RE: [Marxism] Re Problems with The Making of the English Working Class

["Mark Lause" <MLause@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well, a respectful "no" to Ilyenkova: My view of Thompson's work is
anything but the dominant one among labor historians.  My views on
virtually nothing are dominant ones among labor historians.

I honestly don't understand the specifics of some of the questions being
raised and some of the assertions being made.  There are books on this
subject and we aren't going to resolve these things in emails.
Personally, I prefer coming away from a book knowing something with a
degree of certainty about a focused subject rather than having mostly
impressions about sweeping subjects.

I read Rediker and Linebaugh's book when it first came out--and the
article that preceded it by a year or two.  My recollection is that it
made an interesting and worthwhile stab at a sweeping and very broad
subject, but it required a lot of glossing and smudging to bridge the
hard data.  Thompson's narrow focus did not attempt as much and as much
from one point to another and making generalizations that bridged
diverse conditions and circumstances.  If you want something good
touching on the subjects discussed in Rediker and Linebaugh, I'd suggest
Jeffrey Bolster's _Black Jacks, African American Seaman in the age of
Sail_, which focuses in detail on the experience of U.S. blacks on
ships.

Let's start with an understanding of the maritime commercial network
that drew together the trans-Atlantic community.  Maritime workers were
often youngsters and young men eager to see the world with every
intention of later making better and more stable lives for themselves in
safer and more lucrative pursuits.  And race also shaped different (but
very fluid) roles in the workplace.

There is no question but that there was resistance from mutinies to
strikes, but it seems to me a great leap of faith to claim knowledge of
what these things as representing.  Indeed, participants in these could
just as readily have been motivated by the desire to individually rise
out of their condition by becoming entrepreneurs, right?  Running up the
Jolly Roger doesn't mean you don't have a captain.

Did these people see themselves as having a common interest on
shipboard--or with other laboring people in maritime-related jobs--or
with propertyless people in general?  Some surely did, but I suspect
that if there was a common class consciousness in the works, we'd be
living in a far different and better world.

Best,
Mark L.




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