other takes on Freud etc.

[Rainbow Bookstore Cooperative]

In addition to Ken's recommendations, I think the work of Joel Whitebook is
worth looking at. He's influenced by, and critical of, both the FS and
Castoriadis. He had a couple very good article-length critiques of Habermas
in the 80's and early 90's in Telos and Praxis International, as I recall,
and his recent book (which I can't recommend unreservedly but deserves a
read) is called Perversion and Utopia.
	Peter Staudenmaier

----------
> From: kenneth.mackendrick@utoronto.ca
> To: frankfurt-school@lists.village.virginia.edu
> Subject: Re: ADORNO ONE LAST TIME
> Date: Friday, February 11, 2000 5:26 PM
> 
> On Fri, 11 Feb 2000 15:23:29 -0500 Ralph Dumain <rdumain@igc.org> wrote:
> 
> > And I'm thinking maybe I should read Honneth's THE STRUGGLE FOR
RECOGNITION.  
> 
> If you aren't very persuaded by Habermas, then you probably won't be
impressed 
> by Honneth's work either. I'm not sure if you are a fan of psychoanalysis
or 
> not... but Honneth 'reads' Habermas with the work of Jessica Benjamin in
some 
> parts (The Bonds of Love).  I think Benjamin's work is excellent and it 
> provides quite an alternative, if taken seriously, to Habermas's
appropriation 
> of Freud - something I'm not sure Honneth has taken seriously enough. 
I'd 
> recommend Tod Sloan's book Damaged Life as an interesting substitute to
Honneth.
> 
> I'd also highly recommend looking at Zizek's introductory essay (if you
haven't 
> already) in the anthology Mapping Ideology, ed. Zizek - he's got a
critique of 
> Adorno and Habermas that might be of interest (from a distinctly 
> Althusserian-Hegelian-Lacanian perspective).  I find there are
interesting 
> similarities between Adorno and Lacan in many ways... but I've found that
the 
> intersections have largely been left unexplored... I'm not quite sure
why.
> 
> By way of a footnote - what disturbed me most in Habermas was his purely 
> linguistic formulation of subjectivity - and I was interested in
exploring 
> something more... sensual or "emphatic" in the FS sense.  I found
Castoriadis's 
> notion of the imaginary quite helpful.  I eventually figured out he was
drawing 
> on Lacan - when someone put me in touch with Zizek's work.  I had
formerly been 
> working with the FS's conception of emphatic reason, but I've since found
that 
> the idea of the imaginary has been far more useful in exploring and
examining 
> contemporary ideology.
> 
> ken