Soviet philosophy (Was : marxist sociology)

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Sun Feb 24 12:29:11 PST 2002


James Heartfield wrote:


>She was very frustrated with the teaching of dialectical
>materialism, which was utterly lifeless as she experienced it -
>which also sounds quite plausible. She was re-training herself in
>the philosophy of Heidegger, which sounds quite a waste to me, but
>the work she showed me was impressive, if a little unworldly (on
>'Ariadne's thread' if I remember right).
>--

I heard Susan Buck-Morss give a talk the other day. She recounted some of her experiences visiting the USSR in its final days, and a circle of philosophers and other scholars she'd befriended. At a meeting with some other Western visitors, one of the Soviets said he'd been reading Heidegger. One of the Westerners brought up H's Nazi connections, and the Soviets said - "So what? We don't care! He's bourgeois, and that's why we're reading him!"

Doug



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