This paper presents the philosophical questioning of intersubjectivity in the phenomenological theories of Husserl, Scheler and Merleau-Ponty, considering their contribution to the constitution of psychological studies of alterity. It presents forms in which the other appears before me, its possible presence as a constitutive element of the world in which I take part, and above all, as a constitutive element of myself. In order to recognize the other in its radical alterity I cannot institute it by comparison with myself, by analogy or introjection and not even by processes of affective fusion. These forms exclude the possibility of recognizing the other in its difference. It is suggested that we have to start with a sensible/perceptive experience in the proper sphere of a lived body, so as to make it possible to recognize the other as difference in its expressive forms. As a conclusion, a favorable substitution of the notion of intersubjectivity by the one of intercorporeality is proposed.
Phenomenology; Alterity; Intersubjectivity; Intercorporeality