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♡ MLM reading & studying list for studying Dialectical Materialism! ₊˚⊹ᰔ

>> all of these should be available on the Marxist Internet Archive, with just a single!

1. On practice by Mao!

the first work, Mao describes the Marixst theory of knowledge, the stages through with perception moves to knowledge. the dialectical cycle of the contradiction between the external world and consciousness which first leads to perceptual knowledge, and then through study and analysis to rational knwoledge, and how knowledge can be used to interact and change the external world in ways that allows this cycle to repeat, until the most appropriate theory and thus practice can develop!

as a work by mao, it is written in simple language and is meant to be approachable by the vast masses of people. it's a must study to understand how we, as Marxist, must interact with the world to develop correct practice!

2. On contradiction by Mao!

this work describes contradicton, which forms the basis of dialectics, their properties and how to understand them, and their self movement. Materialist Dialectics forms the fundamental all encompassing world view of Marxism and thus it is essential to understand dialectics.

3. Conspectus on Hegel's science of logic by Lenin!

this is a difficult work, however, is much, much more profound than Lenin's prior philosophical work- materialism and emperio criticism. many of the mechanistic materialist erros of Engels adoped by lenin had been shed in this work, and materialist dialectics were described and understood in their most fundamental form. it includes many, many quotes from Hegel which Lenin had jotted down, annotations and commentaries by Lenin. it is all in all a very significant work.

4. Conspectus on Hegel's Philosophy of history by Lenin!

this is also a collection of quotes, commentaries, and annotations by lenin on Hegel's Philosophy of history. it's a much short work, but captures the kernel of historical materialism.

5. Dialectical logic by illyenkov!

a profound and difficult work, where illyenkov traced the history of philosophical Dialectics from Descartes to hegel, from feuerbach to marx, and then described several important problems of Dialectics, such as the materialist dialectical notion of thought and consciousness, philosophical monism, etc.

6. The holy Family, by Marx and Engels!

an important work by marx and Engels, in the backdrop of the two line struggle in the realm of philosophy, where Marx and Engels firmly led the struggle against the Young Hegelians, specifically the Young hegelians Bruno Bauer, and firmly described the revolutionary philosophy and world view of the proleteriat- dialectical materialism.

7. On dialectics, by Lenin.

finally, a short, but incredibally dense work which captured the essene of Dialectics in a single essay by lenin. it's always an excellent reference for Marxist Dialectics.

theuncannyprofessoro

Reading Notes 1: Marx and Engels to Althusser to Benjamin

In “The Ruling Class and The Ruling Ideas,” “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses,” and “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Louis Althusser, and Walter Benjamin, respectively, provide insight on our introduction to ideology and culturalism.

What is the division of mental and material labour and how does it manifest in society?

What is the relationship between the state apparatus and the ideological state apparatuses?

How have the processes of reproducing works of art changed over time, and how have changes in reproduction altered the relationship between a piece of art and its “original” object?

willtarica

The class that has the means of material labor also controls mental labor; one class rules all. The ruling class divides mental and material labor so that one half of the class appears to be the thinkers while the other is passive in reality as they are more busy and have less time to think (Pg. 59-60). I found it similar to studio executives in Hollywood and how they pay for the hard work of the cast and crew yet they don't do any actual work themselves just to take most of the money.

Althusser wrote that the state apparatus coercively favors the upper class while the ideological state apparatuses spread the message of the state apparatus ideology for the ruling class to have control (Pg. 92-93).

A long time ago, art was produced manually and couldn’t be duplicated, but after the invention of the camera and printing press, art could be reproduced infinitely. Even though this allowed more people to view art, Benjamin wrote how this had a negative effect on the soul of the individual piece, losing its unique value as it can be mass produced (Pg. 666-668).

Marx, Karl. Marx and Engels Collected Works Volume 5: Marx and Engels 1845-47. Lawrence & Wishart Limited, 1976.

Sharma, Aradhana, and Akhil Gupta. The anthropology of the state: A reader. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing, 2006.

