Abstract

__Theory of Objective Mind__ is the first book of the important German social philosopher Hans Freyer to appear in English. The work of the neo-Hegelian Freyer, especially the much admired __Theory of Objective Mind__, had a notable influence on German thinkers to follow and on America's two greatest social theorists, Talcott Parsons and Edward Shils._ Freyer took what remained valid in G. F. Hegel's work and drew upon the subsequent insights of the early work of Edmund Husserl in an effort to understand the nature of culture by clarifying methodologically the process of Verstehen, the relation between life and objectivated form and the formation of the historical world as described by Wilhelm Dilthey and especially Georg Simmel. _Theory of Objective Mind__ remains a thought-provoking source of insight into the nature of human cognition and action, and necessarily of culture itself. Indeed, its pressing relevance for social philosophy today is clear from its analysis of nationality as a form of objective mind. No less relevant are its valuable analyses of creativity, tradition, and revolution as philosophical problems. For all those who seek to understand culture not just historically or sociologically but above all philosophically, __Theory of Objective Mind__ is indispensable.