MILADIN ŽIVOTIĆ

In commemoration of the philosopher Miladin Životić, the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory of the University of Belgrade confers an annual award for the critical engagement of leading theorists, whose activity has produced notable critical resonance in social practice.

The award is given to those remarkable individuals, incessantly pushing the envelope and always sprinting towards progress and change, driven by the urgency of the moment, apace with the lurking forces of communal discord.

Miladin Životić (1930-1997), one of the founders of Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, University of Belgrade and a key member of the Yugoslav Praxis philosophy, was also a specific type of Pheidippides runner. Not only was he an ultramarathon runner, courier or citizen athlete, but also a hemerodromos: the day-long runner whose skills went beyond the competition and transcended into the realm of historical achievement. For it is said that Pheidippides died an hour before arriving at the gates of Athens where he saluted the citizens and announced their victory.

In the words of Jean-Paul Sartre: he was dead and yet ran; he ran even dead… testifying with his engagement that the dead still act some time upon their death as if alive. A short time, a year, ten years, fifty perhaps, a given period – or else a whole epoch. Ever in the name of life.