This work aims, in a rather contemplative manner phased into three related parts, to discuss two concepts indispensable for Hegel's entire philosophy of life and history: language and memory. In Part I, I examine the triple relation between language and thinking, thinking and reality, and reality and language. I argue that language shares a logical structure with thinking and reality, and is itself the performative principle (or acteur) of creating reality, being itself the externalizing tool of the movement of thinking without which any development of the Spirit would not be possible. Part II targets the concept of memory and its function within thinking and action of self-consciousness. It is argued that Hegel's language functions as the modern concept of discourse in terms of its agency in reality. Memory is understood as fundamentally entangled with matter, or the material objectivity that calls in memory to be named, i.e. posited in language. Memory is an interiorizing principle, language is the exteriorizing principle, both deeply rooted in the so-called night of the self of each spirit. I also discuss the subject-objective relation against the background of memory, before moving onto Part III which generally tackles the process of the self-expression of the Spirit in history, the distinction...

This work aims, in a rather contemplative manner phased into three related parts, to discuss two concepts indispensable for Hegel's entire philosophy of life and history: language and memory. In Part I, I examine the triple relation between language and thinking, thinking and reality, and reality and language. I argue that language shares a logical structure with thinking and reality, and is itself the performative principle (or acteur) of creating reality, being itself the externalizing tool of the movement of thinking without which any development of the Spirit would not be possible. Part II targets the concept of memory and its function within thinking and action of self-consciousness. It is argued that Hegel's language functions as the modern concept of discourse in terms of its agency in reality. Memory is understood as fundamentally entangled with matter, or the material objectivity that calls in memory to be named, i.e. posited in language. Memory is an interiorizing principle, language is the exteriorizing principle, both deeply rooted in the so-called night of the self of each spirit. I also discuss the subject-objective relation against the background of memory, before moving onto Part III which generally tackles the process of the self-expression of the Spirit in history, the distinction...