exceeds allobjectivist identification of them. It is a reality that I will try to make intelligible in termsof a hermeneutic theory that takes up and reformulates themes of existential analytic. Onthisaccount,thepositivityofpractice-theoreticalknowledgeistheonticoutcomeofthe thematic approaches to practices operating with firm epistemological criteria of iden-tification,whilethenegativity(theconstitutivenothingnesswithinthepositiveexpe-rience) iswhat constantlytranscendstheonticoutcome. (Astheworldhoodoftheworld has an ontological preponderance with regard to the world as thematically objec-tified reality, the interrelatedness of practices has an ontological priority over each par-ticular, objectivelyidentifiable, practice. Apractice is localizedalways against theinterpretativebackgroundofinterrelatedpractices.)As a first step in approaching the transcending reality of practices I will pay attentionto a conclusion drawn by many authors who otherwise defend quite different positions:Practices are enacted by actors but the phenomenon of shared interrelatedness of78 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)practicesisnot tobeaccountedforbyonlyhavingrecoursetothenetworkofthoseactors who share them. It deserves mention that in arriving at this conclusion, one is notobliged to admit that something extrinsic to the interrelatedness of practices (somethinglikeacultural pattern, backgroundknowledge, actors individual andcollectivetacitknowledge,andsoon)hastobeaddedtogiveanaccountofthephenomenon.Interre-lated practices project possibilities whose appropriation and actualization constitute thecollective (inter-subjectively attained) identity of those who are in the practices partic-ular interrelatedness. Since the appropriation of possibilities is potentially never-ending,suchanidentityisalwaysunderconstruction.Onthisaccount,actorsshareaparticularinterrelatedness(nexus)ofpracticeswhentheygainacollectiveunderstandingofthemselveswithregardtothepossibilitiestheycan (collectively) appropriate. (Thus considered, understanding has nothing to do witha competence that is not explicitly articulated.2It is also not a cognitive ability acquiredgradually and necessary for learning practices. Learning takes place ineluctably in a hor-izon of understanding, and for that reason, it assumes a kind of understanding that is notinculcated in its own process.3) In a slightly more sophisticated formulation, a particularinterrelatedness of practices projects its web of meanings upon possibilities. This projec-tion does not amount to a kind of collective intentionality since it does not stem frompractitionerscollectivementality. Grantedthat contextual interrelationsamongprac-ticesgeneratemeaningfulpossibilitiesofhowonecomportsoneselfinthatcontext, itoughttobearguedthattheprojectionofmeaningsuponpossibilitiescomesintobeingthrough practices co-referentiality. Accordingly, those who share the interrelated prac-ticeshaveacollectivemodeofexistencethatistowardsthepossibilitiesprojectedbythesepractices. Put inanequivalent formulation, acollective(group)ofactorsshareinterrelated practices when they articulate that web of meanings which the interrelated-ness projects upon possibilities. It is the appropriation of these possibilities that warrantsthe ongoing construction of a collective identity. Appropriating (and actualizing) possi-bilitiesare,onthisaccount,tantamounttotheconstitutionofmeaning.Tosumup,thephenomenon of shared interrelatedness of practices is within an (existential) constella-tion together with the phenomena of ongoing construction of collective identity, projec-tionand appropriationof possibilities, and constitutionof meaning. The foregoingconsiderationsopposeestablishedaccountsoftherelationshipbetween(therealityof)practicesandpractitionersdispositions,normativeattitudes,andformsofinteraction.Practice theory between essentialism and reductionistnaturalismThe most prominent (and most traditional) account of this relationship attributes causalpower to shared orchestrated practices, and admits furthermore that each particular prac-tice exists per se as an entity in itself (or, as an irreducible social fact a` la Durkheim).At the same time, the very orchestration of interrelated practices imposes constraints ontheparticularpracticesperformances.Thus,whilebeingconstantlyregulatedbyprac-tices with which it is interrelated, a practice exercises (separately or in concert with otherpractices) causal power on an individual form of life (by shaping, for instance, some kindofindividualspreferences).TheexistenceofpracticesisaccountedforbythestrangeGinev 79combinationof physical causalityand social regularity.Onthis approach,practicesarequasi-physical entities inhabiting the normative social world. A case in point is MauriceHalbwachss approach to collective memory. The constraints imposed on the agents bythe actual social order dictate how the collective recollection of the past should work. Itis the social order (as designed by orchestrated practices) that picks out the pertinent pastevents which the agents (the practices performers) should keep in their collective mem-ory. The existing social order obligates on a regular basis the agents not just to reproduceinthought previouseventsbut alsotoshortenthem, ortocompletethemsothat theagentsgivethemaprestigethatrealitydidnotpossess(Halbwachs,1992:51)Inthisregard, the existing social order manages to institute special practices of keeping eventsin collective memory. The framework of collective memory is circumscribed by thesemnemonicpractices.Eachofthemcausesinacertainwaythatrhythmofrecollecting(andforgetting) whichcharacterizes theindividual memoryof aparticular member.Halbwachsstates,accordingly,thatthereisnoindividualmemorythatisnotapartoran aspect of collective memory, and the framework of collective memory confines andbinds our most intimate remembrances to each other (Halbwachs, 1992: 53). Forinstance, the periodic re-activation of a ritual practice activates past events whereby there-activation shapes causally aspects of individual memory. And collective memory (inits capacity to pick out past events whose recollection is instrumental in maintaining theexistingorder)isconstrainedbythepracticescircumscribingitsframework.The extreme opposite of the causal-regulative account of practices rejects any autonomyof practices existence. Habits and habituation (defined in terms of individual behavior) aretheonly realphenomena.Practices withoutinter-subjectivesharingareindividualhabits(Turner, 2001: 129). Furthermore, the only acceptable construal of practices is as psycholo-gically generated patterns of behavior (Turner, 1994: 117). Why habituation provokes theillusory existence of inter-subjectively shared practices as particular social entities is a ques-tionthathastoberelegatedtosocialpsychology.Fromthis(presumablyradicallyanti-essentialist) perspective, what is repudiated is not only holistic social ontologies but also thetheories of social practices which admit that practices are grounded upon a tacit rule book.Within the framework of a social theory that does not permit hypostatized entities endowedwith causal power, practices are to be recast in terms of clusters of individual habits.It is mycontentionthat