Adam Schaff: Individual

Adam Schaff was Polish Marxist philosopher and theorist. Explore interesting quotes on individual.
Adam Schaff: 26   quotes 0   likes

“A system of opinions which, being founded on a system of accepted values, determines the attitudes and behavior of men with respect to desired objectives of development of the society, social group or individual.”

Adam Schaff

Adam Schaff (1967), "Functional Definition, Ideology, and the Problem of the 'fin du siècle' of Ideology." L’Homme et la Société, April-June 1967. pp. 49-61; p. 50

Men , Behavior

“Neglect of the problem of the human individual leads to impoverishing Marxism at the theoretical level and to distorting it at the practical level. In this mistake lies the deep secret of Stalinism. This is why the protagonists of “true” Marxism — where the individual is absent—are so dangerous. I am referring not only to those who put Stalinism into practice, but also to its theorists, whose various political lucubrations and theoretical mistakes have resulted in the thesis that Marxism is anti-humanism. If this were the case, we would have to fight it. But it is a pure lie: Marxism is humanism, and it is the concern of Marxists to fight in the name of such humanism. This has always been my firm belief, as a Marxist and as a Communist. And this fact explains the choice of the lietmotif of my philosophical works.”

Adam Schaff

Adam Schaff (1967) in: "Conversation with Ponzio," in Ponzio 2002; as cited in: Petrilli and Ponzio (2007)

Lie , Secret , Problem , Fight

“The distinction between "language" and "speech" rests on easily observable facts. The theoretical aspect of the issue has been raised in contemporary literature only by de Saussure, although in the terminological sense all the languages (I refer here to our cultural circle and its traditions), beginning with the distinction … lingua and sermo in Latin, accept the difference between "language" as a system of linguistic facts and "speech" as the name of a type of action. Following de Saussure, that theoretical distinction has been adopted in all contemporary linguistics. Gardiner distinguishes between speech as an activity with clearly utilitarian ends in view, and language as a precise knowledge pertaining to communication by means of verbal signs'*. The differentiation has been adopted in the Marxist literature of the subject, linguistic, psychological, etc. In his Psychology (in Russian) S. L. Rubinshtein defines speech as language functioning in the context of individual consciousness, and compares the difference between speech and language to the difference between individual and social consciousness.”

Adam Schaff

Source: Introduction to semantics, 1962, p. 316

Communication , Literature , Knowledge , Sense

“Through the prevailing social consciousness, social relations give shape to the individual who is born and educated in a specific society. In this sense, social relations create the individual.”

Adam Schaff

Adam Schaff (1970:66), as cited in: John F Schostak (2012), Maladjusted Schooling (RLE Edu L). p. 25

Education , Sense