In this year of bicentennial celebration, there will no doubt take place several cultural analyses of the American tradition. This is only as it should be, for without an extensive, broad-based inquiry into where we have come from, we shall surely not foresee where we might go. Nonetheless, most cultural analyses of the American context suffer from a common fault - the lack of a different context to use for purposes of comparison. True, American values and ideals were partly inherited from the European tradition. But that tradition is in many ways an inadequate mode of comparison. Without going too far afield, let us note two points: first, European culture was the proud inheritor of the Renaissance tradition, and, going back still further, of classical culture; second, the European countries are compact. Their land masses are such that the notion of "frontier" simply would not have arisen in the same way as it did in America. On the other side of the globe, however, there does exist a country capable of serving as a suitable mirror. We speak, of course, of Russia. That country also came relatively late onto the cultural horizon, and was not privy to the Renaissance tradition. Furthermore, her land mass is such as to be "experi­ mentally infmite" in character - not unlike the American frontier. It is hoped that much can be leamed about the present cultural context by com­ paring the two countries in their youthful stages.

Inhalt

I: The Cultural Beginnings.- I / The Importance of Ambiguity in Russian and American Culture.- The American Context.- Frontier as Creative Edge.- The Russian Context.- History As Messianic.- The Global Village as Ambiguous.- II / Chaadayev and Emerson - Two Mystical Pragmatists.- Peter Chaadayev.- Ralph Waldo Emerson.- Conclusion.- III / Herzen and James: Freedom as Radical.- Alexander Herzen.- The Context: An Unfinished, Uncertain Universe.- Thinking and Doing: The Efficacy of the Human Person.- William James.- The Efficacy of the Human Person in the "Stream of Consciousness".- The Context as Unfinished, Uncertain Universe.- Conclusion.- IV / Royce and Khomyakov on Community as Process.- Josiah Royce.- Alexis Khomyakov.- V / Art vs. Science in Dewey and Chernyshevsky.- Dewey on Art and Science.- Chernyshevsky on Art and Science.- Conclusion.- VI / Underlying Themes and the Present Cultural Context.- The Revolt Against Cartesianism.- The Human Being as Participator.- The Context: An Unfinished, Mysterious Universe.- The Interpenetration of Thought and Action.- The Importance of Time and History.- Community as Constraint.- Conclusion.- II: Contemporary Soviet Reactions.- VII / Marxist-Leninist Philosophy and Social History.- The Marxist-Leninist Ideology.- Dialectical Materialism.- Historical Materialism.- Marxist-Leninist Historiography of Philosophy.- Problems of Social and National Conditioning.- VIII / Soviet Reaction to Some Nineteenth-Century Philosophers.- The General Soviet View on Russian Philosophy.- The General Soviet View on American Philosophy.- The Soviets on Chaadayev and Emerson.- The Soviets on Herzen and James.- The Soviets on Khomyakov and Royce.- The Soviets on Chernyshevsky and Dewey.- IX / Underlying Themes in Contemporary Marxist-Leninist Philosophy.- Anti-Cartesianism.- The Human Being as Participator.- Scientism versus Contextualism.- Theory and Practice.- Temporality and Historicism.- Community.- Epilogue: Final Thoughts.- Notes.- Index of Names and Titles.