WHAT IS THE ROLE of the intellectual in a revolutionary working-class movement? How does the separation of theory from practice affect the development and utility of Marxism? And how did the twin phenomena of the Frankfurt School and Trotskyism succeed — or fail — in addressing the tasks of their historical moment? These are the questions that lie at the heart of Walter Held’s 1939 essay “Critical theory without political practice?”
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Wenige Persönlichkeiten, Adam Smith vielleicht ausgenommen, sind von der Linken derart mit Verachtung gestraft worden wie Nietzsche. Allzu beflissen ist der Philosoph des Eises und Hochgebirges in die Untiefen der rechten Reaktion verbannt oder als kurzlebige Koketterie verspottet worden, lediglich tauglich für Pubertätskrisen männlicher Jugendlicher.
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Ted Humphrey is President’s Professor, Barrett Professor, Professor of Philosophy and Lincoln Professor of Applied Ethics (all Emeritus) at Arizona State University. At the time of retirement, his primary area of focus was Latin American intellectual history; over the course of 50 years, Humphrey authored numerous books and articles. On July 25, 2020, Ethan Linehan interviewed Prof. Humphrey. What follows is an edited transcript of that conversation.
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Few figures, excepting perhaps Adam Smith,[1] have received such scorn from the Left as has Nietzsche. The philosopher of ice and high mountains has all too assiduously been banished to the depths of rightwing reaction or derided as a brief flirtation only fit for male teenage angst.
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It is my hope that this reflection, comprising a mélange of history and anecdote, will serve the socialist with the patience for a critical perspective in the 21st century. There is no time like the present for the Left to reconsider the Cuban Question.
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