James Crane
@jamescrane.bsky.social
editor @ critical theory working group:
https://ctwgwebsite.github.io/
https://ctwgwebsite.github.io/
Pinned
Just began working on organizing the blog & converting to shareable PDFs, & it’s going to be a big project! For life reasons, it’s going to be harder for me to keep going now, so any support would be crazy appreciated! & thanks for reading & sharing Substudies!
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Adorno-Horkheimer didn’t get a copy of Benjamin’s “Theses” until mid-1941. Reading it they discovered not only remarkable coincidences with their most recent work but differences they couldn’t help but want to fight him over, hours without end, at a Parisian café open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Adorno-Horkheimer: On Walter Benjamin’s ‘Theses’ (Jun./Jul. 1941).
Letters towards “Walter Benjamin zum Gedächtnis” (1942).
open.substack.com
November 29, 2025 at 4:06 AM
Adorno-Horkheimer didn’t get a copy of Benjamin’s “Theses” until mid-1941. Reading it they discovered not only remarkable coincidences with their most recent work but differences they couldn’t help but want to fight him over, hours without end, at a Parisian café open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Reposted by James Crane
now up: full re-translation of Horkheimer’s 1942 essay—co-authored by Adorno!—“Reason & Self-Preservation,” first published in English in ‘42 (w/ ‘tactical’ modifications) as “The End of Reason.” If there’s a Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment, this is it. open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Horkheimer-Adorno: Reason and Self-Preservation. Winter 1941/42.
Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment.
open.substack.com
November 26, 2025 at 5:53 AM
now up: full re-translation of Horkheimer’s 1942 essay—co-authored by Adorno!—“Reason & Self-Preservation,” first published in English in ‘42 (w/ ‘tactical’ modifications) as “The End of Reason.” If there’s a Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment, this is it. open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
short & sweet: ISR’s group entry on the sociology of art for a 1940s American encyclopedia (which turns out to be a barely veiled allusion to Engels on Balzac + an interesting attempt to mediate b/w Adorno & Löwenthal’s divergent approaches to sociology of art!)
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Horkheimer-Löwenthal-Adorno—Encyclopedia Article: On The Sociology of Art (1943/46).
+ Appendix: Horkheimer-Löwenthal’s Letters—On the Sociology of Biographies and Mass Culture (1942).
open.substack.com
November 27, 2025 at 7:54 AM
short & sweet: ISR’s group entry on the sociology of art for a 1940s American encyclopedia (which turns out to be a barely veiled allusion to Engels on Balzac + an interesting attempt to mediate b/w Adorno & Löwenthal’s divergent approaches to sociology of art!)
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
you might wonder: what were Horkheimer-Adorno’s politics in 1941? well: the universal self-enlightening of runaway enlightenment, aka communism
November 26, 2025 at 5:33 PM
you might wonder: what were Horkheimer-Adorno’s politics in 1941? well: the universal self-enlightening of runaway enlightenment, aka communism
now up: full re-translation of Horkheimer’s 1942 essay—co-authored by Adorno!—“Reason & Self-Preservation,” first published in English in ‘42 (w/ ‘tactical’ modifications) as “The End of Reason.” If there’s a Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment, this is it. open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
Horkheimer-Adorno: Reason and Self-Preservation. Winter 1941/42.
Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment.
open.substack.com
November 26, 2025 at 5:53 AM
now up: full re-translation of Horkheimer’s 1942 essay—co-authored by Adorno!—“Reason & Self-Preservation,” first published in English in ‘42 (w/ ‘tactical’ modifications) as “The End of Reason.” If there’s a Prelude to Dialectic of Enlightenment, this is it. open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
doing about as bad as i could be, so i won’t be on here as much. see you all soon, i hope, on the other side of the spell 🤞!
November 13, 2025 at 10:00 PM
doing about as bad as i could be, so i won’t be on here as much. see you all soon, i hope, on the other side of the spell 🤞!
so i ordered a used copy of CLR James’ Mariners, Renegades, and Castaways a while back
November 13, 2025 at 9:09 PM
so i ordered a used copy of CLR James’ Mariners, Renegades, and Castaways a while back
Reposted by James Crane
I’m still getting better at podcasting, so apologies for the awkwardness, but Mac and I made time to blabber about dialectical biology! I definitely think you should read the book, and extend ideology critique to science proper. The book also helps you fight racists, so you should read it for that 2
POD EP 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology, with Mac Parker and Anatarah Bin AlKaf—on Richard Lewontin and Richard Levins' "Dialectical Biologist"!
patreon.com/posts/episod...
patreon.com/posts/episod...
Episode 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology. | crittheoryworkgroup
Get more from crittheoryworkgroup on Patreon
patreon.com
November 13, 2025 at 8:14 PM
I’m still getting better at podcasting, so apologies for the awkwardness, but Mac and I made time to blabber about dialectical biology! I definitely think you should read the book, and extend ideology critique to science proper. The book also helps you fight racists, so you should read it for that 2
New podcast ep with Mac & Anatarah on Lewontin & Levins’ “Dialectical Biologist”! Give their convo—in which they def complete the system of German idealism via organism-debates in Marxist philosophy/history of science—a listen here!
November 13, 2025 at 8:05 PM
New podcast ep with Mac & Anatarah on Lewontin & Levins’ “Dialectical Biologist”! Give their convo—in which they def complete the system of German idealism via organism-debates in Marxist philosophy/history of science—a listen here!
Reposted by James Crane
all episodes of Critique of the Podcast Form are now available on RSS as well: rss.com/podcasts/cri...
