ADORNO ONE LAST TIME

[Sharon Sliwinski]

ralph et al

> I still need to read more Kracauer.  I will have to force
> myself to learn more of the fellow-traveller Benjamin though I'm not
> attracted to him at all.
>

i have to admitt right off the top, i'm not much of an adorno scholar
if anything i "still need to read" him
but i do find benjamin particularly useful for a number of reasons
(you really should attend to him - and a new book is out just recently)
mostly because of the current academic obessions with foucault
i use benjamin because he does similar things in terms of
the "social construction of history": histroy as a project of the present, we
are subjects constructed by the discourses of the past, etc etc.
but foucault and benjamin have very different aims (purposes? motives? i don't
know what is the right word here)
one is critically positive of marx, one is critically negative of marx(ism)
and foucault's very transparent critique of marxism leads him to a theory of
power
compare to benjamin's dynamic visions of historical materialism which i find
much less politcally veiled than foucault
and then bejamin ends up dead at the border
there is a lot to be said here - foucault coming from the structuralist school
and the case of the "missing referant" - could this be "The Social" for
marxist's thinkers?
but anyway
i just wanted to exhibit a fan-like attitude, some passion for these thinkers,
especially in the face of current foucault-vogues and your waning feeling for
the frankfurts

sharon