agenuineovercomingof essentialisminpracticetheorywouldnotamounttoreducingpracticestohabitssincesuchareductioncannotavoid,for instance, the postulation of cognitive-psychological essences and/or the hypostatiza-tion of a teleonomic reality of synchronized habits. An initial step in this overcomingconsistsinconfrontingin aproper mannerthedualnatureofpractices:Practicesareatonce thematic entities (in particular, empirical objects of inquiry) and, in their interrelat-edness, horizons in which the reality of socio-cultural entities (rules, social roles, norma-tive statuses, networks of interaction, etc.) becomes disclosed. My suggestion of how tocopewiththedualnatureofpracticesappliesthefollowingmethodologicaltenet:Anunavoidabledimensionintheconstructionofareflexivetheoryofpracticesamountstotheorizing(intermsofthesamereflexivetheorywhichisintended)thosepracticesof inquiry by virtue of which (all kinds of) practices are constituted as objects of inquiry.In my view, this tenet expresses the underlying methodological hermeneutic circle in theconstructionofareflexivetheoryofpractice.80 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)Thediversityofpracticetheoriesliesbetweentheextremepolesofthehypostatiza-tion of shared practices as primary social entities endowed with causal power (the posi-tion of radical essentialism about practices) and the undoing of practices as autonomousentities (the alleged position of radical anti-essentialism). Between these two poles thereisawidespectrumofpositions.Allofthemtrytogetridoftheholism-psychologismdilemmabysinglingoutmediatoryobjects. Acaseinpointisthecollectiveroutineactivitieswhichceasetoberoutineattheindividuallevelasthishybridobjectissug-gestedbyBarryBarnes(2001).Primafaciethemostprominent(andmostsuccessful)in-betweenpositionisthatofBourdieuwhopresumablyattributestohabitusthestatusofamediatoryobject. Theconcept ofhabitusdefinedasdurablyinstalledgenerativeprinciples of regulated improvisations avoids the pitfalls of both objectivist hypostatiza-tion and psychological reductionism. The habitus is something trans-subjective that doesnot have existence per se. In fact, Bourdieus position is not an in-between position at all.Histhirdway(notbetweenbutbeyond)objectivismandsubjectivismispavedbythesearchforagenuineanti-essentialism. It isnot theempiricist eliminationofdubioussocial entities (such as collective tacit knowledge, shared practices or Weltanschauung)thatleadstoovercomingessentialism. InBourdieusview, theovercomingrequiresaworking out of the dialectical relations between the structures revealed by virtue of the-oretical (inparticular, structuralist)idealizationsandthestructureddispositions(i.e.thedispositionsofthehabitus)withinwhichthosestructuresareconstituted.Following the idea that habitus is a trans-subjective manifestation of agents structureddispositionsthat arefore-structuringsociallyestablishedstructures, Bourdieucountersstructuralanthropology(andotherapproaches succumbedto logicism)for theiraspira-tiontoencloseinconceptspractical logic that is madetodispensewith(externallyimposed) concepts, thereby reducing practices to logical operations. Scientific objectifica-tion based on theoretical idealizations cannot gasp the principles of practical logic with-out changing the nature of those principles. The concept of habitus implies that a practiceowesitspractical coherencetothefact thatitistheoutcomeofconceptual systemsimmanent inpractice.Takinginto considerationthecontextual-situationalsensitivityofthehabitus prevents onefromreifyingpractices. Thedialecticof objectificationandembodiment of practices rests on the capacity of the habitus to improvise by combiningformulas. The habitus governs practice through its endless capacity to engender thoughts,perceptions, expressions, actions whose limits are set by the historically and socially situ-ated conditionsof its production (Bourdieu,1977: 95).All symbolic systems (includingthe systems of theorizing) owe their practical coherence to the fact that they are productsof practices which cannot be performed unless they bring into play principles that can beimmediately mastered. Bourdieu calls this theorem the economy of practical logic. All oftheclaimsjustmentioneddemonstratehowtrueanti-essentialismandatrans-subjectiveview aboutpractices complementeach other.The approach adopted in this article is also trans-subjective and anti-essentialist. Yetit is not a sociological but a hermeneutic approach. At issue are not the generative prin-ciples, whichasintrinsictopracticesensure(quapracticallogic)theresilienceofthesocial structures arising out of these practices. Practices will be discussed in the remain-der of thearticlewithregardtotheir potentiality-for-being, i.e. their potentialityforarticulatingdomainsofmeaningfulobjects. InlinewiththisengagementtheconceptsGinev 81of the horizon of possibilities and the hermeneutic fore-structure of a domains articula-tionoccupyinmyapproachtopracticesaplacesimilartothatofhabitusinthesocio-logicaltheoryofpractice.Theorizing practices from a radically anti-essentialist standpoint leads not to pragma-tism, instrumentalism, orconventionalism, but toapositionthat Ishouldliketodubtrans-subjectiveexistentialism. Theunderlyingformulaofthelattercanbeexpressedaseschewingthereificationofholisticsocialentitiesandthehypostatizationofsocialstructures, whilecombatinganykindofreductionist naturalism. At stakeinthiskindof existentialismare(individual or collective) choicesof possibilitieswithinatrans-subjectivehorizonof possibilities projectedbyaninterrelatedness of practices. Thehorizonalwaysalreadytranscendsthatsubjectivity(i.e.subjectivementality,cognitiveattitudes, volitional dispositions, narratively organized memory, emotionality, etc.)which is liable to choices that are made or can be made. Trans-subjectivity connotes thetranscendence of subjectivity which accompanies the individual choices within thecollectiveappropriationofpossibilities.4Trans-subjective existentialismsounds like an oxymoron. To be sure, practice the-ory involves concepts that sublatethe conceptsof the individual agent and individualchoices. Practicetheoryisaboutarealityinwhichindividualchoicesaresecondaryandderivable. Butthistheoryisnotaboutsomethingthatdeterminesthesechoices.Practicetheorystressesthat thechoosingindividualsareagentsinastateofsituatedtranscendencethey are constantly creating their situations by choosing and appropriat-ingpossibilitiesthatintheiropennessandinexhaustibilityalwaystranscendeachsitu-ated choice and appropriation. In laying emphasis on the figure of situatedtranscendenceofagents-within-interrelated-practices, practicetheory(tacitlyorexpli-citly)admitsapracticalsubjectwhose statusisakinto thedualstatusofHeideggersDasein.5Accordingly, practice theory reproduces in new conceptual frameworks figuresofthatexistentialismwhichispeculiartoexistentialanalytic.To sum up, there is no incompatibility (not to speak of contradiction) betweenprac-tice theory and existentialism since all individual choices (including the decisive choicethat marks the transition from inauthentic to authentic existence) take place within prac-tices. Makingindividual choiceswithinatrans-subjectivehorizonthat transcendstheindividual subjectivity does not