Lectures on Negative Dialectics: Fragments of a Lecture Course 1965/1966

by Theodor W. Adorno

This volume comprises one of the key lecture courses leading up to the publication in 1966 of Adorno's major work, Negative Dialectics. These lectures focus on developing the concepts critical to the introductory section of that book. They show Adorno as an embattled philosopher defining his own methodology among the prevailing trends of the time.

Genres: Philosophy, Politics, Theory, Nonfiction, Ebooks

352 pages, Paperback

Published September 9, 2008

About the author

Theodor Wiesengrund Adorno was one of the most important philosophers and social critics in Germany after World War II. Although less well known among anglophone philosophers than his contemporary Hans-Georg Gadamer, Adorno had even greater influence on scholars and intellectuals in postwar Germany. In the 1960s he was the most prominent challenger to both Sir Karl Popper's philosophy of science and Martin Heidegger's philosophy of existence. Jürgen Habermas, Germany's foremost social philosopher after 1970, was Adorno's student and assistant. The scope of Adorno's influence stems from the interdisciplinary character of his research and of the Frankfurt School to which he belonged. It also stems from the thoroughness with which he examined Western philosophical traditions, especially from Kant onward, and the radicalness to his critique of contemporary Western society. He was a seminal social philosopher and a leading member of the first generation of Critical Theory.

Unreliable translations hampered the initial reception of Adorno's published work in English speaking countries. Since the 1990s, however, better translations have appeared, along with newly translated lectures and other posthumous works that are still being published. These materials not only facilitate an emerging assessment of his work in epistemology and ethics but also strengthen an already advanced reception of his work in aesthetics and cultural theory.

Reviews

[Edward O'Neill · Rating 3 out of 5]

Adorno gave lectures while writing the "Introduction" to "Negative Dialectics."

Those who know Hegel's "Phenomenology" know how thorny the issue of introductions is for those in the critical-phenomenological tradition. Adorno assumes the full complexity of the task, and renders the very process of engaging with that complexity.

What's bound in this volume is a bit odd.

Adorno lectured on his forthcoming book, and he left behind lecture notes, some transcribed recordings, and the final "Introduction" itself. But these don't all line up.

So in some cases, we have transcriptions of Adorno's lectures. But where the tape failed or the tapes were lost, we get his notes. Indeed, the editor gives us the notes, even when we have the lectures. And where there's only notes, we also get some of Adorno's "Introduction."

So it's a bit messy. But it's worth it to read Adorno's lectures on his book.

Basically, Adorno (like Heidegger and Lacan and Hegel) gave terrific lectures, but the published prose is, um, labored, to say the least.

So it's a delight to read Adorno and not to experience the same bafflement readers of his prose habitually face.

I'm a fan. But non-fans can get something out of this one, too.

[Knecht René · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Adorno is always dense, complex … but between the lines, in the statements you will find the gems. I didn’t read the lectures in a linear-sequential order from page one but started with the non-recorded lectures because I felt more familiarity with the Key Concepts and they were shorter.

So I followed this path: Lectures 11, 18, 17, 16, 7, and 5. These lectures directly anticipate the later publication of 'Negative Dialectics' and these chapters gave me distinct recognition points where Adorno’s method becomes visible. (based on prior reading of other works)

At the heart of Adorno’s philosophy and what renders Critical Theory so interesting is his refusal to bow either to a positivist "glorification of facts" of radical positive science or to the abstract, subject-centered totalities.

For Adorno, (Self-Critical) “Theory” and the “Subjective” remain indispensable to discover Truth. Theory is needed …

- not to subsume reality under rigid formulas (Reification, Abstraction), but to pierce through the immediacy of facts. ‘To correct the facts’: something that could sound strange in today’s era of positive Science. Therefore Adorno’s vision is interesting! It is a thinking against the grain

- When we abstract an object under a pre-existing concept, we merely reduce it to what we already know.

- To discover the universal within the particular requires radical mediation: an active subject that uses the concept to open up the non-conceptual object without violently reducing it to the concept itself.

"What is needed for the experience/appearing of objectivity is the subject, not its elimination." (Lecture 17, p. 139)

- And finally arrive at “let the objects speak for themselves” (true objectivity) (= the Preponderance of the Object)

- Or : ‘Truth is Objective, not plausible’ (see Negative Dialectics, p. 41)

--------------------------------------------
Some KLP:
Lecture 11:
When thought demands absolute, unmediated exactitude, it paradoxically leads to reification (Verdinglichung). The necessity of subjective expression. the mimetic, qualitative voice of the subject that acts as a corrective to cold, reified data.

Here, the influence or interaction with Walter Benjamin and Jewish messianic thought becomes visible. Like the concept of Tikkun the gathering and mending of broken vessels.

Lecture 18 & Lecture 17
This messianic undertone of restitutio ad integrum resurfaces in Lecture 18, illustrating Adorno's subtle debt to Gershom Scholem and Jewish mysticism, while sharpening his critique of quantitative reductionism.

In Lecture 17, Adorno addresses the core paradox of his epistemological method: true objectivity requires the subject. In conventional Scientific positivism or dogmatic Marxism, the subject is treated as a source of bias that must be eliminated to reach "pure" facts. Adorno completely reverses this premise. Without an active, interpretive subject, facts remain mute and reified.

