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Books by Mikko Immanen
Cornell University Press, 2020
Toward a Concrete Philosophy explores the reactions of Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herber... more Toward a Concrete Philosophy explores the reactions of Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herbert Marcuse to Martin Heidegger prior to their dismissal of him once he turned to the Nazi party in 1933. Mikko Immanen provides a fascinating glimpse of the three future giants of twentieth-century social criticism when they were still looking for their philosophical voices. By reconstructing their overlooked debates with Heidegger and Heideggerians, Immanen argues that Adorno, Horkheimer, and Marcuse saw Heidegger's 1927 magnum opus, Being and Time, as a serious effort to make philosophy relevant for life again and as the most provocative challenge to their nascent materialist diagnoses of the discontents of European modernity.
Our knowledge of Adorno's "Frankfurt discussion" with "Frankfurt Heideggerians" remains anecdotal, even though it led to a proto-version of Dialectic of Enlightenment's idea of the entwinement of myth and reason. Similarly, Horkheimer's enthusiasm over Heidegger's legendary post–World War I lectures and criticism of Being and Time have escaped attention almost entirely. And Marcuse's intriguing debate with Heidegger over Hegel and the origin of the problematic of "being and time" has remained uncharted until now. Reading these debates as fruitful intellectual encounters rather than hostile confrontations, Toward a Concrete Philosophy offers scholars of critical theory a new, thought-provoking perspective on the emergence of the Frankfurt School as a rejoinder to Heidegger's philosophical revolution.
Papers by Mikko Immanen
Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Ajatuksia särjetystä elämästä, suom. Raija Sironen ja Erkki Vainikkala (Vastapaino), 2024
Afterword to the Finnish translation of Theodor W. Adorno's Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus dem b... more Afterword to the Finnish translation of Theodor W. Adorno's Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus dem beschädigten Leben (1951)
New German Critique, 2021
This article addresses the controversial question of Theodor W. Adorno’s debt to right-wing Zivil... more This article addresses the controversial question of Theodor W. Adorno’s debt to right-wing Zivilisationskritik by a close reading of his essay “Spengler after the Decline” (1950). The article shows that despite Adorno’s harsh polemics against Oswald Spengler’s Decline of the West (1918, 1922), he sought to make Spengler’s analysis of Weimar Germany’s undemocratic tendencies—“Caesarism”—serve progressive ends. However, Adorno’s essay was not just an effort at “coming to terms with the past” in Adenauerian West Germany. Reading the essay’s original 1941 version together with Adorno’s correspondence with Max Horkheimer sheds light on Spengler as an overlooked key (next to Max Weber, Sigmund Freud, and Walter Benjamin) to their Dialectic of Enlightenment, written in 1941–44. Adorno’s daring effort to appropriate Spengler’s analysis of Caesarism makes Adorno’s critical theory an asset in understanding today’s authoritarian populism.
New German Critique, 2018
At the turn of the 1930s the German Jewish philosopher Herbert Marcuse wrote his habilitation stu... more At the turn of the 1930s the German Jewish philosopher Herbert Marcuse wrote his habilitation study for Martin Heidegger, in which he appropriated Heidegger’s 1927 Being and Time to provocatively cast G. W. F. Hegel as the originator of the problematic of “being and time.” However, what took off as a fruitful collaboration between Germany’s new philosophical star and the soon-to-be Frankfurt School thinker ended up in Heidegger’s rejecting Marcuse’s study. The article argues that much can be said about the philosophical dimension of the topic if Marcuse’s Hegel study is placed in dialogue with Heidegger’s overlooked Hegel lectures. Furthermore, that extraphilosophical factors played a major role in Heidegger’s decision finds support in his recently published “black notebooks,” filled with toxic anti-Semitism. Taken together with Heidegger’s rare remarks on Marcuse—which are both anti-Semitic and anti-Marxist—there are three plausible lines of interpretation for Heidegger’s decision: philosophical objections, anti-Marxism, and anti-Semitism.
Eurooppalaisen äärioikeiston filosofiset virtaukset johtavat 1930-luvun Saksaan
Politiikasta.fi, 2018
Martin Heideggerin "Kirje humanismista" -essee oli Hitlerin kannattajana maineensa tahranneen fil... more Martin Heideggerin "Kirje humanismista" -essee oli Hitlerin kannattajana maineensa tahranneen filosofin ensimmäinen ulostulo maailmansodan jälkeen. Heideggerin nöyryyttä säteillyt essee vakuutti Reinin länsipuolella, jossa ranskalainen postmodernismi ylisti sitä uutena filosofisena paradigmana. Heideggerin äskettäin julkaistut antisemiittiset muistikirjat sekä hänen ajattelunsa suosio äärikansallisen Vaihtoehto Saksalle -puolueen piirissä asettavat esseen kuitenkin arveluttavaan valoon.
Edited Volumes by Mikko Immanen
Book Reviews by Mikko Immanen
Heidegger in Ruins: Between Philosophy and Ideology (2023), by Richard Wolin
History of European Ideas, 2024
niin & näin, 2020
Theodor W. Adorno, Näkökulmia uuteen oikeistoradikalismiin (Aspekte des neuen Rechtsradikalismus.... more Theodor W. Adorno, Näkökulmia uuteen oikeistoradikalismiin (Aspekte des neuen Rechtsradikalismus. Ein Vortrag, 2019). Suom. Sauli Havu. Vastapaino, Tampere 2020.
