Communication and Expression

The linguistic turn in critical theory has been routinely justified with the claim that Adornos philosophy is trapped within the limits of consciousness philosophy. Yet Adornos own philosophy of language has not yet been fully and systematically examined in its own right. Philip Hogh argues that it was in fact the linguistic turn in critical theory that prevented a thorough analysis of Adorno's philosophy of language. Here he reconstructs Adornos philosophy of language and presents it as a coherent theory that demands to be understood as an important contribution to contemporary linguistic philosophy. By analysing all the key concepts in Adornos thought (subjectivity, epistemology, social theory and aesthetics), and comparing them to Robert Brandoms material inferentialism, John McDowells theory of conceptual experience and Jrgen Habermas theory of communicative action, this book presents Adornos theory as an important contribution to contemporary philosophy of language in its own right.