Western Marxism

Western Marxism names varied historical orientations reconstructing questions of totality, consciousness, and culture, rather than one organization or fixed doctrine. This entry follows a particular passage through Lukács’s History and Class Consciousness without making him the tradition’s sole representative.

Reification investigates how the commodity form transforms people’s experience of activity and social relations. Economy and consciousness are not reduced to a simple relation of reflection. This opens an important problem-field for Frankfurt inquiries into culture and rationality.

Benjamin’s reading does not imply adoption of every Lukácsian thesis. Adorno’s and Brecht’s disagreements over realism, modernism, and aesthetic form reveal differences within this broader milieu. Reification is linked to its own textual source; later Frankfurt concepts remain independently selected on the school card.

Verdinglichung