Braudy, Leo, and Marshall Cohen. Film theory and criticism: Introductory readings. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.

willtarica

Analytical Application 3: Poststructuralism and Postmodernism

Difference: Gilles Deleuze

Definition: Giles Deleuze writes in "Introduction: Repetition and Difference," that the term "difference" is a fundamental idea in his writings and he describes it as not a way to measure the distance between two things, but actually an existential ideology of abundance and growth. Deleuze writes how this does not create stability and instead focuses on the atypical aspects of reality.

Analysis: In Gilles Deleuze's "Introduction: Repetition and Difference," he writes about his understanding of the term "difference," by suggesting it should be a basic concept in society, not just by its literal definition. Deleuze speaks on how difference is inherent in the very essence of reality, far more than just the difference of two people as an example. He says that difference creates diversity. We see this idea in "Run Lola Run" (1998), directed by Tom Tykwer. In the scene where Lola runs into a homeless man on the street, Deleuze’s concept of difference is exemplified (00:17:43). Specifically, Lola is sprinting down the street while the homeless man is walking in the other direction. She is focused on the task at hand to save her boyfriend Manni. The homeless man juxtaposes the motion of Lola. The bustling streets around him as well as Lola don't affect him.

Delezue’s idea is that difference is what makes individuality stand out. “Run Lola Run” compares the diversity of the city by examining many different people and their differences. The encounter with the homeless man shows how people coexist in a large city. Everyone is living their lives, going about their day in a different manner and that's okay. Deleuze is saying how difference is far more than its literal meaning since it's what progresses our society. In just a small scene in the film, we gain so much meaning out of a simple interaction that anyone can have at any time and anywhere. What makes it special is how this interaction is not special at all.

Deleuze, Gilles. “Introduction: Repetition and Difference.” Essay. In Repetition and Difference, 1–27. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1994.

Hyperreality: Jean Baudrillard

Definition: Jean Baudrillard wrote in "Simulacra and Simulations," how the definition of "hyperreality" is when simulations are more important than reality itself. He describes it as when reality and its clone are more similar than you can tell. The line between the two becomes non-existent. Hyperreality is when simulations are so similar to real life that it creates a disconnect from truth.

Analysis: Jean Baudrillard writes about the term "hyperreality" in his work "Simulacra and Simulation" where he defines it as the lack of a boundary between real life and a simulation. Where a fake world is more real than actual life. In the film "Run Lola Run,"this idea is highlighted in the scene where the main character of the story, Lola, has an encounter with the security guard at the supermarket (00:27:00). Lola runs into the supermarket that her boyfriend Mainni is robbing. She hits the security guard in between her and Manni on the back of the head. This scene is intense and quick editing and a techno soundtrack to back it. This is all intentional to create a simulation style in the world of the film. The events can be changed after each go around.

Baudrillard ideas of hyperreality are so prevalent in this scene because the film is stylized with over exaggerated moments of violence, camera-movement and character emotions. This scene is overwhelming for the viewer since it's so thrilling and fast paced. This scene displays the theme of what you can and can't control and what to do about it. Lola tries to prevent the future cycle of events in the film that is put on a loop. A loop that has nuances from its previous sequence. The supermarket scene in the film shows Lola’s journey through Berlin as hyperrealistic. The setting in the fast-paced city with quick cuts further intensifies this relatively short movie.

Baudrillard, Jean. “Simulacra and Simulations.” Essay. In Modernism/ Postmodernism, 151–62. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014.

Parody: Fredric Jameson

Definition: In Fredric Jameson’s writing "Postmodernism and Consumer Society" he speaks on and defines the term "parody" as an critical imitation of something to subvert its meaning. Jamesons point is that in postmodernism, parody is important to relief in making fun of anything, whether it's political, a societal examination or an event in the past.

