Questions to ponder:

The nature of ideology is at issue in "The Culture Industry" essay, but there are conflicting versions of how A&H view ideology. In this essay, do you find that they present ideology as "false consciousness" ("mass deception") or as a pragmatic and complex element that erupts from and shapes citizens for late capitalism?

Questions to ponder:

1. What is the "dialectic of Enlightenment"?

2. Adorno and Horkheimer's criticisms of certain scientific disciplines and particularly their critique of instrumental reason (Horkheimer even wrote a series of essays under the title _A Critique of Instrumental Reason_) have brought upon them a variety of accusations. Some claim that they have abandoned the Marxian preoccupation with the conditions of capitalist production and opted instead for a (Max) Weberian concern for modern bureaucracy and the conditions of legitimation in an advanced society. Some claim that they are debilitatingly hostile to any version of empirical scientific inquiry, leaving us only with hermeneutic critique. The latter criticism does explain why A&H opt to demonstrate their claims with close analyses of literary texts rather than with opinion surveys or demographics. Based on your reading of the 1st half of _DofE_, are A&H hostile to the empirical sciences, and if so, so what? Are they less interested in capitalism and more interested in bureaucracy/ideology? Is that shift in emphasis reasonable given the advent of "industrial" or "monopoly" capitalism?

Several theorists have argued that there is a difference between the early Marx and the late Marx. Particularly:
* The early Marx was decidedly humanist, while the later Marx either abandoned those humanist concerns or subordinated them to a theory of historical change that does not depend on a teleology or a subject.

Reading Assignment:

Marx and Engels “Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts” (66-126), “Theses on
the Feuerbach” and “German Ideology” (146-202), “Manifesto of the Communist
Party” (469-500), “The Eighteenth Brumaire” (594-617)