Reich & the Frankfurt School
James Rovira
jrovira at drew.edu
Thu, 17 Apr 2003 14:46:47 -0400
A couple of brief corrections:
First,
>
> Yet unlike the Frankfurt School, Freudians institutes have
> relatively formal structures and are generally not run for life
> by one individual
>
I think you mean "Freudian" institututes rather than "Freudians."
>
> Theodor Adorno clearly played a major role in the internal
> conflict within the Institute. Wiggershaus points out, for
> example, that Adorno was fond on referring to Fromm as a
> professional Jew (Wiggershaus, 1994: 266).
>
I think you meant to write, "fond of."
In this sentence:
>
> Horkheimer and Adornos neglect in fully crediting Fromm for his
> part in developing the F-scale could be seen somewhat generously
> as what the literary critic Harold Bloom once call the anxiety
> of influence.
>
I think you meant to say, "once called" rather than "once call."
In this sentence, I think there's an extra word:
>
> since many scholars who came to intellectual maturity during the
> 1960s and 1970s were influenced by the one side-sided criticisms
> made of Fromm by Frankfurt School
>
Should it be "one-sided" rather than "one-side sided."
It's interesting you provide these quotations from Adorno:
> is sentimental and wrong to begin with, being a mixture of social
> democracy and anarchism, and above all shows a severe lack of the
> concept of dialectics.
> For Adorno, the revisionists give an oversimplified account
> of the interaction of the mutually alienated institutions id
> and ego, posit a direct connection between the
> institutional sphere and social experience and are guilty
> of superficial historicism (Adorno, 1968: 79; 89).
>
given your previous comments. It seems that the suggestions offered
earlier had at least some validity in Adorno's case.
Overall you present a very convincing and fairly nuanced desciption of
Fromm's break with Horkheimer and the FS. I appreciate having read it.
It's everything I would expect from a 20 page or so professionally
written article but not, of course, what I expect from a three line post
to a listserve.
Thanks again,
Jim