Analysis: According to Fredric Jameson in "Postmodernism and Consumer Society," a parody in current society is the act of replicating something ironically using historical artistic styles to further the motive of the creator of the piece. Parody is pastiche in the sense that it calls back to significant cultural events for nostalgia purposes. In the animated sequence of “Run Lola Run,” this term is put at the forefront of this sequence (0:12:05). This visually impressive scene is stylized with its animation of Lola running out of her building to start her journey to help her boyfriend. The scene is a parody of the storytelling of the movement of time by changing the entire look of the film.

Jameson argued that parody is pastiche which this scene further proves. The sequence uses standard animated tropes to keep the viewer on the edge of their seat. Familiarity brings comfort in a film as fast paced and unique as this. Meanwhile, this scene is also honoring animated sequences it took inspiration from by using a range of hand-drawn and computerized animation to exemplify the purity of the artform. “Run Lola Run” has a wide range of cinematic styles to keep the audience engaged in a story essentially repeating itself three different times. Without such an interesting look to the film, “Run Lola Run” would not be as dense with great cinematography. The film purposely uses familiar artistic techniques to reflect the narrative style of past films of a wide array of genres and styles.

Jameson, Fredric. “Postmodernism and Consumer Society.” Essay. In Modernism/ Postmodernism, 163–79. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014.

Postmodern: Fredric Jameson

Definition: Fredric Jameson defines the term "postmodern" in "Postmodernism and Consumer Society" as a point in time where traditional values are rejected and a new ideology is created. Jameson writes how a postmodern world has lost its faith in capitalism and challenges the status quo, marking a shift in society itself.

Analysis: Fredric Jameson delves into the idea of postmodernism in "Postmodernism and Consumer Society." He describes capitalism as the cause of a postmodern movement that goes against the economic and social ideology of the current establishment. In the film “Run Lola Run,” this term is highlighted in the opening scene (00:00:00). Setting the tone for what's to come, the first scene in the film uses shattered imagery and intense techno sound that is common in Berlin where the film is set. The kick from the techno pounds like a constant beating heart. Quick cut images of Lola’s face, the city and flashing lights pierce the screen. Jameson would analyze this scene and connect it to the fragmentation of postmodernism. Where imagery and signs are fragmented and deepening the meaning of the film.

“Run Lola Run” encapsulates the notion of postmodernism as it references contemporary society while the fast pacing of the film immerses the audience. The story itself isn't linear and we see versions of this opening sequence two more times throughout the film. The story is fragmented and the quick cuts along with the speed of Lola running and traversing the streets of Berlin makes the story even more unsettling. Moreover, this scene also relates to Jamesons writing about pastiche since it uses cinematography to critique the climate of Germany at the time when the movie was set. Germany is a fast-paced techno country that is progressive but still has its problems just like any country does. The visuals, editing and sound of “Run Lola Run” emphasizes postmodernism in the film.

Jameson, Fredric. “Postmodernism and Consumer Society.” Essay. In Modernism/ Postmodernism, 163–79. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014.

Simulation: Jean Baudrillard

Definition: In "Simulacra and Simulations," Jean Baudrillard defines "simulation" as the process of copying a reality and removing it from its original meaning, making the world hyperrealistic. A simulation can vary from imagery to symbols. Moreover, Baudrillard even wrote how simulations can make their own reality instead of simply imitating another.

Analysis: Jean Baudrillard writes about the term "simulation" in "Simulacra and Simulations" as a process where a sign loses its original meaning and is now of a hyperreality. This can be related to the scene where Lola nearly gets hit by a truck in the film “Run Lola Run” (01:04:00). Lola sprints through the streets of Berlin attempting to save her boyfriend Manni, but when she runs across the street, a truck comes from nowhere and almost hits her. This scene exemplifies the definition of simulation since this moment happens so quickly, the line between reality and a hyper reality is blurred.

Baudrillard believed that the modern world simulations have become so common in society that you cannot even tell what the originality even is. He claims that these simulations have the power to create their own hyperrealistic world. As in the scene with the truck driver, this moment comes as a shock to not only the characters but also the audience. The scene is equally as surreal as it is intense. A truck coming so close to hitting her is hyperrealistic. It's a moment so perfect that it almost can't be real. The truck driver is clearly angry in this scene since he yells at Lola. he's the stereotype of the angry truck driver whose impact on the story is by chance. Maybe if he drove slowly, he would've never encountered Lola. This is just one of the many questions that you can ask yourself about the cause of this scene, further displaying its hyper realistic qualities.

