Adorno’s distanced theorizing is as questionable as unreflective empirical research

Evidence

What tempted Adorno into this self-glorifying indifference to pleasanter aspects of the human objects of his analysis was the notion, which regularly appeared at the conclusion of his trains of thought, of bursting things open from within, of sudden transformation, of disturbance. The theory about the listener in On Popular Music' closed with the sentence, To become transformed into an insect, man needs that energy which might possibly achieve his transformation into a man.’ 264 But a position so distanced from the subjects it was concerned with was just as questionable as one which had no scruples in allowing its subjects to speak only through the filter of questionnaires or experimental situations prepared in advance and lacking any social-critical background. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 268

Categorization

• DEFINE: Nails the methodological fault line between Frankfurt-style critical theory and Lazarsfeld-style American empirical research.
• DEEPTHINKING: Frames the central epistemological dilemma of the whole book: two mirror-image failures, theoretical indifference and empirical tunnel vision, both losing the social subject.
• XREF: connects to: Adorno’s habit of ruling out rival readings foreclosed any empirical testing of his assumptions — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 267; Methodological experience softened Adorno’s early hostility to American empirical techniques — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 671; Adorno admitted the critique’s standpoint versus criticized standpoint was theoretically unclear (+1 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Adorno’s habit of ruling out rival readings foreclosed any empirical testing of his assumptions — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 267; Methodological experience softened Adorno’s early hostility to American empirical techniques — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 671; Adorno admitted the critique’s standpoint versus criticized standpoint was theoretically unclear (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Adorno never abandoned the ideal of critical empirical research despite rejecting established methods #complicates (0.85) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2120