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Freudian Theory and the Pattern of Fascist Propaganda book cover
Freudian Theory and the Pattern of Fascist Propaganda
2023
First Published
3.72
Average Rating
21
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Written in 1951, this essay systematizes Theodor Adorno's extensive work in the 1940s, informed by psychoanalysis, on the mass psychological base of fascism. It is important for us because it asks for the socio-psychological conditions of the possibility (and also the limits) of modern authoritarian states. The essay further demonstrates the interrelationship of the Frankfurt critique of mass culture and the Institute's fascism theory. Adorno was to call both the culture industry and fascist propaganda "psychoanalysis in reverse."
Avg Rating
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Author

Theodor W. Adorno
Theodor W. Adorno
Author · 51 books

Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno was one of the most important philosophers and social critics in Germany after World War II. Although less well known among anglophone philosophers than his contemporary Hans-Georg Gadamer, Adorno had even greater influence on scholars and intellectuals in postwar Germany. In the 1960s he was the most prominent challenger to both Sir Karl Popper's philosophy of science and Martin Heidegger's philosophy of existence. Jürgen Habermas, Germany's foremost social philosopher after 1970, was Adorno's student and assistant. The scope of Adorno's influence stems from the interdisciplinary character of his research and of the Frankfurt School to which he belonged. It also stems from the thoroughness with which he examined Western philosophical traditions, especially from Kant onward, and the radicalness to his critique of contemporary Western society. He was a seminal social philosopher and a leading member of the first generation of Critical Theory. Unreliable translations hampered the initial reception of Adorno's published work in English speaking countries. Since the 1990s, however, better translations have appeared, along with newly translated lectures and other posthumous works that are still being published. These materials not only facilitate an emerging assessment of his work in epistemology and ethics but also strengthen an already advanced reception of his work in aesthetics and cultural theory.

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