Baudrillard, Jean. “Simulacra and Simulations.” Essay. In Modernism/ Postmodernism, 151–62. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014.

mssbdr

🚨 We Need Your Kindness to Survive 🚨

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grandpasessions

It is only fair to say that Riviere’s account of the case in question often reads as an oversimplified application of psychoanalytic theory and its “readymade” concepts, rather than as analysis proper. Yet crucial for our argument here is her next step, which brought the article its (deserved) fame, and in which she arrives at a more general conclusion, not necessarily related to this particular woman’s history and psyche: femininity (or womanliness) as such is nothing but this susceptibility to wear femininity as a mask (that is to say, to wear castration as a mask).

There is no “true femininity” as opposed to femininity as masquerade:

The reader may now ask how I define womanliness or where I draw the line between genuine womanliness and the “masquerade.” My suggestion is not, however, that there is any such difference; whether radical or superficial. They are the same thing. (Riviere 1929, 306)

One can be a woman only if one is not “intrinsically so”—at its most genuine, femininity is masquerade. In this precise sense it is perhaps not enough to say that there is no essence of femininity; one could go a step further and say that the essence of femininity is to pretend to be a woman.

What is Sex Alenka Zupancic

grandpasessions

The One at stake in the S_1 which the subject produces, so to say, at the ideal point of analysis, is, differently from the One at stake in repetition, the One as One alone [Un seul]. It is the One so far as, whatever the difference that exists, of all the differences that exist and that all have the same value, there is only one, and that is the difference.

It is crucial to note that in the quote from Lacan above, the emphasis is on production: what is at stake is not that in the course of analysis one finds the missing signifier—the latter is precisely not something that could be found, dug up from the unconscious. For it is most literally not there (and this is why there is the unconscious—the unconscious is the crack implied by the one-less). This is not a repressed signifier, but a signifier whose non-being is the only thing that makes repression possible, and structurally precedes it. (This is where Freud introduced the hypothesis of “primal repression.”)

The new signifier, S_1, does not replace this “hole” with which the signifying order appears, it does not close it or do away with it; rather, it produces it (by producing its letter) as something that can work as an emancipatory weapon. In what sense?

Briefly put, the operation of the analytic discourse consists in making a model of neurosis. Why? Because this robs it of the dose of enjoyment. This enjoyment does not demand any privilege; there is only one way to do it for everybody. All reduplication kills it. It survives only so far as its repetition is hollow [vaine], that is to say, always the same. And it is the introduction of the model that ends [achève] this hollow repetition. The achieved [achevée] repetition dissolves it, since it is a simplified repetition.

Enjoyment is thus the very means of production of the signifier that eventually kills it off; this signifier interposes itself between the (signifying) enjoyment and the hole/gap at the place of which the latter appears, “takes place.”

The new signifier is the algorithm that disorients the drive by cutting off the well-established routes of its satisfaction. It is what inserts itself at the very core of the double face of the drive and of its “satisfaction.”

In itself, the drive is quite indiscriminate, indifferent toward what it satisfies along the path of pursuing its one and only goal, which is simply to “return into circuit”, that is, to repeat itself, as Deleuze reads this. This is the “affirmative” force of repetition (repetition for the sake of repetition) related to the drive: not something that failed, but repetition itself as the sole “drive” of the drive.

The drive is always satisfied.

However, in its very indifference it is also always supportive of whatever complicated paths and extraordinary objects our enjoyment may choose under the sign of repression. It doesn’t care one way or the other. By itself, the drive does not work against repression (which retroactively works on repetition).

In this precise sense the death drive is as much an accomplice of repression as it is utterly indifferent to it. This also means that one cannot simply count on it to make the “right” selection (which is what is implied in the Nietzschean/Deleuzian perspective). There is absolutely no guarantee that, left to itself, the death drive will expel the right (that is, the wrong) things, as Deleuze seems to maintain.

