Documents of research on "Experiences about antisemitism" by the Institute of Social Research

Title: Documents of research on "Experiences about antisemitism" by the Institute of Social Research
Date Created: October 1943
Creator: Max Horkheimer
Identifier: Na 1 Nachlass Max Horkheimer, 683 - 'Erfahrungen mit dem Antisemitismus' (p. IX 146a.1-5)
Original Location: Aufbau magazine and the Horkheimer estate
Current Location: Max Horkheimer Archive, University of Frankfurt (Na 1 Nachlass Max Horkheimer, 683 - 'Erfahrungen mit dem Antisemitismus' (p. IX 146a.1-5))
Description: The three documents displayed here – a German-language call for participation in a research contest, a circular letter to prospective contributors, and a handwritten evaluation sheet – mark the beginning of a collaborative study on antisemitism conducted in 1943 by the Frankfurt scholars of the Institute of Social Research in exile and the American Jewish Committee. Together, they record not only the launch of a research project but the material traces of how knowledge moved across languages, institutions, and political contexts during the Second World War. The magazine article solicited personal testimonies from German-speaking émigrés; the letter framed the project’s aims for contributors; and the evaluation sheet reveals how responses were assessed and categorized. Annotated and handled by multiple actors, the documents embody the layered and collective nature of social scientific production.

These materials exemplify the 'circulation of knowledge' through multiple forms of translation. First, there is literal linguistic translation: German émigré scholars addressing displaced German-speaking participants while working within an American institutional framework. Second, there is methodological translation: critical-theoretical concerns about antisemitism were reformulated into empirical social research practices compatible with American scientific discourse and funding structures. Finally, there is institutional translation: a European intellectual tradition, represented by the Frankfurt School, was re-situated within American academia and the Scientific Department of the American Jewish Committee, creating a hybrid space of research shaped by exile, philanthropy, and wartime politics. The later publication of the Studies in Prejudice series (1950), including The Authoritarian Personality, would become the most visible outcome of this exchange, but these modest working documents reveal the practical, multilingual, and collaborative processes that made such intellectual transfer possible.
Credit: Experiences about Antisemitism. Documents of a Research Project between Frankfurt Migrant Scholars and American Researchers, 1943. Digitized by the J.C. Senckenberg University Library Frankfurt am Main.
Link: https://sammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/horkheimer/content/titleinfo/5668701
Contributor: Dr. Eszter Pál, Associate Professor, Department of Social Theory, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary