The Project of the Reconceptualization of the Subject: Incomplete Assembly

The author attempts to trace the formation of the concept of the subject, beginning with its conceptualization in classical philosophy up to its current state, i.e. reconceptualization. There are three projects of conceptualization of the subject in Western philosophy. The first one has to do with the conceptualization of the subject in classical philosophy from Descartes to Hegel. The concept of the subject was conceived as transparent and operative in regard to a passive object which can eliminate all subjective qualities. The second project is devoted to the deconceptualization of the subject that means the critique of the classical concept of the subject, the discovery of objective forces, such as power, language, the unconscious, society, which impact the subject and reduce its subjectivity to objectivity. The third one is about the reconceptualization of the subject: rethinking of the classical concept of the subject, given the critique undertaken within the deconceptualization project. The project of subject reconceptualization deals with a paradoxical situation: despite the objective determination of the subject, the subject remains the subject not reducible to an object. The subject appears non-substantial and non-transparent, disconnected, historical and temporal. The contemporary conception of the subject is constructed in such a way that the subject is never the subject yet, but always presupposes a future subject capable of freely choosing its subjectivity from a multitude of contradictory options. The article suggests a new perspective on the subject, which is seen not only as a human actor, but also as a complex of various objects that behave as subjects, that is, can make objects of themselves. The article shows that before the Cartesian moment the concept of the subject did not exist but was explicitly assumed. Referring to the concept of Foucault, Bourdieu, Althusser and Butler, the author shows the process of the formation of the subject as dependable on power, which is a condition and a possibility for subject to form. Therefore, power addresses to the absent subject as an already formed subject, thereby shaping it and bringing subjectivity into the currently forming subject. The following questions are thus raised: when does the subject become the subject? What precedes the subject? The author attempts to demonstrate that the subject is formed, in a void, since there was nothing before the subject, and it is the subject itself that is eventually formed. 

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