Critical Models: Interventions and Catchwords

by Theodor W. Adorno, Henry W. Pickford (Translator), Lydia Goehr (Introduction)

Critical Models combines into a single volume two of Adorno's most important postwar works -- Interventions: Nine Critical Models (1963) and Catchwords: Critical Models II (1969). Written after his return to Germany in 1949, the articles, essays, and radio talks included in this volume speak to the pressing political, cultural, and philosophical concerns of the postwar era. The pieces in Critical Models reflect the intellectually provocative as well as the practical Adorno as he addresses such issues as the dangers of ideological conformity, the fragility of democracy, educational reform, the influence of television and radio, and the aftermath of fascism.

This new edition includes an introduction by Lydia Goehr, a renowned scholar in philosophy, aesthetic theory, and musicology. Goehr illuminates Adorno's ideas as well as the intellectual, historical, and critical contexts that shaped his postwar thinking.

Genres: Philosophy, Sociology, Nonfiction, Essays, Theory, Reference, Education

472 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

About the author

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.

Reviews

[Lucía Martín]

Textos de Adorno sobre los que vuelvo constantemente. Sobre el sujeto y el objeto ocupa todo mi pensamiento.

[Inferus]

1-Observaciones sobre el pensamiento filosófico.
2-Razón y revelación.
3-Progreso.
4-Glosa sobre personalidad.
5-Tiempo libre.
6-Tabúes relativos a la profesión de enseñar.
7-La eduación después de Auschwitz.
8-Sobre la pregunta ¿Que es alemán?.
9-Experiencias científicas en Estados Unidos.
10-Epilegómenos dialécticos.
11-Sobre sujeto y objeto.
12-Notas marginales sobre teoría y praxis.