Mannheim, Karl

Mannheim, Karl (män'hīm) [key], 1893–1947, Austro-Hungarian sociologist and historian, born and educated in Hungary. He taught at Heidelberg and Frankfurt and, from 1933 to his death, at the Univ. of London. In his historical writings he emphasized the role of social values. Mannheim was influenced by—but critical of—Karl Marx. His best-known work is Ideology and Utopia (1929, tr. 1936), but his essays were influential in developing the field of the sociology of knowledge, which studies how ideas should be analyzed in their social context.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

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