To demonstrate how the universal is liberated from the particular, Adorno introduces his famous metaphor of the constellation (or the the famous example of the combination lock, see book Negative Dialectics, p. 163)

Lecture 16

"True thoughts are those alone which don't understand themselves." (p. 135)

==> Which can be linked to Adorno’s concept of ‘unintentional truth’.
(cf. Susan Buck-Morss, The Origin of Negative Dialectics, p. 77 where she discussed earlier texts of Adorno (The Actuality of Philosophy) and quotes from Walter Benjamin Trauerspiel book, p. 17: “Truth never enters into a relation ... Truth is the death of intention”)

A thought that fully "understands itself" is one that fits into pre-established categories, leaving no residue. A true thought, however, encounters an irreducible core in the object: a moment of friction where the object speaks for itself and resists being classified. It shocks the thinking subject out of its conceptual complacency.

Lecture 7
On the critique of Bergson/Husserl/Heidegger, the preponderance of the object, Proust vs. Bergson, and the definition of cognitive utopia: "To open up the non-conceptual with the aid of the concept, without reducing it to the concept" (p. 66).

In footnote 13 (p. 233) you can read more about how Proust differs from Bergson and how Proust opens up, make visible, the non-conceptual with the aid of the concept /language/ psychological categories while Bergson excludes ‘reason’ to get to the truth (of course the explanation remains complicated….)

The decisive divide between Adorno and Phenomenology/ Essentialism is the preponderance of the object (Der Vorrang des Objekts). We do not reach the real world by stripping away concepts/time or seeking a pure, (a-)historical "Being" (Bergson), or Wesensschau (Husserl).

(note: the discussion on Heidegger seems more discussable and is not quoted)

==> Instead, we use the concept, history, and social theory as precision tools. When the concept collides with its own internal contradictions, when it confronts the scars, suffering, and material antagonisms of history: it breaks open, exposing the reality of the object.

“The non-conceptual to which their (*) philosophical efforts are devoted remains something mental, subjective. And, in truth, the concept always forms an implicit part of the non-conceptual.” (p. 71)

(*)Husserl, Bergson, Heidegger in the text

Conclusion: Philosophy is Giving Name to the Unsayable

Adorno’s (negative) dialectical method can be summarized as the unlocking of the non-conceptual by means of the concept, accompanied by the radical self-criticism of the concept.

Quotes from Lecture 7:
“… (Ludwig) Wittgenstein famously declared that "what we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence," is the "anti-philosophical statement par excellence" (p. 74).

For Adorno, the very raison d'être of philosophy lies in the dialectical effort to say precisely what cannot be said directly or encapsulated in a single, isolated proposition. Rather than surrendering to silence or resorting to naive, non-conceptual intuition, philosophy fulfills its task through context and mediation. This critique leads directly to Adorno’s core formulation of the utopia of cognition:

"… we would achieve the utopia of cognition if it might prove possible to grasp the non-conceptual not by means of some allegedly superior non-conceptual methods, but by unlocking the non-conceptual by means of the concept, and the self-criticism of concepts – without reducing what has been comprehended, the non-conceptual, to concepts by main force." (p. 74 / which expression you can also find in Negative Dialectics, p. 10)

Philosophy exists precisely because reality cannot be neatly exhausted by definitions. If all of existence were transparently legible through static categories, philosophy would be redundant.

Philosophy’s true calling is to give a name to that which cannot be directly said: not through mystical silence, but by constructing critical constellations that make the unsayable visible. By placing the suffering, historical object at the center of thought, Adorno leaves us with a method that is as intellectually honest as it is politically urgent: a philosophy that refuses to settle for false harmonies in a broken world.

==> The same message you get by reading Negative Dialectics, but in the lectures it comes more alive.

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is actually a very good book about philosophy. I do not think it is a terribly good book on negative dialectics, because most of the available 10 lectures talks mostly about the 'proper' function of philosophy, and only bits of the first few talk about negative dialectics. Still, Adorno is capable of saying extremely interesting things, and often in a way that is far superior/accessible than his writing.

[Dmitry Muravyov]

"[...]But the crucial differences are to be found precisely in such minimal nuances as the distinction between the concept of synthesis in Hegel and the version of the concept of negative dialectics that I have been at pains to formulate. The differences are to be found in such minimal nuances. And the ability to think philosophically is essentially the ability to experience the large-scale implications of these seemingly minute differences."

[Chen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Adorno en sus clases habla genial, pero tampoco es que diga muchas cosas.

[Jonas Derz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Spaß Spaß Spaß ausschließlich Spaß beim Lesen kann man hier haben

[raphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adorno’s philosophy, I find, is never straightforward. The style itself oscillates from aphoristic to rigorous in the span of several paragraphs. This lecture series was the first one I’ve finished cover to cover, and I find that even his lectures reflect this overall style. In terms of content, I find this very satisfactory in so far as it maps out his intentions for a modified philosophy in the form of the Negative Dialectics. The ambiguities and references to philosophical history are distinctly Adorno, and hence, cannot be simply accused as convolutions of otherwise easily simplified ideas. Despite being such a pain to read when you’re unfamiliar to the references, the lectures provided a way of easing into the Negative Dialectics.

[graceofgod · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first few lectures are, in my opinion, absolutely brilliant. But in all honesty, it was very hard to follow his flow in the later lectures. Nonetheless, check this out.

[Slava Skobeloff · Rating 5 out of 5]

spec.realism/deleuze