Critique of Everyday Life, Volume II: Foundations for a Sociology of the Everyday

by Henri Lefebvre

Henri Lefebvre’s three-volume Critique of Everyday Life is perhaps the richest, most prescient work by one of the twentieth century’s greatest philosophers. The first volume presented an introduction to the concept of everyday life. Written twenty years later, this second volume attempts to establish the necessary formal instruments for analysis, and outlines a series of theoretical categories within everyday life such as the theory of the semantic field and the theory of moments.

The moment at which the book appeared—1961—was significant both for France and for Lefebvre he was just beginning his career as a lecturer in sociology at Strasbourg, and then at Nanterre, and many of the ideas which were influential in the events leading up to 1968 are to be found in this critique. In its impetuous, often undisciplined prose, the reader may catch a glimpse of how charismatic a lecturer Lefebvre must have been.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Sociology, Politics, Theory, France, Urbanism

480 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1961

About the author

Henri Lefebvre was a French sociologist, Marxist intellectual, and philosopher, best known for pioneering the critique of everyday life, for introducing the concepts of the right to the city and the production of social space, and for his work on dialectics, alienation, and criticism of Stalinism, existentialism, and structuralism.

In his prolific career, Lefebvre wrote more than sixty books and three hundred articles. He founded or took part in the founding of several intellectual and academic journals such as Philosophies, La Revue Marxiste, Arguments, Socialisme et Barbarie, Espaces et Sociétés.

Lefebvre died in 1991. In his obituary, Radical Philosophy magazine honored his long and complex career and influence:
the most prolific of French Marxist intellectuals, died during the night of 28–29 June 1991, less than a fortnight after his ninetieth birthday. During his long career, his work has gone in and out of fashion several times, and has influenced the development not only of philosophy but also of sociology, geography, political science and literary criticism.

Reviews

[Dan]

The parts of this I had a chance to go through thoroughly were fantastic. This is everything you ever hoped a Nietzschean Marxian theory would be (and if you never had hopes for a great synthesis of Marx and Nietzsche, you might like this anyway). The final chapter, "The theory of moments," is itself worth the price of the book. I haven't had the chance to go through everything in the book yet, but it's as rich in provocative analytic terms as, say, 1000 plateaus, but more accessible and much more geared toward application. Ethics, research methods, and social theory blended into one very satisfying package.

[Paul]

Profound moments between excruciating ones, when reading on was pure torture, due to incredible vagueness and mouth-parching dryness.