"Communicative Praxis and the Space of Subjectivity" spans the fields of philosophy and communication, illustrating how the amalgam of discourse and action, and language and social practices, is constructive of the way that we define ourselves and makes sense of the world in which we exist. The author provides an elaboration of an original concept in which communication and praxis are commingled. This allows discourse and action to be viewed as twin halves of the constitution of meaning in our personal and social existence. The interwoven texture of discourse and action, and language and social practices accommodates the author's novel notions of reference, self-implication and rhetoric. These notions are developed against the backdrop of an entwined hermeneutical understanding and explanation. Communicative praxis is multifaceted saying, writing and doing that is "about" something, "by" someone, and "to and for" someone. The intercalcating moments of hermeneutical reference, self-implicature, and rhetoric display an interface of the fields of philosophy and communication studies. The economy of communicative praxis is stimulated by the forces of philosophical analysis and interpretation coupled with an acknowledgement of the transactional dynamics in the rhetoric of the ongoing community of investigators and concerned citizens. The art of thinking, which philosophers - by mandate of their tradition - have been called upon to develop, proceeds hand in glove with the contextuality of thought as it emerges from the rough and tumble of everyday social and political interactions. It is this that "Communicative Praxis and the Space of Subjectivity" can properly be viewed as a work that integrates the disciplines of philosophy and communication studies in such a manner as to enrich the contributions of each.
Calvin O. Schrag, the George Ade Distinguished Professor of Philosophy Emeritus of Purdue University, is the author of numerous books on philosophy. His most recent publications are: The Resources of Rationality: The Self After Postmodernity; and God as Otherwise than Being. He is a recipient of Fulbright and Guggenheim Fellowship awards and he is a founding editor of the international philosophical journal, Continental Philosophy Review.
With this important treatise on the contemporary philosophy of interpretation, Schrag takes his stand at the leading edge of hermeneutic discussion. . . . Highly recommended."" - Choice ""He (Schrag) marvelously exemplifies and practices the ideal of philosophy as a reflective overcoming of one-sidedness. . . . His book is well worth reading for an up-to-date, state of the art discussion of the most fundamental issues in the debate between modernism and post-modernism."" - Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology ""Calvin O. Schrag is one of those remarkable writers who can draw widely from the diverse and complex work of contemporary philosophy, and do so without sacrificing detailed interpretation."" - International Studies in Philosophy
