DEATH OF RECIPIENT. THE TRAUMA OF MODERNIZATION IN THE SOCIO-POLITICAL DISCOURSE OF THE TRANSITIONAL AGE

Abstract

In the context of the hermeneutic turn that has been marked in the Ukrainian philosophical literature after 2014, in particular the problematization of the reception procedure, the article examines the impact of the trauma modernization and its processing on the discursive practices of a transitional society. At the same time, the combined nature of the researcher’s competencies is revealed, which cannot be reduced. It is shown, that in the absence of the necessary figure of a carrier of such competencies in a post-traumatic society, the alternative is the (counter) elites reliance on resentment. As a result, the process of (inter)national reconciliation (which can be represented as a certain hermeneutical cycle) is not guaranteed, as the examples of the Armenian genocide (1915) and ‘Afghan’ trauma demonstrate. Noting the open nature of the hermeneutical network of the Maidan phenomenon study, in terms of its emancipatory factor, which sets the frontier for the hermeneutics of the maturation of the Ukrainian transit community, the author draws attention to the impossibility of presenting this issue within the framework of the normative communicative practical philosophy (which does not provide for a ‘game of resentment’ scenario). Overcoming this conceptual limitation prompts us to turn to the broader field of discursive practices of organic intellectuals (Gramsci): media editors, public intellectuals, bloggers. In this context, the distinction between metaphor and hyperbole as tropes that determine the performative dimension of socio-political discourse becomes heuristic. While society can learn new metaphors evolutionarily, new hyperbole implies conditions of revolutionary change or war. In the light of the recent Ukrainian experience and new unprecented challenges, the deliberative theory is assessed as insufficiently relevant. In conclusion, the author makes proposals for further research directions.