Re: Open Marxism

[Marshall Feldman <MARSH@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Seamus,  could you give citations for the underlined things?  Thanks.

>Posted on 14 Dec 1994 at 04:55:41 by TELEC List Distributor (011802)
>
>Open Marxism
>
>Date: Wed, 14 Dec 1994 04:12:53 -0500
>From: ReDionysus@xxxxxxx
>To: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>Reply-To: marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>Hum,
>I am thinking through the same questions of determination and totality at the
>moment in relation to the terms performativity and praxis. I am particulatly
>swayed by Lefebvre and Wallach-Bolough. The later, I believe would say that
           ^^^^^^^^     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Specifically, what work are your referring to?

>Jameson's Althusserian structualism ends up being positivist (and even I
>would argue- in Althusser (the ISA essay) subjectivist.. even as I recognize
>he is trying to refute this on some level).
>Two things strike me. One Jameson's diagram on p 36 of the Political Uc is
                                                            ^^^^^^^^^^^^
>incomplete in relation to Marx's account in the Grundrisse and elsewhere- (of
>productive consumption-- but it is other places as well)... the
>forces/realtions of produciton return as the mode of production and thus
>recirculate, exactly *through the medium* of culture, ideology, the judicial,
>the political etc...
>A second realization is, in Bolough's excellent account (Dialectial
                                                          ^^^^^^^^^^
>Phenomenology), the "form of life" which Marx is grounded in determines his
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>dialectical method... capital is the condition of possibility of (historical
>or) phenomenological dialectical thought. This brings back the concept of
>praxis, from which point one might say that Marx is a thinker of analogical
>thought constrained by capital into the simpler logic of dialectic.. which is
>historically necessary.
>I'm still trying to work out exaclty where that leaves me in terms of praxis
>and performativity, but I'd like to get some feedback on these I think rather
>contentious thoughts, as well as perhaps prod some consideration of Lefebvre?
>A lot of his work has been recently translated, I'm wondering if anyone else
>is working through it?

I've been working through _The Production of Space_ for some time now (not
having much time for reading it).

>I'm actually trying to cut a line across certain
>arguments, including Derrida's "Signature, Event, Context" in relation to the
                      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>historical determination of signs, but I'm not sure that "acts" can be
>reduced to language, and therefore their meaning, while never fixed, is not
>continually defered, but rather constantly produced.... i.e. Derrida is
>dispairing something which never could be in relation to truth... that is
>never what truth was. It was nothing but a practice of truth. I recognize
>that I could recoup this elsewhere in Derrida, perhaps those who've read
>spectres can tell me if this comes up there. I am trying to point out a
 ^^^^^^^^
>misrecognition of the term production on both sides of the "crisis of
>post-modern marxism" debate for focusing on texts as opposed to
>performances.... hence Habermas makes what seems to be similar claims
>(mistakes in my veiw) in the "outmodedness of the production principle"
>chapter of PDM... and this is followed out in Habermas influenced debates
            ^^^
>around democratic discourse and the social sphere (except Kluge & Negt
                                                           ^^^^^^^^^^^^
>perhaps... but precisely because they attack Habermas on almost the same
>grounds).
>
>Seamus
>
>Seamus Malone
>Whitney ISP

Thanks.

Marsh Feldman
Community Planning                      Phone: 401/792-2248
204 Rodman Hall                           FAX: 401/792-4395
University of Rhode Island           Internet: marsh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Kingston, RI 02881-0815

"Marginality confers legitimacy on one's contrariness."


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