CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University Volume 20 (2018) Issue 3 Article 8 From the "Other" to the "Master Narrative": the Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School Guohua Zhu East China Normal University Xiangchun Meng Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb Part of the Chinese Studies Commons Dedicated to the dissemination of scholarly and professional information, Purdue University Press selects, develops, and distributes quality resources in several key subject areas for which its parent university is famous, including business, technology, health, veterinary medicine, and other selected disciplines in the humanities and sciences. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Language Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monograph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: <[email protected]> Recommended Citation Zhu, Guohua; and Meng, Xiangchun. "From the "Other" to the "Master Narrative": the Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School." 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UNIVERSITY PRESS <http://www.thepress.purdue.edu> CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb> Purdue University Press ©Purdue University CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." In addition to the publication of articles, the journal publishes review articles of scholarly books and publishes research material in its Library Series. Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Langua- ge Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monog- raph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: <[email protected]> Volume 20 Issue 3 (September 2018) Article 8 Guohua Zhu and Xiangchun Meng, "From the 'Other' to the 'Master Narrative': the Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School" <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol20/iss3/8> Contents of CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 20.3 (2018) Special Issue Rethinking Critical Theory and Maoism <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol20/iss3/> Abstract: In their article, "From the 'Other' to the 'Master Narrative': The Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School," Guohua Zhu and Xiangchun Meng discuss the Chinese reception of Frankfurt School and the Maoist historical context. Chinese scholars take the narrow view of the Frankfurt School theories as a depoliticized instrument to explain Chinese practice, particularly in the realm of mass culture. Furthermore, the Frankfurt School has encountered the powerful political and ideological legacy of Maoism, which not only dictates instrumentalist view, but also predisposes to a nationalistic attitude that pits Chinese exceptionalism against universalism, including the Frankfurt School and other western Marxist theories. It is thus imperative to disentangle the complex relationship of Critical Theory and Maoism in China. Recontexualizing the broader history of Chinese reception and response to western theories and knowledge will help renew conversations with the West in humanities and social sciences. Guohua Zhu & Xiangchun Meng, "From the 'Other' to the 'Master Narrative': page 2 of 8 the Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School" CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 20.3 (2018): <http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb/vol20/iss3/8> Special Issue Rethinking Critical Theory and Maoism. Ed. Kang Liu Guohua ZHU and Xiangchun MENG From the 'Other' to the 'Master Narrative': the Chinese Journey of the Frankfurt School In September 2008, the conference on the reception and influence of the Frankfurt School in China convened at the Frankfurt Goethe University, attended by scholars from China, Germany, South Korea, Japan, the United States, and so on. (In this article, the Frankfurt School and Critical Theory are used interchangeably.) In the conference proceedings, two opposing views emerge. Axel Honneth, the current director of the Institut für Sozialforschung (Institute for Social Research) in Frankfurt, maintains that the Frankfurt critics, having overt Eurocentric biases, do not possess the power to elucidate or solve China’s issues, but that Chinese intellectuals in general have more or less misread or misrepresented the school (1-4). Fabian Heubel, a German scholar of Chinese philosophy, argues that a possible way out of the plight of the trans-contextual validity of Critical Theory would be a return to contemporary Chinese philosophical resources, for instance, to a possible rediscovery of the intellectual potential of the 1958 Neo-Confucianist manifesto (12-28). On the other hand, Fu Yongjun, a prominent Chinese scholar of the Frankfurt School, points out that Critical Theory has been utilized in China merely as academic discourse rather than discursive practice in the reshaping of society (29-37). Another Chinese scholar, Zhao Yong, contends that the Frankfurt School in China is the "flowers of thought that do not bear fruit" (25). While most Western scholars are concerned with the loss of the validity of Critical Theory in its Chinese reception, Chinese scholars have a different reason to criticize Critical Theory. Those Chinese scholars who have invested so many of their resources in drawing on western theories to solve China’s practical problems feel disappointed and frustrated. Western theories turn out not to be handy problem-solvers, but often further complicate the problems in China. The reaction of these Chinese scholars reminds us of Edward Said’s "traveling theory." In Said’s view, Georg Lukács’s theory is a response to the political context of his time. However, Lukács’s ideas of revolutionary zeal then turned into a rather cold and objective literary theory via Lucien Goldman (Said, The World 241-2). In a similar situation, the value of Critical Theory lies in its political critique. In the Chinese context, however, Critical Theory has become an academic discourse detached from China’s reality and historical conditions. Both German and Chinese scholars agree that the value of the Frankfurt School in China lies in its transcultural political relevance. Such an expectation seems legitimate, as the Frankfurt School’s lineage to Marxism puts it squarely in the leftist camp of social and political critique. As Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels put it, "the philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point however is to change it" (6). The Frankfurt School’s mission is to change the world, not through violent political revolution, but through philosophical critique. If the critique misses its subject, then it becomes useless, like the allegory of the ancient Taoist sage Zhuangzi, in which a man tries to sell scholar’s hats to the barbaric skin-heads. Moreover, the journey of the Frankfurt School has set on the Chinese soil, where the powerful political and ideological legacy of Maoism not only dictates an instrumentalist view, but also predisposes to a nationalistic attitude that pits Chinese exceptionalism against universalism, including the Frankfurt School and other western Marxist theories. It is thus imperative to disentangle the complex relationship of Critical Theory and Maoism in China. In what follows, we first outline the Frankfurt School’s Chinese journey with a focus on a few thematic issues, including: 1) the Chinese appropriation of Adorno’s aesthetic theory and the critique of Culture Industry; 2) the transformation of the Frankfurt School from a political critique into a depoliticized, academic discourse in China; and 3) the recent Chinese assaults on western universalist theories, including the Frankfurt School. Second, we probe into Critical Theory’s encounter