Joseph Dietzgen

Peter Josef Dietzgen, known as Joseph Dietzgen ( born December 9, 1828 in town of Blankenberg, now part of Hennef in the Rhein- Sieg-Kreis, † April 15, 1888 in Chicago ) was a materialist philosopher, socialist theorist and journalist of the German workers' movement or. the German workers' movement in New York and Chicago.

Life & work

Family and Education

Peter Josef Dietzgen was born into an old established Gerber and farming family of victory valley. He was the first of five children of Johann Gottfried Anno Dietzgen tanner (1794-1887) and his wife Anna Margaretha Lückerath ( 1808-1881 ). About the siblings practically nothing is known. Two brothers are mentioned on the occasion of family issues in letters. There I learn their names, Philip and Cornell, and by the way that they are eventually emigrated to the United States.

The father of Joseph, Johann Dietzgen had learned the tanning trade with his father and settled in town of Blankenburg with its own business, which he in 1835 Uckerath, a village with about 400 inhabitants, moved. Father, Johann, is described by Eugen Dietzgen, the oldest son, Joseph Dietzgen, as portly, "real petty bourgeois " who had earned a modest prosperity. About the mother testified that she was " mentally highly predisposed ".

Of the parents Joseph is after visiting the elementary school in Uckerath the two-year visit to the Cologne public school and subsequently half a year makes a visit to the Latin school of the parish priest in the nearby Oberpleis. For that time extremely unusual Josef begins his four-year apprenticeship as a tanner with his father until the age of 17 years. During the apprenticeship, he found the opportunity, taught himself French and in the memoirs written by Eugene D. The story goes that while working always an open book was lying beside him. The books he read had been philosophical, national economic and beautiful spiritual nature. A playmate from childhood and boyhood friend, Josef Schmitz, who studied law in Bonn and was a member of a fraternity there was an opportunity for discussion and debate on policy issues and possibly gave the impetus to read the literature of the " Jeune France" and the " young Germany ". A few received poems from the pen of Joseph Dietzgen from the period around 1848 reflect quite the enthusiasm for the "social question " resist, as they can also be found in the products of the literary pre-March period. Considering that Dietzgen was acquainted with the literature of the early French socialists such as Henri de Saint -Simon, Louis Blanc and Pierre Joseph Proudhon at this time, there is no evidence. Tradition has it, however, that he was an admirer of Pierre -Jean de Beranger and translated into German by Ferdinand Freiligrath Scottish poet Robert Burns. Béranger portrait adorned yet 1882 Dietzgen study.

Political commitment and global citizenship

Even Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels interested him. He held seditious speeches in Uckerath. He left Germany in 1848 in the course of revolutionary events and went into exile in the United States. He lived there as a teacher, Gerber, House Painter or tramp. He returned in 1851 returned to Germany and worked at his father. In 1852 he became a member of the " League of Communists ." 1853, after his marriage with Cordula Finke from Drolshagen, he founded in Winter Scheid a grocery store with a bakery and tannery. Soon he also opened a branch in Ruppichteroth. In winter Scheid, the couple had four daughters ( Adelgunde 1854-1859, Margaret * 1855, * 1857 and Pauline Adelgunde 1859-1869/70 ). Two sons were 1862 ( Eugene, † 1929) and 1870 (Peter Joseph) born.

1859 Dietzgen emigrated for economic reasons again in the United States and established a tannery in Montgomery, Alabama, where he campaigned for the abolition of slavery. In 1861 he returned to the outbreak of Civil War back to his father. He was president founded 1862 Siegburger company for academic conversation. In 1864 he co-founded the International Working Men's Association, which sought among other things to the workers of the Siegburger calico and the Friedrich- Wilhelms-Hütte.

In 1863, he applied to become a Announce the Cologne Gazette, received an on-site visit by the Russian chamberlain Gouraux and traveled with this from. From 1864 to 1868 he was head of a Regierungslohgerberei in Saint Petersburg, Russia, where he quintupled the production and the work of The Nature of Human Brain Work wrote that was printed in 1869 after his return to Hamburg.

