It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, May 08, 2019
Capitalism and climate change - can we avert disaster? - video
At a London public meeting, Elaine Graham-Leigh explains why climate change is a product of capitalism and the solution has to be one that confronts the system
Reification in the 21st Century
Lukacs’ Dialectic – the First Hundred Years
2008 is a centenary of sorts for the great Hungarian philosopher George Lukacs (1886-1971). A centenary because a hundred years ago, in Budapest, Lukacs produced his first work, a prize-winning study of German drama. In 1922, following his leading participation in the short-lived Hungarian Soviet Republic, Lukacs published his most influential work, a collection essays entitled History and Class Consciousness. Lukacs’ ‘problematic’ of a reified ‘false’ consciousness – which can only be grasped in relation to its non-reified liberatory alternative – deeply impacted on the philosophers of the 20th Century: especially Adorno, Sartre, Marcuse, Merleau-Ponty, Debord, Edward Said – and maybe even Heidegger. Lukacs continues to engage thinkers in various fields, even if most of them see his socialist “solution” as “class-bound” and therefore historically invalidated by the collapse of the Stalinist system he subsequently embraced and eventually hoped to see reformed democratically.
Reification and hegemony : the politics of culture in the writings of Georg Lukács and Antonio Gramsci, 1918-1938
Creator
Robinson, James.
Contributor
Hellman, John (Supervisor)
Date
Pages
1983
448
Abstract
This study is a comparison of the development of the theories of reification and hegemony in the writings and political activities of Georg Lukacs and Antonio Gramsci during the years from 1918 to 1938. In demonstrating that reification and hegemony were formulated in response to the unsuccessful revolutionary movements in Hungary and Italy of 1919-1920, it becomes evident that the respective theories of Lukacs and Gramsci were meant to constitute critiques of bourgeois cultural domination. Thus, their problematic extends to analyses of more specific issues, such as the role of positivist science as the prevailing "paradigm of rationality" and the instrumental function of "traditional" and "organic intellectuals." The solutions that both theorists sought in order to overcome reification and hegemony are embedded in their neo-Hegelian interpretations of Marxism, where historical materialism is defined as a methodology characterised by its utilisation of the conceptual tools of "dialectic," "totality," and "absolute historicism." However, Lukacs was forced by historical circumstances to retreat into the realm of aesthetics, although he continued the critique of reification by way of his theory of critical realism. Simultaneously, Gramsci began to elaborate more practical solutions to cultural domination through his theory of the "war of position," catharsis, and counter-hegemony.
Subject
Lukács, György, 1885-1971 -- Philosophy.
Gramsci, Antonio, 1891-1937 -- Philosophy.
Politics and culture -- Hungary -- History.
Politics and culture -- Italy -- History.
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
Department of History.
Rights
All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated.
© 2019 |
JUST RELEASED
Lukács’s Phenomenology of Capitalism
Reification Revalued
Author: Westerman, Richard
Offers one of the first full-scale accounts of Lukács’s Heidelberg Aesthetics in English.
Reveals the links between Lukács’s account of society and his philosophy of art.
Applies Lukács’s thought beyond the paradigm of class conflict, showing what it implies for analysis of human domination of nature, and the notion of rationality as such.
- This book offers a radical new interpretation of Georg Lukács’s History and Class Consciousness, showing for the first time how the philosophical framework for his analysis of society was laid in the drafts of a philosophy of art that he planned but never completed before he converted to Marxism. Reading Lukács’s work through the so-called “Heidelberg Aesthetics” reveals for the first time a range of unsuspected influences on his thought, such as Edmund Husserl, Emil Lask, and Alois Riegl; it also offers a theory of subjectivity within social relations that avoids many of the problems of earlier readings of his text. At a time when Lukács’s reputation is once more on the rise, this bold new reading helps revitalize his thought in ways that help it speak to contemporary concerns.
Reification and the Consciousness of the Proletariat by Georg Lukacs |
Lukács: Reification and the Class Consciousness of the Proletariat ... |
In Marxism, reification is the process by which social relations are perceived as inherent .... Arato, Andrew: Lukacs' Theory of Reification - Telos Press
The Conversion of Georg Lukács - Jacobin
Platypus Georg Lukács and his theory of "Reification" - Platypus
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reification: a recognition-Theoretical view - The Tanner Lectures on ... |
What is Reification – Academia - PhilArchive
Lukacs' theory of reification and contemporary social movements - Verso |
China Grabs More Canadian Oil as Dirty Crude Supplies Dwindle
(Bloomberg) -- China is snapping up more Canadian crude as global heavy oil supplies dwindle amid Iran sanctions and a political crisis in Venezuela.
Ambelos is the second tanker to leave Vancouver’s Westridge terminal this year bound for China, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It’s carrying more than half a million barrels of heavy Canadian crude, according to IHS Markit. It follows the Erik Spirit, which sailed to China’s Nanhai district from Westridge last month. The shipments happened even as Canadian heavy crude has sold at an average discount to West Texas Intermediate futures of less than $11 a barrel so far this year. READ ON
It is hard to overstate just how in the tank the corporate media is for the U.S. government overthrowing another government. It's as though they never read a history book. But it's worse than that, because you know they have read history books and continue to back this insanity anyway.
COMMONDREAMS.ORG
That elite media didn’t find a single person to vouch for Maduro or Chavismo, and that almost all the opinions explicitly or implicitly expressed support for the ouster of Venezuela’s elected president, demonstrates a firm editorial line, eerily obedient to the US government’s regime change po...
www.handsoffvenezuela.org |
"Modern society’s systemic problem is capitalism, not this or that kind of capitalism."
COMMONDREAMS.ORG
By democratizing our workplaces, we can supplant the dominant ecomomic system which cannot escape its intrinsic exploitation of labor.. As capitalism drives itself into ever-greater inequality, instability and injustice, its critics multiply. Worried defenders react in two ways. Many dismiss the cri...
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