Subject against Subjectivity: Adorno and the Philosophy of the Subject
Author(s) Predrag Krstić Publisher Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, University of Belgrade „Filip Višnjić“, Belgrade Published 2007 ISBN 86-82417-15-4 Pages 279 Edition Fronesis
The book seeks to reconstruct Adorno’s understanding of the subject and examine the status, meaning, and reach of this concept in his philosophy. In the first section, the term is broken down into key composite meanings. The following section is a kind of necessary half-step: its central player is the concept of identity, which in Adorno’s terminology, along with the subject, marks the destiny of Western thought and action. The central and longest part of the text is dedicated to the thematization of the subjective and/or identitary character of traditional philosophy, as well as ‘fatal strategies’ issuing therefrom. The subsequent chapter inquires into the possibility of overcoming the fate of Western thought via the concepts of the ‘non-identitary’ and ‘not-being-subject’, which is to say, the emancipatory potential of metaphysics in light of its Adornian recomposition. The final portions of the book attempt an assessment of the contemporary relevance of Adorno’s philosophy for current controversies: the positioning of its significance allows for a few provocative moments of Adorno’s theory to be expounded in the conclusion, which instead of becoming obsolete, rather determine certain more recent debates.