Habit is the hinge connecting Greek substance-subject, self-feeling, and soul as work of art

Evidence

It is critical to make habit a turning point, and this for three fundamental reasons. First, if we do this, we can open up an original perspective on the history of subjectivity, where this history has the double sense of the dialectical constitution of the individual subject and the evolution of the concept of ‘subject’ itself. Reversing all ‘pragmatic anthropology’, Hegelian anthropology returns us to the founding Greek moment of the ‘substance-subject’. Second, habit emerges as the fundamental anthropological determination in so far as it is a ‘mechanism of self-feeling’. This mechanism, by its very structure, presupposes a particular modality of the reduplication of the negative. Third, habit fashions the human ‘as a work of art of the soul’, a transformation which will bring us back to plasticity. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 304

Categorization

• DEFINE: Establishes the threefold function of habit in Hegelian anthropology: history of subjectivity, mechanism of self-feeling, and soul as work of art — the conceptual skeleton of the chapter.
• XREF: The ‘substance-subject’ reversal connects to Heraclitus studies and to the plastic-brained subject from the reader’s brain-work projects. — connects to: Habit’s virtuality marks the shift from Greek to modern subjectivity — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 613; Habitual suffering enables interpretive skill and invention beyond immediate need — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 532; Habit’s reversible soul-body translation constitutes the Self and awakens consciousness. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 573 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Habit’s virtuality marks the shift from Greek to modern subjectivity #expands (0.85) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 613