"The general aim of the project is to significantly contribute to the development of a more unitary view of the human body that can shed light on both its rootedness in the world and its capacities to transcend itself, such that it establishes, on the level of a higher subjective life, a specifically human cultural world of works and creations in which different cultures can recognize each other and dynamically interact within the same history. The research therefore addresses the issue of corporality, but it is mainly aimed at the following question: how do we define the various modalities by which bodily selfhood comes about and gives rise to creativity in a continuous intertwining with the world, that constantly nurtures its formative activity? To answer this I will set up a dialogue between Jan Patočka and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. By so doing I intend to show that the interlacing between these two European thinkers leads us towards a more integrated view of the living body, which would better recognize the value of our full engagement in the body and its movement in all the activities that determine our inner formation and also participate in the creation of a community of exchanges and culture, that accommodates and lets co-exist different cultures and ways of being (life-worlds).This view of the body can be relevant not only to embrace a living idea of culture as “milieu of recognition”, but also to conceptualize the becoming cultural horizon against which the process of European unification can progress. As such, the project could create a new research dynamics within the ERA in the field of studies dedicated to European integration strategies."