What is resonance? What is alienation? How do the two relate? Reflections on Rosa’s theory of resonance and alienation

This article explores the concepts of resonance and alienation. Resonance is the phenomenal core of the relationship between social subject and the recreation of meaning. This is normatively neutral concept. Normatively desirable resonance involves enchantment Alienation derives from a particular relationship between subject and object, whereby the object controls the social subject. This is normatively objectionable because the subject becomes a means to the ends of the object. There are two form of alienation, means-ends alienation, (consumerism or exploitation) and end-state alienation(acceleration, reification, and utopian projects). In end-state alienation the social subject loses all capacity for living in the present, thus enchanted resonance disappears.