Hey. I like Marxism.
(Good thing it's not the '60s.)
posted by Lauren | 10:31 PM
April Birds and May Bees
Ain't no Literature here, folks.
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- I should be reading about Marxism.
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13 Comments:
lauren, what a coincidence... i just got a free copy of The Communist Manifesto: Marx & Engels and have really enjoyed studying it. Fascinating...
i'm really fond of the dialetic-idea he borrowed from hegel with the thesis + antithesis = synthesis... good good stuff. brain candy.
oh, and i really enjoyed your "how to" piece.
oh, and... thanks for including me among other note-worthy blogs...
Marxism, Lauren? MARXISM? *sigh* I'm a neo-romantic though, so I'm hardly one to criticize.
Also, if you were in the 60's, you'd be sitting pretty! Marxism was all the rage among young Americans. You could be a beatnik or a hippie (depending on which part of the 60's you chose).
David: I'm reading about how to apply it to literary criticism. Interesting. I mean, the obvious way is by looking for class struggles, etc. within the text, but the whole idea of dialetic materialism is really interesting. Hmm. (And thanks for the compliment on the "How-To" piece.)
Ian: Yeah, Marxism. And if it ever was "popular" to be a Marxist in America, it became increasingly "unpopular" around the time of the cold war. I was referring to McCarthyism. Red Scare. All of that.
I guess that was the '50s, though, huh?
And, Ian, you're just saying that because you lived in Berkeley.
No, I'm saying that because I think he's hopelessly naive; because I think his assessment of religion is hopelessly shallow, focused as it is entirely on certain superficial features endemic to European Christianity and Judaism; and because I find his assertion that the ideological realm must effectively be done away with by adopting a NEW ideology to be inherently contradictory...
I guess I just feel that historical materialism is overly-simplistic and grounded in a lot of ignorant assumptions about human society and nature. I'm also not crazy about Freud or Hume for that matter.
Although i will admit, my anti-Marx sentiments were largely grounded in unreasoning hatred until I read "The Communist Manifesto" in 11th Grade and realized I had actual philosophical, intellectual and ideological issues with his writings. And yes, Berkeley DID colour my opinion just a tad. ;-)
Heh. Sorry about that. I'm writing a paper now so my mind is in "refutation/aggression" mode.
Huh. I also really like Freud, Ian. Sorry.
(By the way, I totally would have been a beatnik.)
And I don't necessarily agree with Marx's thoughts on religion. I believe it has the potential to be the "opium for the masses." But that doesn't detract from his theories about capitalism or materialism or alienation or reification...
I feel like a snob now. I quit.
Oh, I definitely think Marx helped shock Western society out of the intellectual and economic complacency into which it had slipped. I just don't agree with most of the methods or methodologies he advocated.
Whatever our beliefs about Marx & Freud, it seems that we can agree on how much Beatniks rocked. It's all about Maynard G. Krebs, seriously!
And don't worry: we're all snobs. :D
Okay. I literally just went to bed and was thinking about that last comment I wrote. I don't like that I wrote that. I should explain that I actually do know what those long words mean. But only because I looked them up last night as I was reading. And we went over them in class tonight.
I'm not a snob.
But I do have to add to your comment Ian that I do NOT think that "we" have been shocked out of intellectual or economic complacency AT ALL. The only possible exceptions would be the current welfare system and social security. But those systems were only implemented after the Depression (when capitalism almost failed completely, I might add).
I'm not a snob.
I guess I don't know as much about economic history as I probably should, but it seems like Marx and his contemporaries helped usher in an age of greater economic experimentation. I guess that could probably be attributed to the industrial revolution itself, but it seems like he helped change the way people thought about work, labour and society. More and more people started suggesting and trying to implement alternative models. And by presenting a supposed alternative to capitalism, they helped people conceive of different ways of living in the world. That's really all I meant.
Also, I assumed that your comment about snobbery was intended in jest.
I'm sorry if I seem combatitive. I'm not trying to argue. I'm just enjoying the intelligent dialogue here, which I haven't been getting from my classes lately.
You're right. I guess my problem was with the "Western society" part. It really depends on who that refers to -- the citizens (and by Marxist theory that would be divided into smaller groups), or economists, or maybe unions, etc. He defintely shook it up a bit. I just don't know about any lack of "complacency." That's all I was trying to say.
And I wasn't kidding about the "snob" comment; I really dislike when I come across people trying to show off a vocabulary that they can't back up with definitions or anything more than vague hand gestures.
(And I wasn't mad when I was writing any of this, if that's what you think. Don't dish it out if you can't take it. :))
Heh. People are always getting mad at me, finding (I suppose) my comments to be a bit...acerbic? That's why I've begun interjecting "emoticons" into any on-line posts I make. I'm glad I haven't raised your ire though!
I think that from the context it was clear you knew the meanings of those words, because you can't really understand most English translations of Marx without knowing them.
Rock, rock on!
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