The exiled Frankfurt Institute isolated itself from American academic life while resenting its marginalization.

Evidence

The seminars were virtually discussion groups for the Institute’s associates, and American students only rarely took part in them. If the Institute’s staff kept to themselves the meetings announced in its prospectus, they felt all the more secure. … For Horkheimer, at least, all this was an irritating distraction from the real work. He did not want to invest much time and energy in it, and was not particularly interested in what the students were interested in. On the other hand, it was, in the long run, not dignified enough for him merely to give badly attended lectures in the Extension Division on topics unrelated to examination subjects. And in 1939-40 he, Lowenthal and Adorno all felt it as an insult to the Institute when Neumann, who was much more successful as a university teacher, was appointed to a professorship at Columbia, and not Horkheimer. This was symptomatic of the dilemma Horkheimer and his supporters saw themselves as facing: they wanted to remain at a distance from the academic system, but at the same time to be treated as if they were taking part in it in leading positions. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1045

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the pattern of European emigre academics’ self-imposed isolation in American universities during the 1930s-40s. — connects to: The exiled Institute cultivated American scholarly ties to legitimize itself — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 3317; Rival American institutions blocked the Frankfurt School’s early reception in exile. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 433; The exiles’ alienation from America both blinded and equipped the Frankfurt School’s critique. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 647 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• The exiles’ alienation from America both blinded and equipped the Frankfurt School’s critique. #expands (0.85) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 647
• Rival American institutions blocked the Frankfurt School’s early reception in exile. #corroborates (0.80) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 433
• The Rockefeller Foundation refused to fund independent Frankfurt Institute research #corroborates (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1148
• Lazarsfeld’s methodological collaboration helped the exiled Frankfurt Institute enter American academia #contradicts (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 687