amount to presenting the choosing process as determinedby a transcendent essence. Projection and appropriation of possibilities by practices arein a relation of mutual reinforcement on the level of trans-subjectivity. In the upcomingconsiderationsIwilldevelopthisthesisintwosteps,eachofwhichisrelatedtoapar-ticular definition of configured practices. (Let me stress again that from the viewpoint ofhermeneuticphenomenologythenotionofinterrelatedpracticeshaspriorityoverthenotionofpractice.)DefinitionI: Atendencytoprojectionandappropriationof definite possibilitieswithinatrans-subjectivehorizonofpossibilitiesisaconfigurationofpracticesiftheactualization of the appropriated possibilities leads to a temporal-spatial order of doingsand sayings. With regard to the clusters of doings and sayings one can post hoc single outwithin this order, so there can be formulated empirically relevant criteria for distinguish-ingparticularpracticesintheconfiguration. Theunderlyingassumptionisthat everyclusterrepresentsarelativelyautonomouspractice.82 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)The expression tendency to projection and appropriation has the character of a tech-nicalterminDefinitionI.Thetendencyisnotateleologicalchainofactualizedpossi-bilities. It refers to a regime of temporalization as it is informed by the way ofchoosing possibilities within a horizon that constantly transcends and situates the choos-ing agents. A tendency is an established regime of temporalization within routinely per-formed, interrelated practices.6Through the choice which is fore-structured by aprojected horizon, one unveils the past (i.e., what has been with regard to the possibilitiesthat can be appropriated) by means of opening the future, thereby making the present anactualizedpossibility. Aregimeof temporalizationis theongoingdifferentiationoftemporal modes within interrelated practices that at once project and appropriatepossibilities.7Put differently, a tendency is the ongoing fore-structuring of the practicalbeing-in-the-worldbythepotentialfuture(thepossibilitiesthatareopentobeappro-priated). On this reading, a tendency to projection and appropriation of possibilities is nota hidden (or transcendent) teleological essence of interrelated practices. It does not exter-nallyandcausallydeterminethechoicesinceitcomesintobeingthroughthechoice.Thereisinterpretativeinterplaybetweentendentious(temporalizing) fore-structuringof choicesandactual individual choices. (I sayinterpretative becausetheinterplaytakeson theform of an unfoldinghermeneutic circle.The mutual interpretativedepen-dencewithinthiscircledefinesa characteristichermeneuticsituationofprojectionandappropriation of possibilities.) Against the background of this interplay, a tendency is theongoing situatedtranscendenceof agents-within-practicesthatdifferentiatespast,pres-ent, and future. Thus considered, the tendency is an existential phenomenon that charac-terizestheconstitutionofmeaningandthemeaningfularticulationoftheworld.DefinitionI does not appeal to the practices performers. It assumes that practicesarecollective accomplishments but not in the sense of being enacted and performed by orga-nizedcollectivesentitledtoexecutethem. Practicesarecollectivelysharedbecausethetrans-subjectiveprojectionandappropriationofpossibilitiesconstantlyconstitutemoreorlesssustainablecollectiveswhosetendenciesofchoosingbringpracticestothefore.Collectives are entities constituted within-the-world-of-possibilities. They are not creatorsanddesigners of practices. Apracticecomes totheforesotheargument of trans-subjectiveexistentialismgoesonlybymeans of choicesthatareshared withinatrans-subjective horizon. The latter, however, is projected not by practitioners collective men-tality but by that interrelatedness of practices in which the particular practice is involved.Byimplication, sharedpracticescannot beaccountedfor simplyintermsof theaccomplishments of competent members of collectives (Barnes, 2001: 32). Trans-subjective existentialism is a conception that overcomes social theorys dilemma whosehornsarethehyperboleof theindividualchoicesandthestrong determinationofthesechoiceswhichmakesthesocial actorsjudgmental dopes(touseHaroldGarfinkelscelebratedexpressionarisingfromhiscriticismofconventionalsociology).Thesocialactors are neither determined by structures and norms, nor are they absolutely free. Theyarechoosingactorswithinthehorizonsofpossibilitiesthat arealwaysalreadypro-jectedbychangingconfigurations of practices inwhichtheactors arethrown andimplicated.A preliminary rationale for Definition I is provided by examples of horizons that areprimarily related only to practices whose performances are not accomplished by clearlyGinev 83delineatedcollectivesubjects. Amongtheseexamplesarethehorizonof aculturalmilieu embracing heterogeneous agencies, the horizon of a big citys everydayness, thehorizon of a large-scale historical situation (as described in historical anthropology or byAnnales School of historiography), and the horizon of a region distinguished by a char-acteristictypeofculturebutwithlooselydefined(geographical,politicalandadminis-trative) borders. By contrast, the horizon of a tradition as an evolving collective form oflife, the horizon of a spatially located professional everydayness, or the horizons of prac-tices performed by various types of (formal and non-formal) social networks are exam-plesofhorizonsinwhichthecollectivesubjectisclearlyidentifiable. Intheformerseries of examples, the projection and the appropriation of horizons of possibilities entailthe figure of a heterogeneous trans-subjectivity as contrasted to the homogeneous trans-subjectivity exemplified by the second series. Yet the identification of a collective sub-ject is not tantamount to a (sociological) identification (i.e., identification by means ofstandardsociological criteria)ofaconcretecollective. Howeverstrongthedegreeofhomogeneity could be, trans-subjectivity resists procedural recognition through such cri-teria. Regardlessofwhetheritishomogeneousorheterogeneous, trans-subjectivityisnot a sociological but an ontological characteristic of the ways in which possibilities areprojected and appropriated. The collective subjects as synonymous with homogeneoustrans-subjectivity are also to be identified with regard to the possibilities they appropriateandnotwiththesocialstructuresinwhichtheyreside.Accordingly,trans-subjectivitymay or may not refer to collective subjects. But trans-subjectivity is by all means irre-ducibletotheinter-subjectivityoftheconcrete(empiricallyidentified)collectives. Atthe same time, the projection of a trans-subjective horizon of possibilities is a necessaryconditionfortheformationofanetworkofinter-subjectiverelationsthattakesontheform of an organized collective distinguished usually by rules, role allocations, schemesof interaction, patterns of power distribution and the rest of the inter-subjective compo-nentsstudiedbytheoreticalsociologyandsocialpsychology.DefinitionII:Aconfigurationofpracticesistheminimal(temporalized)sitewithintheworld (asa transcendinghorizonof all modes of existence)wheretheconstellationof interpretative understanding, attunement (state-of-mind) and discourse takes