Rationalisation as Reification

Abstract

I now want to explore in more detail what I regard as the continuing relevance of two concepts used by first generation Critical Theory: reification and commodity fetishism. I shall refer directly to the way Adorno and Marcuse use them, but also use some contemporary examples to illustrate their case.

There is no more unfortunate creature under the sun than a fetishist who yearns for a woman’s shoe and has to settle for the whole woman (Karl Kraus 1986: 97)