1869 Dietzgen inherited the tannery of his uncle in Siegburg and returned despite the successes in the home. At this time, Dietzgen a prominent figure within the socialist movement in Germany. He then lived in Siegburg, where he was visited in 1869 by Karl Marx, according to sources with daughter. This praised him at a conference in The Hague with the words: "This is our philosopher ," and praised him for his economic thinking in the preface of his first volume of Capital (2nd edition 1873). 1869 Dietzgen was a member of the Social Democratic Workers' Party and wrote at this time for the Social Democratic press. He also had close contact with the major Heidelberg philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach.

Persecution and emigration

1880 demand after mentioning the Social Democrat of Berlin in Siegburg, " what is this Dietzgen for a subject and if there were more social democrats in Siegburg ". The response of the mayor was that there's just this one, the retired live as tanners and occasionally write for the Social Democrats. That was a reassuring statement and would have fit on the brother of Joseph, Philip Dietzgen, who was the only member of the Social Democrats and tanners in Eitorf 1861-1875.

After the introduction of the Anti-Socialist Laws, the two unsuccessful attempts on Kaiser Wilhelm I served as a pretext, the Social Democrats were more sharply observed. One of the now eight Siegburger Social Democrats, the shoemaker Joseph Palm, expressed in a business visit politically incorrect to the emperor, was betrayed, arrested and committed suicide. June 8th 1878 Dietzgen was arrested for the points made in Cologne and later printed article: The Future of Social Democracy. He was three months later acquitted, released his writings. In 1880 he sent his son Eugene in the United States. This he later appropriated the rights to the publication of his writings, but ordered the transfer of funds to the town of Siegburg.

In 1884 he emigrated permanently with the other children in the United States, where he worked as editor of the socialist in New York and from 1886 for the workers vote in Chicago. Dietzgen died on 15 April 1888 in Chicago.

Dialectical materialism

Josef Dietzgen wrote independently of Marx and Engels theories of a dialectical materialism. Later, he became familiar with the theories of Marx and Engels and ardent supporter of their assumptions, as a letter to Marx Dietzgen occupied.

Honors

On the place of his birth house is a bronze relief was set up with his portrait: " Here was the birthplace of the philosopher Josef Dietzgen workers 1828-1888 ". In his native city, the Josef Dietzgen Street was named after him.

On 30 January 1933 the district Buckow the " Dietzgenweg " was in Berlin- Neukölln, named after him, which was renamed on August 8, 1935 in " Glimmerweg ". On 12 April 1951, the " Dietzgenstraße " was renamed after him in Berlin 's Pankow district.

On 18 July 1978, the stamp shown here was issued in his honor.

Works (selection)

• A few words about the nature of money; The Lassalle's ideas; The Social Question ( host stem crises ); Labor and capital; The art and crafts; The science and craft. In: Palm Leaf, St. Petersburg 1868
• Sketches from the field of political economy. In: Gerber newspaper. Newspaper for leather production and leather trade. May 31, 1868
• The essence of the human brain work. Portrayed by a manual worker. A repeated criticism but of pure and practical reason, Otto Meissner, Hamburg 1869 online
• Bourgeois society. Lecture. Publisher of the cooperative book printing, Leipzig 1876
• The religion of social democracy. Five sermons. 3 verm edition Publisher of the cooperative book printing, Leipzig 1877
• National economic. Lectures. 2nd impression. Publisher of the cooperative book printing, Leipzig 1877 Digitized edition of the University and State Library Dusseldorf
• Anonymous: Capped Theology. In: The new time. Review of intellectual and public life in 1883, No. 7, pp. 327-331 online
• Wanderings of a socialist into the territory of the Erkenntnißtheorie. Publisher of the People's bookstore, Hottingen - Zurich 1887 ( Social Democratic library 18)
• The human soul. In: The new time. Review of intellectual and public life. 6 (1888 ), No. 6, pp. 272-278 online
• All writings, ed.. 4 of Eugene Dietzgen, Wiesbaden, 1911 edition, Berlin, 1930.
• Writings in three volumes, ed. by the Working Group of philosophy at the German Academy of Sciences of the GDR, Berlin, Berlin, 1961, 1962, 1965.
• The essence of the human brain work and other writings. Edited and with an afterword by Hellmut G. Haasis, Darmstadt, Neuwied, Luchterhand, Luchterhand Collection, No. 50, 1973.