What do Edgar Allen Poe, Theodor Adorno, György Lukács, and John Dos Passos have in common? All four writers understand the prevailing logic of art to be one of formal subordination. That is, they all believe that the work of art produces “a resolution that will make what we already know worth knowing.” This logic organizes the form and content of Dos Passos’s U.S.A. trilogy, a seemingly open text that, in Godek-Kiryluk’s reading, closely aligns with both Poe’s theory of composition (...) and Lukács’s desire for immanent critique. (shrink)

A position joining critical theory with the Marxist critique of imperialism informs the following discussion on the perceived shortcomings of Chibber’s study in its avowed claim to disavow postcolonial theory. Chibber’s insistence on reading Subaltern Studiesaspostcolonial theory is unsustainable in that it fails to address the epistemological premises of a theory adopted and not initiated by the project. Whereas Chibber does ably contest assertions made by Subaltern Studies concerning the special conditions of India halting capitalism’s universalising drive, his concentrated but (...) narrowly-focused and repetitive criticism disregards prior work contiguous to his own specialism as well as disciplines other than the social sciences. Thus the explanatory power of Uneven and Combined Development in understanding the internal conditions of societies conscripted into capitalism is cast aside, as are the resources of Marxist cultural criticism in writing a metanarrative of these consequences inallof their aspects: economic, social, cultural and experiential – omissions that paradoxically are to the fore in postcolonial theory. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn this paper, I consider Adorno's claim that art is at, or is coming to, an ‘end’. I consider Adorno's account in relation to the work of Arthur Danto and G. W. F. Hegel. I employ Danto's account, together with two distinct interpretive glosses of Hegel's account, as heuristic devices in order to clarify both Adorno's own arguments, and the context within which they are being advanced. I argue that while Danto and Hegel see art as coming to an end (...) autonomously, owing to art's successful realization of its governing principle, Adorno by contrast sees art as coming to an end heteronomously. Art's narrative is forcibly broken off, rather than completed. Adorno's account, indebted to Hegel, of art's commitment both to autonomy and the realization of ‘spiritual needs’ is explored in order to clarify how, on Adorno's view, this has happened to art; and why, precisely, he believes art is coming to an end. (shrink)

ExcerptI. Introduction Minima Moralia seems to go further than any other of Adorno's published works toward developing a substantive ethical point of view on modern society. It might appear curious, then, that this book could also stake an entirely plausible claim to be the most neglected and underappreciated work in Adorno's critical oeuvre.1 Minima Moralia has simply not been able to generate the critical readings of the same scope and influence that have helped make a name for the more programmatic (...) Negative Dialectics, nor those that have drawn on the ever popular, posthumously published Aesthetic Theory.2. (shrink)

The theories of Pierre Bourdieu and Theodor Adorno both conceive culture as legitimating the inequalities of modern societies. But they postulate different mechanisms of legitimation. For Bourdieu, modern culture is a class culture, characterized by socially ranked symbolic differences among classes that make some seem superior to others. For Adorno, modern culture is a mass culture, characterized by a socially imposed symbolic unity that obscures class differences behind a facade of leveled democracy. In his later writings, however, Bourdieu’s theory converges (...) with that of Adorno. He too begins to privilege the high culture of intellectuals over mass culture by employing the universal standard of autonomy from economic interests. But there remains one vital difference between these theories. Bourdieu grounds the origins of a critical, autonomous culture in specific social structures, while Adorno grounds it in technology. (shrink)

Lukács describes his intellectual trajectory from 1910 - 1960.

Ross Wolfe reviews The Invisible Committee’s To Our Friends.