place. (Iwilllaterdiscussthenotionofatemporalizedsite.Forthemoment,letmeonlynotethat the latter results from an elaboration on the notion of a tendency of projection andappropriationofpossibilities fromDefinitionI.)Thenewdefinitioncanstandasanepigraphfor theapproachI amadvocating. Followingthetenetsof aversionof theexistentialanalytic, identifyingsuchaconstellationamountstoidentifyingamodeofbeing-in-the-world. Thusdefined, practicecanbeconceivedofasaunit. Yetitisnotanindependentanddiscreteunit.Aparticularpracticeisalwayscircumscribedwithinaconfigurationofinterrelatedpractices.Thisisafurtherspecificationoftheargumentfor the claim that a particular practice is always (ontologically) secondary with regard totheprimacyoftheinterrelatednessofpractices.Aparticularconfigurationofpractices(say, theconfigurationofexperimental, instrumental, andformal-theoretical practicesin a situation of normal scientific research) in its turn is only a moment of the continuousstreamofchangingconfigurationstakingplacewithinamodeofbeing-in-the-world.Nonetheless, practiceshouldbeconceivedof as a(non-discrete) unit of anintegralhermeneuticcirclethattemporalizesapracticalmodeofbeing-in-the-world.884 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)Trans-subjective existentialism and the ontological concept ofthe chronotopeTo introduce a further methodological tenet of trans-subjective existentialism, I have toexplicatemyambivalentattitudetowardstheinfluentialandhighlyelaboratedpracticetheory of Theodore Schatzki. The way in which Schatzki sets the agenda by outlining apractice-theoreticalontology is impressive.The inventivedevelopment of a new orien-tationto establishedproblemsandtopicsin thesocialsciencesishardlyto beunderes-timated. Placing emphasis on the nexus between site as practices spatiality and situatedaccomplishments of practitioners, Schatzki manages to emancipate practice theory fromseveral other approaches to social theory. Now, my unease with his theory is elicited bytheideaofdiscretenessthatunderliesthetheory. WhenSchatzkiraisestheclaimthatpracticesareorganizedopensetsofdoingsandsayings,headmitsthatpracticescom-prisediscursiveandnon-discursiveacts (or,bundledactivities).The pointin this for-mulationisthat practicescomprisesomething, andhence, theyhavespatial borders.Eachparticular practiceisaccordinglylocalizableandseparable. Becauseheiscon-cerned with the physical-spatial identification of practices, Schatzki is compelled to treatthe doings and sayings (as practices components) in terms of bodily actions that peopledirectly perform. Practices are delineated social entities, each of them representing a spa-tially organized nexus of actions. Practices are integral blocks (Schatzki, 2002: 71). Indelineating practices in this way, his primary intention is to stress a thematic rationale fora theoretical approachthat operationallycancompose anddecompose the contentsattributedtotheconceptsofpractices,arrangementsofpracticesandorders.Formallyseen, thepurviewof practicetheoryiscircumscribedbypossibleoperationsdefinedinsetsofdiscreteelements.9There is a kind of (in my words) hidden principle of concatenation that governs theconstruction of practice theory. The way of making sense of practices from a theoreticalviewpointlookslike analgorithmicconcatenationof classesofdiscreteelements.(Notby accident the frequent use of metaphors such as assemblages, aggregated doings, bun-dles, nets, and confederations is typical of Schatzkis language.) At each stage of conca-tenationoneconfrontsanemergingdiscreteobject (intherealityofpractices)whoseexplanation compels one to add a new class of discrete entities. (Of course, the numberof stages is final, and accordingly, one admits that there is an ultimate stage at which onegetspresumablyasemanticallycompletetheoryofpractices.)Examplesofemergingobjectsareintegral activitybundles, practical understandings, practical intelligibility,rules regulating arrangements, rules determining the course of actions involved in prac-tices, andteleo-affectivestructures(organizedsetsof ends, projectsandaffectivitiesunevenlyincorporatedinpractitionersmentalityandemotionalattitudes).10Oneshouldnot overlook, however, that theprincipleof concatenationof discreteunitsoperateswithinaworldthatisunderstoodandinterpreted,i.e.aworldprojectedupon possibilities whose ongoing appropriation articulates what is within-the-world. Themutualreinforcementofprojectionandappropriationisacontinuitythattemporalizes(i.e., serves the function of a horizon of temporalizing) all doings and sayingswithin-the-world. Apracticetheoryhastogiveanaccount ofhowthecontinuityofpractices streamis(under definitecircumstances) transformed(without ceasingtoGinev 85beahorizonal-temporalizingcontinuity)intoempiricallyidentifiable, spatiallyloca-lizableandseparablepractices(whereforeachofthematanymomentacleardiffer-entiation of past, present and future is possible). Yet by addressing this transformation,oneobligatorilyintegratesontological differenceinthestructureofpracticetheory.Thephenomenologicalanalysisofcontinuity(notasathematicallyobjectifiablepro-cess of becoming, but as horizon), which demands for its accomplishment the ontolo-gicaldifference,isthemissingaspectinSchatzkisversionofpracticetheory.Sincepractice theory cannot escape the task of handling the problematic of meaning consti-tutionsothe argument goesit has toadopt a phenomenological frameworktoaddressthisproblematic.Itistheintegrationoftheontologicaldifferenceinpracticetheory that harmonizes the interplay of empirical (ontic) and phenomenological (onto-logical) dimensionsintheorysstructure.Inmyview,these aredimensionsthat com-plementeachotherandnotsubordinatedlevelsoftheorizing.Now, thetranscendenceoftheworldiswhat makesthevaryingconfigurationsofpractices abattery of a continuous constitutionof meaning. Inthe perspective oftrans-subjectiveexistentialism,thecontinuousconstitutionofmeaningisthepractical-meaningful articulation of what is ready to hand within the world. By taking thetranscendenceof theworldintoconsideration, onedisplacestheideaof discretenessinatwofoldmanner.First,oneaffirmsthateachwebofmeaningsenclosedinalocalspacebelongstotheworldsuniversalwebofmeaningswhichisalwaysinastateofongoingformation. (It shouldbe emphasized, however, that the universalityof theworldswebofmeanings, orthetotalityofsignificanceinHeideggerssense, istobe understood as a horizonal potentiality and not as a thematic givenness [Gegebenheit].)Second, onecomestotheconclusionthat thesemanticdefinitenessanddeterminacy(regardless of how strongly it is codified with regard to a class of rules of semantic inter-pretation)isindispensablysubordinatedtothehermeneutic-horizonal opennessoftheworldofpracticalexistence.Theworlddoesnottranscendinaninvariantfashionfor-ever. Ineachparticularsetting, situation, context, configuration, theworldtranscendsinaspecificmannerbydisclosinganopenhorizonofpossibilities. Theleewayofthepossibilities that can be appropriated in this context (setting, configuration) is finite, buttheprocessisinfinite. Thisiswhythehorizonisatoncedistinguishedbysituational-contextual finitudeandinexhaustibleness (infinity). Byimplication, theinvolvementof the transcendence of the world in the construction of the ontology of situated trans-cendence