Book Review: Embracing Alienation

I like Todd McGowan. He writes and talks about the most jargon-heavy areas of philosophy (German Idealism, Lacan, Marxism) and somehow finds a way to keep it simple and accessible. His simplicity is the biggest indicator of the vastness of his knowledge. Recently, I read his 2024 book “Embracing Alienation: Why We Shouldn’t Try to Find Ourselves”. This is a short review of the book. Alienation is perceived as a negative thing by most. It means being separated from our essence. It’s what prevents us from living our lives in full and on our own terms. Its source is capitalism, which structures our lives around the circulation of commodities, or modernity, which uproots everything and displaces the human being. Emancipation means being free from alienation. This view is what McGowan rejects in his book. Following the tradition of German Idealism, McGowan sees alienation as neither negative nor positive. It’s simply the basis of our subjectivity. This notion of alienation started with…