Abstract

Intellectual history is a discipline still in the process of defining itself, or one which is constantly in need of redefining itself. Asjays’ mentor, H. Stuart Hughes, writes in his introduction to Consciousness and Society: “To declare that one is writing intellectual history is really to say nothing until one has defined the term.” Following this precept, Jay distances himself from Lovejoy's History of Ideas school because such a restrictive methodology would supposedly “do violence to the history of Marxist thought.” He writes: “Western Marxists were intellectuals, often deeply engaged intellectuals, whose work responded to the events of their day. To understand the development of the concept of totality in their work is to probe that response.