requires a clear demarcation between semantic and hermeneutic interpretationtobedrawn. Furthermore, theonlywayof addressingthedualityoftheworld(asahorizon-transcendence and a multiplicity of practical contexts) is through entering thehermeneuticcircularityoftheworldsinterpretativearticulation.Despitethiscriticism, however, inanimportant respect IamfollowingSchatzkislead. Inunveilingthereification(ofeitherabstractornominalistentities)asthesamemistakewhichholisticandindividualistapproachestosocialtheorycommit, SchatzkiadumbratesakindofsiteontologyofpracticeswhosespiritIcompletelyadhereto.Insocial theory, a rationale for a commitment to site ontology is the observation that prac-tices(beingalwayscontextualized)constitutethesiteofthesocial.Thus,thesocialisalways identified with some site. Schatzki is throughout correct in arguing that the notionof sitehas no placein the individualist and holistic ontologies of the social. At issuein86 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)site ontologies is the sense of embedded situatedness articulated in the notion of spati-ality. Treating practices as situated integral nexuses of activity helps one to forge a sce-nariotoavoidthemistakeofreification.Onlybydeprivingactivityofitssituatedness(andintrinsictemporality/spatiality),canonereifyit.Thestructuralistformalcodifica-tion of mental structures that supposedly govern types of social activity is a case in point.Site is the situatedness of practices in the process of their reproduction that involves rear-rangementsofpracticescomponents.Putmoreconcretely, site(typicallyexemplifiedbyBourdieuspractice-fieldcom-pound) is situatedness that enacts such a reproduction. As a corollary, site is the contex-tuallysituatedreproductionofpractices,wherepracticesidentitiesareinherentinthatreproduction, and are not externally imposed by practitioners.11The concept of site alsoconnotesthepeculiarspatialityconstitutedbypracticesoperatinginconcert.(Thisisadynamic spatiality in the sense that practices make room for social entities by entan-gling them with a regime of temporalizing of spatial relations.) Roughly, the task of siteontology is to approach the social as being constituted by the unity of practices contex-tual situatedness and practices creation of spatiality. Schatzki tends to the view that con-textualized practices are a clearing or disclosing (in Heideggerian sense) spaces (localstructures of existential spatiality) inwhichthesocial exists. Scrutinizingdisclosedspacesin termsof siteontology laysbare atthesametimeindividual formsof lifethathang together through intentional relations, chains of action, and the interpersonal struc-turingof mentalityandpractical intelligibility, aswell asthroughlayoutsof, eventsoccurringin, andconnectionsamongthecomponentsof material setting. (Schatzki,2002:149).The situatedproduction of meaning is another dimension of site ontology. All kindsof site ontology are in need of a spatial definition of the world that relates (existential)spatiality(as beingtemporalized) tothe ongoingpractical constitutionof meaning.Schatzki, like Hubert Dreyfus and many others, borrows such a definition from the exis-tentialanalytic.Itcanbeformulatedasfollows:theworldisdisclosedbyeachassem-blageof practices (includingthetotalityof theseassemblages) that creates spaceinwhicharelativelyself-containedwebofmeaningsproducedbythesepracticestakesplace. Siteissomethinglikethespatial unit of meaningconstitution. At thispoint Iamagaininasignificant disagreement withSchatzkisproposal forhowtheconceptofsiteassituatedconstitutionofmeaningistobereadoff.Tosetthescene,notethatin his definition of the world the term space is closely related to the figure of semanticspaceandaforterioriagaintotheideaofdiscreteness.12Thedubiousmomentinthedefinitionistheobscureexpressionof relativelyself-containedweb. If thewebofmeaningsproducedbyanorganizedset ofpracticesisonlyrelativelyenclosed, thenobviouslyitisrelatedsomehowtosomethingthatisbeyondit. Morespecifically, thewebisopentowhattranscendsit.Thesomethingthatisbeyondremainsunspecifiedin the definition being cited. The deficiency is informed by the strong commitment to theidea that meaning is produced contextually and locally, thereby is enveloped by partic-ularassemblagesofpractices.Theconceptofsitesuffersagainfrombeingtiedtotheparadigmofdiscreteness.Doubtless, theworld(ascircumscribedintermsofsiteontologyofthesocial)isamultiplicity(oramanifold)ofrelativelyenclosedconfigurationsofpractices, eachofGinev 87which is characterized by its own local spatiality. Yet the world is first and foremost aninexhaustiblehorizonofpractical(concernful)constitutionofmeaningsthattrans-cends always already each and every spatially organized assemblage of practices. Thisis whyanyparticular assemblageproduces onlyarelativelyself-containedwebofmeanings. Thewebspartial seclusionisrelativetothetranscendenceof theworldwhich Schatzkis site ontology simply does not take into account. The figure of contex-tualsituatednesspresupposesthefigureofsituatedtranscendence.Site is a located constitution of meaning that is characterized by a regime of tempor-alization (Zeitigung der Zeitlichkeit). Speaking in terms of the existential analytic, site isaspatialmultiplicityofplaces.Placeisthespatialcharacteristicofatool-entitythatisreadytohand.Thusconsidered, themultiplicityofplacesisthespatialityofacertaincontext of equipment (Zeugzusammenhang) within the world. One can admit (as a kindof convention) that each practice is distinguished by a multiplicity of places, and for thatreason, it is spatially contextualized. Though Schatzki does not deny that there is a con-stantre-contextualizationofpractices(andconsequently,aconstantinterferenceandco-penetration of contexts of equipment) within the world, this observation does not playasignificant roleinhistheory. Yet thesite(assituatedreproductionofpracticesthatbrings into being a web of meanings) exists only in this interference that constantly dis-seminates the meanings produced within the relatively enclosed multiplicity of practices.The interference of contexts does not destroy or dissolve the site. Rather, it makes the siteinterconnectedwithpotentiallyinfinite(andconstantlyproliferating)world-sites.