Concrete Critical Theory: Althusser’s Marxism

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Taking an analytic and historical approach, this work develops and defends Althusserian critical theory. This theory, it is argued, produces knowledge of how a particular class of people, in a particular time, in a particular place, is dominated, oppressed, or exploited. Moreover, without relying on a general notion of human emancipation, concrete critical theory can suggest political means for the alleviation of these conditions. Because it puts Althusser’s ideas in dialogue with contemporary social science and philosophy, the book as a whole makes contributions to Althusser studies, to Anglo-American political philosophy, and to current debates in the philosophy of the social sciences.
Copyright Year:
2022
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978-90-04-50336-6
Publication:
06 Dec 2021
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ISBN:
978-90-04-50335-9
Publication:
02 Dec 2021
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William S. Lewis, PhD (2001, Pennsylvania State University), is Professor of Philosophy and Director of Media and Film Studies at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York. He has published in political philosophy, American pragmatism and philosophy of the social sciences, including the book Louis Althusser and the Traditions of French Marxism (Lexington, 2005).
Acknowledgements

1 Introduction
 1 Concrete Analysis and Frankfurt School Critical Theory
 2 Methodology
 3 Structure the Book

2 ‘But Didn’t He Kill His Wife?’
 1 The Duty to Cite
 2 Countervailing Harms
 3 External and Internal Approaches
 4 A Duty to Speak and to Respond

3 Althusser’s Scientism
 1 Definition of Althusser’s Scientism
 2 Althusser’s (Mostly) Consistent Scientism: 1960–1980
 3 Althusser 1982–1987: Marxist Philosophy without Marxist Science?
 4 An Aleatory Materialism Consistent with Marxist Science?
 5 Conclusion

4 Historical Materialism and Concrete Analysis
 1 The Theoretical and Political Context for Concrete Analysis
 2 Althusser’s Original Formulation of Concrete Analysis
 3 Critique of Concrete Analysis
 4 Reconstructing Concrete Analysis
 5 Historical Materialism and Critical Theory

5 ‘Class as Concrete and Normative’
 Introduction
 1 Gender Theories
 2 Marxian Class Theories
 3 Trait/Norm Covariant Class Model

6 Separating Racist Science from Racial Science
 1 Separating Science from Ideology
 2 Critical Technique Defined
 3 Critical Technique Applied

7 Manipulation of Consent and Deliberative Democracy
 1 Deliberation from Procedural to Feasible
 2 Obstacles to Deliberation
 3 Overcoming Obstacles
 4 Insurmountable Obstacles?

8 Cosmopolitanism and Class Erasure
 1 Against a ‘Cosmopolitanism of Fear’
 2 Reconstruction of Althusser’s Anti-Cosmopolitan Argument
 3 Contemporary Cosmopolitanisms
 4 Critique of Moral and Cultural Cosmopolitanisms

Works Cited
Index
Primarily, the book is aimed at Althusser scholars, political philosophers, and theoretically inclined activists. However, the book includes material relevant to philosophers of race, political scientists, and moral psychologists and may well be read by these folks.
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Publisher:
Brill
Language:
English
Pages:
viii, 212 pp.
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004503366

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