Re: [Marxism] Marx and race

[Einde O'Callaghan <einde@xxxxxx>]

Charles Brown schrieb:
>  
>  
>
> Mark Lause 
>
> I find this "materialist" explanation of the use of racial terms by Marx and
> Engels unpersuasive.  Surely, every part of a modern capitalist economy is
> ultimately connected to everything other part of the economy.
>
> Rather than implying that this can be explained by the connections of Marx
> and Engels to slavery, it seems far more persuasive to me to say it was
> their being so divorced from the realities of African slavery that allowed
> for their episodic verbal callowness.
>
> Certainly, there were plenty of Yankee textile capitalists funding
> antislavery work despite the "materialist" association with the industry.
>
> ML
>
>
> ^^^^^
> CB: No, not _explained_.  Just if somebody is complaining about their words,
> one might say , well, you really might complain about their deeds. 
>
> Myself, I'm not complaining about their deeds. When it counted , they were
> against slavery.
When dealing with the language used by Marx and Engels, particularly in 
their private correspondence, we have to remember that they were men of 
their time - the remarkable thing IMHO is that they were remarkably free 
of racial prejudice. I understand if you look at the utterances of, say, 
Abraham Lincoln you'll find language that is equally, if not more 
reprehensible than that used by M&E.

We also have to be aware that the that the actual usage of words in 19th 
century Britain was not necessarily the same as today and the actual 
connotations of the "N"-word, for example, were not necessarily the same 
as today - especially at a considerable distance from the front line, so 
to say, in the Southern States and the West Indies.

We've all seen how the connotations and usage of the words "gay" and 
"queer" or the words "Colored", "Negro", "Black", "Afro-American" etc. 
have changed during our own lifetimes.

Even here in Germany I've noticed how the connotations of teh word 
"Neger", actually the equivalent of "Negro", has come to take on the 
same connotations as the "N"-word in English, although the "N"-word also 
exists in German with the same connotations as in English.

Einde O'Callaghan

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