One needs something else, or more: only a new signifier (and the new subjectivation triggered by it) can effect and sustain the separation at the very heart of the drive. Not a force (be it centrifugal or other), only a letter can disentangle what exists only in entangled form, and hence eventually change this form itself.

What is Sex A. Zupancic

reterritorialisation-deactivate

Deleuze & Guattari

1000rh

Imperial racism, or differential racism, in the society of control integrates others with its order and then orchestrates those differences in a system of control. Fixed and biological notions of peoples thus tend to dissolve into a fluid and amorphous multitude, which is of course shot through with lines of conflict and antagonism but none which appear as fixed and eternal boundaries. The surface of the imperial society of control continuously shifts in such a way that it destabilizes any notion of place.

– Michael Hardt, "The Global Society of Control" (1998)

celtos

Deleuze on dreams

Even the most gracious of young girls is a terrible devourer—not because of her soul, but because of her dreams.

[the accurate translation of the end is “you’re fucked” (vous êtes foutu).]

teenage-lightning-2005

"A Thousand Plateaus" (1980), Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari

altrbody

Abstraction:

"Abstraction is flying. Abstracting is ascending to higher and higher levels of conceptual generalization; soaring back and forth, reflectively circling around above the specificity and immediacy of things and events in space and time, from a perspective that embeds them in a conceptual framework of increasing breadth and depth, a framework without horizon, ceil-ing, or basement; a framework composed of increasingly comprehensive concepts that generalize over increasingly comprehensive classes of things, organize them relative to one another, unify them into a coherent tapestry, a dizzying object of contemplation the details of which stun one into panic by their connectedness, significance, and vividness.

Abstraction is also flight. It is freedom from the immediate spatiotemporal constraints of the moment; freedom to plan the future, recall the past, comprehend the present from a reflective perspective that incorporates all three; freedom from the immediate boundaries of concrete subjectivity, freedom to imagine the possible and transport oneself into it; freedom to survey the real as a resource for embodying the possible; freedom to detach the realized object from oneself more and more fully as a self-contained entity, fully determined by its contextual properties and relations, and consider it from afar, as new grist for the mill of the possible. Abstraction is freedom from the socially prescribed and consensually accepted; freedom to violate in imagination the constraints of public practice, to play with conventions, or to indulge them. Abstraction is a solitary journey through the conceptual uni-verse, with no anchors, no cues, no signposts, no maps, no foundations to cling to. Abstraction makes one love material objects all the more."

--Adrian Piper

From Adrian Piper: Reflections 1967-1987, Alternative Museum, New York City April 18-May 30, 1987.

ldr-lil2

sluttyhaecceities

"That is why the fundamental problem of political philosophy is still precisely the one that Spinoza saw so clearly, and that Wilhelm Reich rediscovered: "Why do men fight for their servitude as stubbornly as though it were their salvation?" How can people possibly reach the point of shouting: "More taxes! Less bread!"? As Reich remarks, the astonishing thing is not that some people steal or that others occasionally go out on strike, but rather that all those who are starving do not steal as a regular practice, and all those who are exploited are not continually out on strike: after centuries of exploitation, why do people still tolerate being humiliated and enslaved, to such a point, indeed, that they actually want humiliation and slavery not only for others but for themselves? Reich is at his profoundest as a thinker when he refuses to accept ignorance or illusion on the part of the masses as an explanation of fascism, and demands an explanation that will take their desires into account, an explanation formulated in terms of desire: no, the masses were not innocent dupes; at a certain point, under a certain set of conditions, they wanted fascism, and it is this perversion of the desire of the masses that needs to be accounted for."

Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Anti Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (Page 29)

rapidly-spiralling43

To put the matter theoretically, androcentric literature structures the reading experience differently depending on the gender of the reader. For the male reader, the text serves as the meeting ground of the personal and the universal. Whether or not the text approximates the particularities of his own experience, he is invited to validate the equation of maleness with humanity. The male reader feels his affinity with the universal, with the paradigmatic human being, precisely because he is male. Consider the famous scene of Stephen’s epiphany in The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

A girl stood before him in midstream, alone and still, gazing out to sea. She seemed like one whom magic had changed into the likeness of a strange and beautiful seabird. Her long slender bare legs were delicate as a crane’s and pure save where an emerald trail of seaweed had fashioned itself as a sign upon the flesh. Her thighs, fuller and softhued as ivory, were bared almost to the hips, where the white fringes of her drawers were like feathering of soft white down. Her slateblue skirts were kilted boldly about her waist and dovetailed behind her. Her bosom was a bird’s, soft and slight, slight and soft, as the breast of some darkplumaged dove. But her long fair hair was girlish: and girlish, and touched with the wonder of mortal beauty, her face.

A man reading this passage is invited to identify with Stephen, to feel “the riot in his blood,” and, thus, to ratify the alleged universality of the experience. Whether or not the sight of a girl on the beach has ever provoked similar emotions in him, the male reader is invited to feel his difference (concretely, from the girl) and to equate that with the universal. Relevant here is Levi-Strauss’s theory that woman functions as currency exchanged between men. The woman in the text converts the text into a woman, and the circulation of this text/woman becomes the central ritual that establishes the bond between the author and his male readers.

The same text affects a woman reader differently. Judith Fetterley gives the most explicit theory to date about the dynamics of the woman reader’s encounter with androcentric literature. According to Fetterley, notwithstanding the prevalence of the castrating bitch stereotype, “the cultural reality is not the emasculation of men by women, but the immasculation of women by men. As readers and teachers and scholars, women are taught to think as men, to identify with a male point of view, and to accept as normal and legitimate a male system of values, one of whose central principles is misogyny.”

The process of immasculation does not impart virile power to the woman reader. On the contrary, it doubles her oppression. She suffers “not simply the powerlessness which derives from not seeing one’s experience articulated, clarified, and legitimized in art, but more significantly, the powerlessness which results from the endless division of self against self, the consequence of the invocation to identify as male while being reminded that to be male—to be universal—is to be not female.”

A woman reading Joyce’s novel of artistic awakening, and in particular the passage quoted above, will, like her male counterpart, be invited to identify with Stephen and therefore to ratify the equation of maleness with the universal. Androcentric literature is all the more efficient as an instrument of sexual politics because it does not allow the woman reader to seek refuge in her difference. Instead, it draws her into a process that uses her against herself. It solicits her complicity in the elevation of male difference into universality and, accordingly, the denigration of female difference into otherness without reciprocity. To be sure, misogyny is abundant in the literary canon. It is important, however, that Fetterley’s argument can stand on a weaker premise. Androcentricity is a sufficient condition for the process of immasculation.

—Patrocino P. Schweickart, Reading Ourselves: Toward a Feminist Theory of Reading (1986)

herecomesoberon

Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo…

James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

writtenbycamus

"Man, in this earthly life, though capable of many evils, is not capable of them all at once.."

James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

full quote;

"Man, in this earthly life, though capable of many evils, is not capable of them all at once, inasmuch as one evil corrects and counteracts another just as one poison frequently corrects another. In hell, on the contrary, one torment, instead of counteracting another, lends it still greater force: and, moreover, as the internal faculties are more perfect than the external senses, so they are more capable of suffering."

karamazovapologist

—Look here, Cranly, he said. You have asked me what I would do and what I would not do. I will tell you what I will do and what I will not do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe whether it call itself my home, my fatherland or my church: and I will try to express myself in some mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as I can, using for my defence the only arms I allow myself to use—silence, exile, and cunning. [...]

—You made me confess the fears that I have. But I will tell you also what I do not fear. I do not fear to be alone or to be spurned for another or to leave whatever I have to leave. And I am not afraid to make a mistake, even a great mistake, a lifelong mistake and perhaps as long as eternity too.

James Joyce (Stephen Dedalus), A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (p. 268-269)

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Amal?