(Duetothere-contextualization, themeaningsproducedinacertainsitebyamultiplicityof practices become immediately dispersed/disseminated in other multiplicities of prac-tices.) The contextual situatedness of a multiplicity of interrelated practices has (qua thespatiality of a relatively enclosed web of meaning) a relative autonomy within the con-tinuous re-contextualization of practices. To this autonomy belongs also a multiplicityscharacteristic regime of temporalization which takes place, however, within the worldshorizonoftemporality.Each particular multiplicity of practices is temporalized due to the worlds transcen-dence. Beingtemporalizedwithin-the-world, siteisneitheradiscretelocationnoranenclosedspace. Theinterferenceof spatial contexts of equipment whichbrings theongoing re-contextualization of practices into play is the spatial counterpart of the con-stant temporalizingof temporality (whoseoutcomes aretherelativelyautonomousregimes of temporalization). Site as considered with regard to the figure of situated trans-cendenceisinevitablytemporalized. Theworldisnot acontainer of sites. ThoughSchatzkis theory would not approve a view of the world as a manifold of sites, this the-oryhasnoresourcestorejectargumentativelysuchaview.Bythesametoken,itdoesnotoffergoodargumentsfortheclaimthatsitesareacharacteristicdisclosureoftheworldthroughchangingconfigurationsofinterrelatedpractices. Asacorollarytothisclaim, the world-as-transcendence is potentially infinite hermeneutic situations ofspatial-temporaldisclosureoftheworld.Ineachofthesesituationsaformofpracticallifeprojectsandappropriatespossibilities.Against thebackgroundof theforegoingconsiderations, mypoint isthat thesiteontologyof practiceshasto work withtheconceptof a temporalizedsiteor, more pre-cisely,withtheconceptof (whatMikhailBakhtincalls)thechronotope.In thisregard,88 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)one should also distinguish between site ontologies of actuality (actually given discreteunits) and site ontologies of potentiality that employ a kind of ontological difference.13Toreiterateanargument alreadydiscussed, sincesituatednessandtranscendenceareexistentially (not only equiprimordial but also) correlative, the image of site (spatialitydisclosedbysocialpractices)asintrinsicallytiedtodiscretenessiswrong. Siteasnotbeingdetached(1) fromthestreamof meaningconstitution, whichtemporalizes alldoingsandsayingswithin-the-world,and(2)fromtheongoingre-contextualizationofpractices is a chronotope. In literary criticism, the chronotope is spatial-temporal plotting(emplotment), and consequently, it is, in Bakhtins words, a formally constitutive cate-gory of literature that reveals the intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial rela-tionships(1981:8491).14Yeteveninthisdisciplineoneassumesthattheconceptofthe chronotope is relevant not onlytothe fictional narration. The basis for a non-fictionalextensionoftheconceptisprovidedbyBakhtinsclaimthateveryentryintothe sphere of meaning is accomplished only through the gates of the chronotope (1981:258). The chronotope is first and foremost a discursive-practical phenomenonthatreflects and expresses the pre-narrativity of existence.15To use a distinction spelled outbytheSchoolofRussianFormalism,thechronotopebelongsnotonlytothesphereofsyuzhetbuttothesphereoffabulaaswell, wherebyfabulaactivelyparticipatesintheconstructionofthesyuzhet.(Onthisreading, thefabulaisnottherawmaterialofa story, but the pre-narrative fore-structuring of a constructed narrative with a temporalplot. Accordingly,fabula and syuzhet are involved in a joint horizon of temporalizing.)Now, for the purposes of the present article, the concept of the chronotope should bebroughtintoaccordwiththetenetsoftrans-subjectiveexistentialism. Siteisaspatial-temporal context whose inhabitants are inherently part of it. They (not permanently butquite often) face the need to make a decisive choice of one possibility among alternativepossibilitiesthat canbeappropriatedinagivensituation.16(Bydefinition, adecisivechoice is the one in which the multiplicity of practices that constitute a site becomes rear-ranged. For instance, the decisive choice in favor of a new reading of tenacious anoma-lies in experimental results, i.e. a reading of results that look anomalous because they donot agree with the established horizon of expectation, leads to the overall rearrangementof those practices of doing research which constitute the site of a scientific domain.) Thechronotopic structure of site is disclosed at the moments of such a choice. Put differently,itisthesituationofdecisivechoiceofpossibilitiesthatdisclosessiteasachronotope.What is at issue in this disclosing is first and foremost the way in which the practitionersconstruct their (collective) identity as inhabitants of a particular site. In this regard, a siteis a chronotope of decisive collective emancipation from what does not belong (persons,groups,contexts,artifacts,practices,policies,arrangements,orders,plans, normativity,intentions,feelings,attitudes,etc.)tothatsite.The use of the term emancipation in this formulation is not to be confused with theuse of the same term in those kinds of social (and critical) theory which are after an uni-versal liberation from the anonymous dictate of instrumental and strategic rationality. Asa rule, the appeal to the universal liberation is in the name of a united life-world whoseownrationalityissupposedlyoppressedbythatdictate. Accordingly, allcultural life-forms are to be embraced by the horizon of the united life-world whose idealized norma-tivityof social integrationis presumablycounterfactual toall culturallycontingentGinev 89configurations of norms. (This is why the idealized normativity can serve as a regulativeideal in a Kantian sense.) As a consequence, a progressive unification of the cultural life-formschronotopesshouldtakeplace. Thisisanunavoidableconsequencewithintheframework of, for instance, the social theory based on the tenets of universal pragmatics.My talk of a collective emancipation is to be understood as the attainment of a chron-otopic autonomy of a cultural life-form shared by a group/collective. This understandingunderscores,first,theuniquenessofeachparticularculturallife-form,andsecond,thenon-integrabilityoftheculturallife-formsinaunitedlife-world(or,fromanotherper-spective which takes into account the multitude of cultural life-forms in a multiculturalstate, their non-integrability in a civil society guided by unified system of political valuesandnorms).The chronotope is the interconnectedness of temporality and spatiality of a collectiveemancipation (e.g. the emancipationof an artisticgroup committed to a new manifestoand style, a scientific team committed to a new research paradigm, a religious minoritycreatingthroughanewexegesisofsacraltextsandnewritualpracticesitsownpublicspherethatcannotbeassimilatedbytheofficialsphereofpubliclife, andsoon).Inasituationofdecisivechoicetheemancipatoryprocessdefinesitsownregimeoftem-poralizing(i.e. thewayofdifferentiatingbetweenthefutureasprojectedpossibilitiesthataretobeappropriatedforthesakeofemancipation,themomentofthepresentasthe Augenblick in which the state of emancipation is envisaged in a proper manner, andthe relevantpast as those possibilitiesalready actualizedwhichserve the emancipatoryprocess). Alongside the regime of temporalizing, a collective existences specific spati-ality(i.e.acollectivemakingroomforaparticularculturallife-form)beginstotakeshape. This is why a theory of existential spatiality (as complementing a theory of exis-tential temporality)isapart of(theontologypertinent to)thehermeneutictheoryofpractices.Why hermeneutic realism about practices?Let me in conclusion address the issue of why the view of trans-subjective existentialismimpliesakindofhermeneuticrealismabout social practices. Tobeginwith, athesisalready discussed provides the key to the explication of the view of hermeneutic realism:the world of practices has the potentiality-for-being through its openness towards possi-bilities. By implication, the world always is disclosed (as the reality of multiplicities ofpractices) in a hermeneutic situation of projection and appropriation of