Contact Information
Urbana, IL 61801
Research Areas
Biography
Thomas Byrne is a Research Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois and the Head of the Laboratory for Phenomenological Research. He completed his PhD at KU Leuven’s Husserl Archives under Ullrich Melle, followed by research appointments at KU Leuven and the University of Macau and a tenured position at Sun Yat-Sen University before joining Illinois in 2023. His work in classical phenomenology examines meaning, feelings, attention, and signs, with publications in the European Journal of Philosophy, Human Studies, Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, and Husserl Studies. Several of these studies have been translated into German and Turkish, reflecting their continued reception in international scholarship.
Byrne is now developing the Laboratory for Phenomenological Research to support concept-driven qualitative studies that draw on phenomenology without reducing it to a set of technical procedures. He publishes in qualitative health research and education journals such as Qualitative Health Research, Qualitative Inquiry, Studies in Higher Education, and The Qualitative Report, where his work addresses how lived experience shapes illness, institutional authority, and contemporary social life. Current projects in the lab examine mortality in cancer care, objectification in clinical encounters, conflict in doctoral education, treatment refusal in oncology, and the experience of AI systems in everyday contexts.
Highlighted Publications
The Phenomenology of ChatGPT: A Semiotics. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 2024.
Husserl’s Analogical Axiological Reason. European Journal of Philosophy, 2025.
The Lived Experience of Mortality in Cancer Care. Qualitative Health Research, 2025.
The Struggle for Identity in Doctoral Supervision. Studies in Higher Education, 2025.
An Introduction to Phenomenology in Qualitative Education Research. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 2025.
Recent Publications
Journal articles since 2022
Forthcoming. The Risks of Phenomenology in Qualitative Research: Method and Concepts. Qualitative Inquiry.
Forthcoming. Clark Moustakas' Husserl. The Qualitative Report.
2025. The Lived Experience of Mortality in Cancer Care: A Phenomenologically Grounded Qualitative Study of Being-towards-death. Qualitative Health Research.
2025. An Introduction to Phenomenology in Qualitative Education Research. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences.
2025. The Struggle for Identity in Doctoral Supervision: A Phenomenologically Grounded Qualitative Study of Power and Conflict. Studies in Higher Education.
2025. Husserl's Analogical Axiological Reason: A Phenomenology of Wish Fulfillment. European Journal of Philosophy.
2025. Husserl's Phenomenology of Wishing. Human Studies.
2025. Phenomenology is Explanatory: Science and Metaphysics. With Heath Williams. European Journal of Philosophy.
2024. The Phenomenology of ChatGPT: A Semiotics. Journal of Consciousness Studies.
2024. The Dawn of the Phenomenology of Feelings. Philosophy Today.
2023. Husserl's Other Phenomenology of Feelings. Husserl Studies.
2023. The Origin of the Phenomenology of Instincts. Husserl Studies.
2022. Husserl's Theory of Scientific Explanation. With Heath Williams. Husserl Studies.
2022. Husserl's Semiotics of Gestures. Studia Phaenomenologica.
2022. The Origin of the Phenomenology of Attention. Research in Phenomenology.
2022. The Origin of the Phenomenology of Feelings. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology.
2022. The Meaning of Being: Husserl on Existential Propositions as Predicative Propositions. Axiomathes.