Episode 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology. | Podcast Episode on RSS.com
In this episode, Mac Parker and Anatarah Bin AlKaf have a casual chat on Richard Lewontin and Richard Levins seminal book the Dialectical Biologist. They cover why this book remains a key contribution...
rss.com
November 13, 2025 at 7:44 PM
all episodes of Critique of the Podcast Form are now available on RSS as well: rss.com/podcasts/cri...
Reposted by James Crane
POD EP 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology, with Mac Parker and Anatarah Bin AlKaf—on Richard Lewontin and Richard Levins' "Dialectical Biologist"!
patreon.com/posts/episod...
patreon.com/posts/episod...
Episode 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology. | crittheoryworkgroup
Get more from crittheoryworkgroup on Patreon
patreon.com
November 13, 2025 at 7:44 PM
POD EP 5: A Conversation About Dialectical Biology, with Mac Parker and Anatarah Bin AlKaf—on Richard Lewontin and Richard Levins' "Dialectical Biologist"!
patreon.com/posts/episod...
patreon.com/posts/episod...
also my most generous take on Pollock’s contrib. to 1940s Critical Theory: to Adorno & Horkheimer, he was an impossible, unbowed human being in times of terror. an attitude infinitely more important as inspiration for Dialectic of Enlightenment than the state capitalism essays
November 13, 2025 at 6:52 PM
also my most generous take on Pollock’s contrib. to 1940s Critical Theory: to Adorno & Horkheimer, he was an impossible, unbowed human being in times of terror. an attitude infinitely more important as inspiration for Dialectic of Enlightenment than the state capitalism essays
favorite find here: discussion minutes from a group “interview” (seemingly organized by Paul & Hannah Tillich) w/ a young Russian emigre, Mrs. Masha Scott, on the meaning of life for the younger generation in the Soviet system
November 13, 2025 at 5:47 PM
favorite find here: discussion minutes from a group “interview” (seemingly organized by Paul & Hannah Tillich) w/ a young Russian emigre, Mrs. Masha Scott, on the meaning of life for the younger generation in the Soviet system
Reposted by James Crane
happy 6am to those who celebrate: a set of short (mostly unpublished) & strange theoretical texts on the affinities of intellect & domination from Pollock’s early 40’s reports to Horkheimer about discussions in Paul Tillich’s NY salon!
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
November 13, 2025 at 11:20 AM
happy 6am to those who celebrate: a set of short (mostly unpublished) & strange theoretical texts on the affinities of intellect & domination from Pollock’s early 40’s reports to Horkheimer about discussions in Paul Tillich’s NY salon!
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
happy 6am to those who celebrate: a set of short (mostly unpublished) & strange theoretical texts on the affinities of intellect & domination from Pollock’s early 40’s reports to Horkheimer about discussions in Paul Tillich’s NY salon!
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
November 13, 2025 at 11:20 AM
happy 6am to those who celebrate: a set of short (mostly unpublished) & strange theoretical texts on the affinities of intellect & domination from Pollock’s early 40’s reports to Horkheimer about discussions in Paul Tillich’s NY salon!
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
link: open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
today’s find! On the “anthropology” of the Dialectic of Enlightenment drafts: “to clarify present day society by tracing back the different modes of human existence to their origins and the different catastrophes through which they have gone.” —Horkheimer to Pollock, 12/11/1942.
November 12, 2025 at 9:06 PM
today’s find! On the “anthropology” of the Dialectic of Enlightenment drafts: “to clarify present day society by tracing back the different modes of human existence to their origins and the different catastrophes through which they have gone.” —Horkheimer to Pollock, 12/11/1942.
Reposted by James Crane
My uncle, who is a farmer in Watonwan county, sent me this image of the lights above his barn.
November 12, 2025 at 3:37 AM
My uncle, who is a farmer in Watonwan county, sent me this image of the lights above his barn.
hey slime. need a hand
November 12, 2025 at 12:29 AM
hey slime. need a hand
Reposted by James Crane
Forgot to perform a hog check and just found this in the kitchen
November 11, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Forgot to perform a hog check and just found this in the kitchen
Added a paragraph on why I think the “Reports” are important for reading early Critical Theory, especially given how weak even the better attempts to “restart the disrupted debate” between the CTers & the Vienna Circle have been
November 11, 2025 at 7:58 PM
Added a paragraph on why I think the “Reports” are important for reading early Critical Theory, especially given how weak even the better attempts to “restart the disrupted debate” between the CTers & the Vienna Circle have been
POV: you are positivism-friendly theologian at the 1937 logical positivism congress in Paris and have just quoted from Stendhal’s De l'Amour in broken French, misattributing it to Balzac
November 11, 2025 at 2:08 PM
POV: you are positivism-friendly theologian at the 1937 logical positivism congress in Paris and have just quoted from Stendhal’s De l'Amour in broken French, misattributing it to Balzac
Reposted by James Crane
lol Adorno & Benjamin are in rare form here
November 11, 2025 at 8:20 AM
lol Adorno & Benjamin are in rare form here
Reposted by James Crane
huge ty to everyone supporting the Substudies project, & in that spirit i finally finished the translation drafts i started a while back of Adorno-Benjamin’s joint critical (incredibly catty lol) “reports” for Horkheimer on 3 Paris conferences in early August ‘37! open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...
November 11, 2025 at 8:16 AM
huge ty to everyone supporting the Substudies project, & in that spirit i finally finished the translation drafts i started a while back of Adorno-Benjamin’s joint critical (incredibly catty lol) “reports” for Horkheimer on 3 Paris conferences in early August ‘37! open.substack.com/pub/jamescra...