possibilities. Thehermeneuticsituationbecomesspecifiedasacharacteristichermeneuticsituationbyvirtueof thedecisivechoiceof possibilities. Important fromtheviewpoint of trans-subjective existentialism is not only the exceptionality of the decisive choice but also thewayinwhichthere-contextualizedpracticeswhichpossiblyformanewsitebecomeroutinized.Allnoveltiesinformedbythedecisivechoicearedoomedtobesituatedinanaverageeverydayness.Soonorlaterthecharacteristichermeneuticsituationleadstoacollectiveformof lifegovernedbynewtrans-subjectiveThey inHeideggerssense. The reality of social practices is revealed not as a-temporal presence. It is a realitythat is always disclosed within a characteristic hermeneutic situation that by circumscrib-ingthefore-having, thefore-sight, andthefore-conceptionofatendencyofchoosing90 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)possibilities brings into being a definite regime of social practices situated temporaliza-tion. Within this regime, the present is a function of a constructive future (appropriatedpossibilities)andapast that isalwaysinstatunascendi (apast that isdisclosedwithregard to the actualized possibilities). The reality of social practices is in a state of con-stanttemporalizationasinformedbycharacteristichermeneuticsituations.Hermeneutic realism is a view that in many respects is the counterpart of the concep-tion of situated transcendence. On this view, if the reality were to be out there, ready tobe represented by the human mind, then the human mind would be something outside thereality.Hermeneuticrealism takesthe realityto be the totalityof being-in-the-worldinwhich the mental faculties of the humans (the human mind) are ecstatically united withthe worlds contextual entities. Mental capacities are not only an integral part of the real-ity. Theyarealwaysorganizedandworkingasparticularcognitivepractices(suchaspractices of perception, recollection, imagination, narration, cognition, and so on). Thusconsidered, all practices of gaining knowledge are contextually situated. These practices(or, their particular configurations in which by all means also non-cognitive practices areincluded)takeplaceinacertainchronotope.Likeallotherkindsofpractices,thecog-nitivepracticesdisclosetherealityincharacteristichermeneuticsituationsthatbelongtothereality.17Being contextually situated, practices are inherently accountable for their character-istic situation and the site in which their particular interrelatedness takes place.18There-fore, themultiplicityofinterrelatedpracticesisdistinguishedbyreflexivity. What isarticulated within the multiplicity of practices is a meaningful-reflexive reality. The dee-pest meaning of the concept of reflexivity consists in the ontological thesis that disclos-ing reality is a moment of the reality itself. Of course, not the reality in toto but a site (thechronotope) is always disclosed in a characteristic hermeneutic situation. The sites inha-bitants(theparticipantswhoshareamultiplicityofpractices)gainaccesstorealitythrough the presuppositions of fore-having, fore-seeing, and fore-grasping that are impli-catedintheirpractices.Therealitydisclosedwithinacharacteristichermeneuticsituationhasnothingtodowith the reality to which the doctrine of internal realism subscribes. The claim that thereis no reality that is independent of any hermeneutic situation does not amount to holdingthatthestructureoftheworldisontologicallydependentonthehumanmind. Theher-meneutic situation is an event that belongs to the thrown projection of existence and theworldstranscendence. It isanontological andnot anepistemological (relatedtotheimplementation of a conceptual scheme) event. On hermeneutic realism, the meaningfulreality disclosed in a characteristic hermeneutic situation is not the upshot of loading apre-practical (and non-contextualized) reality with meaning. Such a (neo-Kantian) viewwronglyassumesthattheconstitutionofmeaningtransformsarealityinitselfintoameaningfulreality.Thereisnorealitythatprecedestherealityofbeing-in-the-worldpractically.Notes1. Bytheexpressionessentialisttheoriesofpractices,Imeantwoprincipaltypesoftheories:(1) theoriesthat admit aninitial presenceat hand(somethingliketheobjectiverealityofpractices) whose conceptualization starts with sorting out the primitive terms (in theGinev 91logical-epistemologicalsense)oftheorizing;and(2)theoriesthatbyvirtueoftheirintrinsiclogicofconstitutingobjectsofinquiryhypostatizewhatisobjectifiedasinvariantentities.2. For a reading of the existential-analytic concept of understanding as unarticulated competencethatmakesitpossibletofollowrules,seeRouse(2007:642).Suchareadingtransformsthehermeneutic-ontological nexus of understanding and interpretation intoa kind of proto-epistemologicalrelation.3. On the view of understanding as the ability to learn practices that is set in the stream of beha-vior,seeTaylor(1985:26).4. Theintegrationofthefigureofthetranscendenceofsubjectivityinthetheoryofpracticeshelpsonetoundoanykindoftranscendentalsubjectivityasarequisitefor(theanalysisof)theconstitutionofmeaning.5. Notoriously, Heidegger opposes any reduction of Dasein either to individuality or to a kind ofsociality. Yet Dasein as portrayed in Being and Time is by no means a hybrid between indivi-duality and sociality. It is a subjective self-constitution that projects its existence upon possi-bilities. With regard to trans-subjectivitys inherence to Dasein, Heidegger draws theconclusionthatbeing-aloneisadeficientmodeofbeing-with, amodethatcontinuestobeinvolvedin trans-subjectivepractices.Daseinis theecstaticunity(inthesenseofBeingandTime) of subjectivity (it is in each case I myself) and trans-subjectivity (of linguisticmedium,culturalmilieu,traditions,institutions,communities,etc.)thattranscendstheselfinawaythatmakesitasituatedself(or,culturallyembodiedself).6. The technical term that Heidegger uses for practices in Being and Time is concernful dealingswithin-the-world.7. Regimeoftemporalizationwithinpracticesisthepractice-theoreticalcounterpartofwhatHeideggercallsthetemporalizingoftemporality.8. Tostress again, this is a bit paradoxical formulation. On theonehand, apractice is alocation(something static) and a unit (something discrete). On the other hand, a practice is not an inde-pendent entity since it is ineluctably involved in a hermeneutic circle set up by the configurationof practices to which it belongs. Being involved in such a circle, a practice is neither static nordiscrete. Yet it is still a location and a unit. The way out of this paradox is by conferring a chron-otopic meaning to the notionsoflocationandunitastep Iwill undertake in amoment.9. Schatzkisuggestsaplanforconstructingpracticetheorythatis,asitwere,builtonaquasi-modelof discretemathematicsina doublesense.First,thetheorydealswith setsofdiscreteentities (like actions, groups, constellations of doings, scattered practices, organized practices,orders,setsoflocalizedpractices,etc.)thatarestructuredinaccordancewiththeoperationsonecandefineonthesetselements.Second,onlycountablesetsofsuchentitiesbelongtothe purview of research delineated by the theory of practices. That the strong emphasis on dis-creteness may threaten practice theory with an undesired exclusion of interesting phenomenafrom its purview makes several theorists cautious