Aligned with the French Communist Party, philosopher Louis Althusser (1918-1990) strove to explain contemporary developments by reinterpreting the doctrines of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Louis Althusser was born at Birmandreis, Algeria (then a...

Louis Althusser was one of the most important Communist philosophers of the late twentieth century. From his bases at the Ecole Normale Supérieure, where he taught for more than thirty years, and in the Parti Communiste Français (PCF;...

L ouis Althusser was, of modern times, undoubtedly the most influential of all Marxist political thinkers. The more so, perhaps, as he came to personify the Socratic ideal of a philosopher without an oeuvre, his two best-known books, For Marx (1965) and Reading "Capital"...

PAUL ROAZEN is professor emeritus at York University. His most recent book is How Freud Worked: First-hand Accounts of Patients. IN libraries across North America, Freud's works are catalogued under the designation "Philosophy," and therefore writings in the tradition of thought he...

In the following essay, Block analyzes the relationships between the works of Althusser, Marx, and Hegel.

In the following essay, James discusses the influence Althusser's conception of materialism has had on other thinkers and points out some of the problems with his arguments.

In the following essay, Rhodes discusses Althusser's work on ideology and the aesthetic as it applies specifically to mass culture. In addition he analyzes the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off in relation to an Althusserian approach to mass culture.