[clydethefrog]

Fantastic comment - thanks for summarizing the same thoughts I had reading this review.

In the interesting times we are currently living in, it seems many Anglo-Saxon political philosophers and other analytic academics are creating a theory Continental philosophy already figured out during the second half of the 20th century. (I see something similar with the current developments AI and Heidegger - Dreyfus phenomenology, but that's a bit off topic since this focuses on politics) Why? Is the difference in language the two schools use to communicate ideas too big? Did so many dismiss the esoteric writing as nonsense without even reading it, or worse, believe the Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory? The result is now an identity crisis of people disaffected by the machinations they used to defend. The actualization of ideas only modern and post-modern critics used to lament. The things the Frankfurt School[0], Foucault, Derrida and Lacan used to write about in ridiculed corners of academia are now actually affecting these people and they have no idea what is happening.

[0] For anyone wanting to know more, the New York Review of Books just published in their latest edition a great article that summarizes their ideas. http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/03/23/frankfurt-school-...

[rmk2]

There definitely seems to be a language barrier, even if they all are easily available in translation. I think one of the more interesting distinctions there is Marcuse, who I see separated sometimes into the "German" Marcuse (including his early-ish exile writings) and the "American" Marcuse as part of the New Left. Meanwhile, on the continent, traditionally, studying philosophy meant knowing Greek, potentially Latin (since that came as part of a Humanist education either way), German and French, which is why you see a lot of reception flowing either way (Derrida reading Kafka etc., Adorno/Horkheimer reading de Sade, everybody reading Marx & Engels). Some of the English translations are also (still!) in a worse state, such as Bourdieu's core text "Outline of a Theory of Practice" which in English exists mainly as the 1977 CUP translation, while there exists a much more recent (post-2000) revised and extended translation based on a later version by Bourdieu, who made some quite substantial changes.

This might very well be the slightly awkward clash between a generally anglophone audience and their regular focus on the US and, to a lesser degree, England, combined with the spectre of "evil" Marxism.

[AnimalMuppet]

> In the interesting times we are currently living in, it seems many Anglo-Saxon political philosophers and other analytic academics are creating a wheel Continental philosophy already figured out during the second half of the 20th century.

Continental philosophy may have done well at identifying the problem. I'm not sure that they figured out a solution, though.