about the paradigm of discreteness. In Bour-dieustheory,forinstance,thethreatofhypostatizingadiscreteworldofpracticesunitsisremoved by elaborating on the constant interplay between the product of practices (opus oper-atum)andpractical mastery(modusoperandi). Tothequestionofwhat iswrongwiththemethodological paradigmof discreteness, the answer straightaway is that the paradigmimpliesanobjectivistviewofpracticespurespatialpresence.10. It is not to be denied that Schatzki very often insists on the endless becoming of the sites atwhichorganizedpracticesandordersareconstituted.Invariousmethodologicalcontextshe92 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)makesthecasethat becoming(andnot beingasabidingness)istheconstitutivefeatureofsociallife. In placing emphasison becoming,however, he does not breakwith the paradigmofdiscreteness.Becomingisamovementwithinaworlddividedintodiscreteunitsthatarepresent at hand. Becoming is a reordering of arrangements.Depending on whetherthis reor-dering is an intentional or unintentional process, becoming is either a reorganization of rulesand teleoaffective structures or a recomposition of practices and shifts in their practical under-standings (see Schatzki, 2002: 241). From the phenomenological point of view which I adoptin this article, continuity is to be ascribed in the first place to the horizons transcendence thatmakes possible the ongoing constitution of meaning. It is this continuity that is the opposite ofthe epistemic/semantic discreteness which results from objectification. This rendering of con-tinuity is to be strongly distinguished from the way of treating continuity on a par with stabilityand as opposed to change. In the latter case, continuity belongs not to the world-as-transcendencebuttotheworldthatisalreadyobjectified.11. The external imposition of such identities leads to the formation of patterns as a-temporalized,normative models of social behavior. A prerequisite for having such an imposition is the trans-formation of practitioners intrinsic reflexivity into external attitudes toward the performancesofpractices. Thistransformationcomesintoplay, inparticular, vianarratingtheseperfor-mances.Thoughnarratingisbyitselfnoobjectificationofpractices,itcreatesamediuminwhichthepractitionersareenabledtotakeadistancefromtheirembeddednessinpractices.Repeatablenarrationofpracticesperformancesinsocialcommunicationleadstostylizingthem in normative patterns. The classic versions of social theory (but also the traditional the-oriesinculturalanthropologyandseveralothersocialdisciplines)takeforgrantedtheexis-tenceofnormativepatterns. Accordingly, theyrefrainfromscrutinizingthepre-normativegenesisofnormativepatterns.12. Building on Charles Taylors theory of interpretation in the human sciences, Schatzki uses theconcept of semantic space in a manner that allows him to draw a strong parallel between thespatial units of the social and the discrete units of meaning as related to the different fields ofpractices arrangements. More generally, the notion of meaning Taylor and Schatzki refer to isanotionofsemanticmeaningthatisalientothemeaningarisingoutofinterpretativecircu-larity(thehermeneuticmeaning).13. Theformer placeemphasis exclusivelyonthecontextual spatiality, therebyignoringtheissuesofcontextualtemporality.14. Bakhtin holds that the chronotope stands for the fusion of spatial and temporal indicators into aconcretewhole. Furthermore, hepointsout that this is not astaticfusionbut rather anongoingspatializationof time(wherebytimetakesonflesh) andthetemporalizationofspace that is responsive to plots narrative time. Of course, Bakhtin confines his considerationstotheliteraryartisticchronotopeandthefictionalworldofchronotope.Yethisnotionisspelled out along the lines of a kind of site ontology. More specifically, this is an ontology ofthenarrative-genericconfigurationswhich(notasdiscretestructuresbutintheircontinuousvariability) underlie human action. (This is why several students in literary criticism admit thatany typology of chronotopes as clearly delineated structures would be a futile enterprise sincethereisawholespectrumofpossibilitiesandvariations.)15. Ontheconceptofpre-narrativity,seeMeuter(1994).16. Here I am adopting the concept of situation from Otto Friedrich Bollnows critique of existen-tialism. Bollnowscritical point isthat thesituationofdecisivechoiceisnot apermanentGinev 93situation. In this connection, he distinguishes between Lage and Situation. The former desig-nates the usual surrounding of circumstances which does not define a specific site of existence.Differentia specifica of situation is the nexus of decisive choice and the specification of a siteofexistence.SeeBollnow(2011:2832).17. See,forargumentsofthisclaim,Ginev(2011).18. This formulationassumes theethnomethodological wayof equalizingaccountabilitywithreflexivity: practices are reflexively accountable achievements. More specifically, theaccountabilityofpracticesistheprimaryevidenceoftheirreflexivity.ReferencesBakhtin M (1981) Forms of time and of the chronotope in the novel. In: Bakhtin M The DialogicImagination.HolquistM(ed.).Austin:UniversityofTexasPress.Barnes B (2001) Practice as collective action. In: Schatzki T, Knorr-Cetina K and von Savigny E(eds)ThePracticeTurninContemporaryTheory.London:Routledge.BollnowOF(2011)NeueGeborgenheit:DasProblemeinerUberwindungdesExistentialismus(Schriftenvol.V).Wurzburg:Konigshausen&Neumann.BourdieuP(1977)OutlineofaTheoryofPractice.Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress.GinevD(2011)TheTenetsofCognitiveExistentialism.Athens:OhioUniversityPress.HalbwachsM(1992)OnCollectiveMemory. CoserLA(ed.). Chicago: UniversityofChicagoPress.MeuterN(1994)Pra-Narrativitat:einOrganisationsprinzipunseresHandelns.StudiaCulturolo-gica3:11940.ReckwitzA(2002)Towardatheoryofsocialpractices:adevelopmentinculturalisttheorizing.EuropeanJournalofSocialTheory5:24363.Rouse J (2007) Practice theory. In: Turner S and Risjord M (eds), Handbook of the Philosophy ofScience,vol.15.Dordrecht:Elsevier.Schatzki T (2002) The Site of the Social: A Philosophical Account of the Constitution of Social LifeandChange.UniversityPark:PennsylvaniaStateUniversityPress.Taylor C (1985) Interpretation and the sciences of man. In: Taylor C Philosophical Papers 2. Cam-bridge:CambridgeUniversityPress.Turner S (1994) The Social Theory of Practices. Tradition, Tacit Knowledge and Presuppositions.Chicago:UniversityofChicagoPress.TurnerS(2001)Throwingoutthetacitrulebook:learningandpractices.In:SchatzkiT,Knorr-CetinaKandvonSavignyE(eds) ThePractice TurninContemporaryTheory. London:Routledge.Author biographyDimitri Ginev taught Continental Philosophy of Science at the Western Kentucky University andHistoryofModernHermeneuticsatSofiaUniversity. HewasaFellowoftheCenterforPhilo-sophyof Sciences, Universityof Pittsburgh, andaSenior Fellowat theZukunftskollegof theUniversityofKonstanz.Heisthefounderandeditor-in-chiefoftheinternationaljournalStudiaCulturologica. Among his books are The Context of Constitution (Boston/Dordrecht, 2006),Transformationen der Hermeneutik (Wurzburg 2008), Das hermeneutische Projekt Georg Mischs(Vienna,2011),andTheTenetsofCognitiveExistentialism(Athens,O,2011).94 EuropeanJournal ofSocial Theory17(1)