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Na 1 - The Bequest Max Horkheimer
| Description: | Max Horkheimer (1895-1973) is best known as one of the leading members of the Frankfurt school,
and one of the leading proponents of what he called "critical theory." In 1930,
Horkheimer became the director of the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt, marking a turning
point both for Horkheimer and the Institute. In his best known work Dialectic of Enlightenment
(1944), Horkheimer and his Frankfurt School colleague Theodor Adorno argued that while the
Enlightenment promised freedom and progress through reason and knowledge, reason and knowledge have
instead become instruments of domination, enabling more efficient and extensive control not only
over the natural environment, but also human beings. In this and subsequent work (e.g., Eclipse of
Reason [1947] and Critique of Instrumental Reason [1967]), Horkheimer stresses how
"instrumental reason" - the principle and methods by which means, such as factories or
consumer goods, are calculatingly designed to efficiently meet certain ends, usually greater profit
or control - has come to dominate not only the work lives of modern people, but also their leisure
lives through the mass consumption of commodities. The heirs handed over the literary remains to the former Stadt- und Universitätsbibliothek Frankfurt in 1974. |
| Signature: | Na 1 |
| Period: | ca. 1892-1972 |
| Contents: | letters, manuscripts, materials, biographical documents, discs und photos (52 m) |
| Indexing: | The content has been indexed and is accessible via a card index. |
| Further Information: | » biographical data  » Bibliographie » Max Horkheimer's voice goes digital
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| Literature: | Max Horkheimer, Gesammelte Schriften. Hrsg. von Alfred Schmidt u. Gunzelin Schmidt Noerr (19 Bände), Frankfurt am Main 1988-1996 |
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