Cornell University Press, 2020
Toward a Concrete Philosophy explores the reactions of Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herber... more Toward a Concrete Philosophy explores the reactions of Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herbert Marcuse to Martin Heidegger prior to their dismissal of him once he turned to the Nazi party in 1933. Mikko Immanen provides a fascinating glimpse of the three future giants of twentieth-century social criticism when they were still looking for their philosophical voices. By reconstructing their overlooked debates with Heidegger and Heideggerians, Immanen argues that Adorno, Horkheimer, and Marcuse saw Heidegger's 1927 magnum opus, Being and Time, as a serious effort to make philosophy relevant for life again and as the most provocative challenge to their nascent materialist diagnoses of the discontents of European modernity.
Our knowledge of Adorno's "Frankfurt discussion" with "Frankfurt Heideggerians" remains anecdotal, even though it led to a proto-version of Dialectic of Enlightenment's idea of the entwinement of myth and reason. Similarly, Horkheimer's enthusiasm over Heidegger's legendary post–World War I lectures and criticism of Being and Time have escaped attention almost entirely. And Marcuse's intriguing debate with Heidegger over Hegel and the origin of the problematic of "being and time" has remained uncharted until now. Reading these debates as fruitful intellectual encounters rather than hostile confrontations, Toward a Concrete Philosophy offers scholars of critical theory a new, thought-provoking perspective on the emergence of the Frankfurt School as a rejoinder to Heidegger's philosophical revolution.
Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Ajatuksia särjetystä elämästä, suom. Raija Sironen ja Erkki Vainikkala (Vastapaino), 2024
Afterword to the Finnish translation of Theodor W. Adorno's Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus dem b... more Afterword to the Finnish translation of Theodor W. Adorno's Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus dem beschädigten Leben (1951)
New German Critique, 2021
This article addresses the controversial question of Theodor W. Adorno’s debt to right-wing Zivil... more This article addresses the controversial question of Theodor W. Adorno’s debt to right-wing Zivilisationskritik by a close reading of his essay “Spengler after the Decline” (1950). The article shows that despite Adorno’s harsh polemics against Oswald Spengler’s Decline of the West (1918, 1922), he sought to make Spengler’s analysis of Weimar Germany’s undemocratic tendencies—“Caesarism”—serve progressive ends. However, Adorno’s essay was not just an effort at “coming to terms with the past” in Adenauerian West Germany. Reading the essay’s original 1941 version together with Adorno’s correspondence with Max Horkheimer sheds light on Spengler as an overlooked key (next to Max Weber, Sigmund Freud, and Walter Benjamin) to their Dialectic of Enlightenment, written in 1941–44. Adorno’s daring effort to appropriate Spengler’s analysis of Caesarism makes Adorno’s critical theory an asset in understanding today’s authoritarian populism.
New German Critique, 2018
At the turn of the 1930s the German Jewish philosopher Herbert Marcuse wrote his habilitation stu... more At the turn of the 1930s the German Jewish philosopher Herbert Marcuse wrote his habilitation study for Martin Heidegger, in which he appropriated Heidegger’s 1927 Being and Time to provocatively cast G. W. F. Hegel as the originator of the problematic of “being and time.” However, what took off as a fruitful collaboration between Germany’s new philosophical star and the soon-to-be Frankfurt School thinker ended up in Heidegger’s rejecting Marcuse’s study. The article argues that much can be said about the philosophical dimension of the topic if Marcuse’s Hegel study is placed in dialogue with Heidegger’s overlooked Hegel lectures. Furthermore, that extraphilosophical factors played a major role in Heidegger’s decision finds support in his recently published “black notebooks,” filled with toxic anti-Semitism. Taken together with Heidegger’s rare remarks on Marcuse—which are both anti-Semitic and anti-Marxist—there are three plausible lines of interpretation for Heidegger’s decision: philosophical objections, anti-Marxism, and anti-Semitism.
Eurooppalaisen äärioikeiston filosofiset virtaukset johtavat 1930-luvun Saksaan
Politiikasta.fi, 2018
Martin Heideggerin "Kirje humanismista" -essee oli Hitlerin kannattajana maineensa tahranneen fil... more Martin Heideggerin "Kirje humanismista" -essee oli Hitlerin kannattajana maineensa tahranneen filosofin ensimmäinen ulostulo maailmansodan jälkeen. Heideggerin nöyryyttä säteillyt essee vakuutti Reinin länsipuolella, jossa ranskalainen postmodernismi ylisti sitä uutena filosofisena paradigmana. Heideggerin äskettäin julkaistut antisemiittiset muistikirjat sekä hänen ajattelunsa suosio äärikansallisen Vaihtoehto Saksalle -puolueen piirissä asettavat esseen kuitenkin arveluttavaan valoon.
Heidegger in Ruins: Between Philosophy and Ideology (2023), by Richard Wolin
History of European Ideas, 2024
niin & näin, 2020
Theodor W. Adorno, Näkökulmia uuteen oikeistoradikalismiin (Aspekte des neuen Rechtsradikalismus.... more Theodor W. Adorno, Näkökulmia uuteen oikeistoradikalismiin (Aspekte des neuen Rechtsradikalismus. Ein Vortrag, 2019). Suom. Sauli Havu. Vastapaino, Tampere 2020.