Joseph Dietzgen
| Joseph Dietzgen | |
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| Born | October 28, 1828 Blankenberg, Germany |
| Died | April 15, 1888 Chicago, United States |
| Era | 19th century philosophy |
| Region | Western Philosophy |
| School | Socialism, Marxism |
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Main interests
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Epistemology, Logic, Dialectics |
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Notable ideas
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Dialectical materialism |
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Peter Josef Dietzgen (October 28, 1828 – April 15, 1888) was a German socialist philosopher, Marxist and journalist. Joseph was born in Blankenberg in the Rhine Province of Prussia. He was the first of five children of father Johann Gottfried Anno Dietzgen (1794–1887) and mother Anna Margaretha Lückerath (1808–1881). He was, like his father, a tanner by profession; inheriting his uncle's business in Siegburg. Entirely self-educated, he developed the notion of dialectical materialism independently from Marx and Engels as an independent philosopher of socialist theory. His publications had major influences on Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution of 1917, which are rarely commented on today. Ludwig Feuerbach's works had a great influence on his early theories. He had one son, Eugene Dietzgen.
Early on in his youth, Joseph Dietzgen worked with the famed '48ers of the 1848 German Revolution. It was there that he first met Karl Marx and other socialist revolutionaries, and began his career as a socialist philosopher. Following the failure of the 1848 Revolution he spent some time in the United States from 1849 to 1851, returning once again for a visit from 1859 to 1861. While in the New World he traversed the American South and witnessed first hand the lynchings which had come to characterize the slave states. During the period between his travels, Dietzgen joined the Alliance of Communists with Karl Marx back in Germany in 1852. In 1853, after marrying his wife Cordula Finke, he established his tannery business in Winterscheid, Germany. When he returned to the United States in 1859 he set up another tannery in Montgomery, Alabama. From 1864 to 1868, he lived with his son Eugene in St. Petersburg, where he was headmaster in the state tannery. He worked with the Tsar of Russia on improvement of the Russian methods. During his time spent in Russia he wrote one of his earliest texts, The Nature of Human Brain-Work, which was published in 1869. Upon his first reading of the text, Marx forwarded a copy to Engels, remarking, "My opinion is that J. Dietzgen would do better to condense all his ideas into two printer's sheets and have them published under his own name as a tanner. If he publishes them in the size he is proposing, he will discredit himself with his lack of dialectical development and his way of going round in circles."[1] While he traveled, his wife managed the family tannery business back in Germany until he returned in mid-1869. Once he was back home, he was visited by Marx and his daughter, who proclaimed that Joseph had become "the Philosopher" of socialism. By 1870, Marx had embraced Dietzgen as a friend, and later praised him and his theory of dialectical materialism in the 2nd edition of the first volume of Das Kapital.
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