A Theory Reading List

[Smokeandsteam]

Also, I am going to add this for three reasons:

1. It is a fucking great book;
2. The 'double movement' idea is especially important now I believe as the fact that neo-liberalism has run out of road begins to finally become more widely understood and it anticipates Trumpesque return to national interests etc;
3. The book brilliantly explains how capitalism isn't 'natural' or representative of human nature but in fact is utterly constructed and consciously so.

 

[butchersapron]

Also, I am going to add this for three reasons:

1. It is a fucking great book;
2. The 'double movement' idea is especially important now I believe as the fact that neo-liberalism has run out of road begins to finally become more widely understood and it anticipates Trumpesque return to national interests etc;
3. The book brilliantly explains how capitalism isn't 'natural' or representative of human nature but in fact is utterly constructed and consciously so.

There is some really interesting discussion in the recently published - Capitalism: A Conversation in Critical Theory - Nancy Fraser, Rahel Jaeggi - well the nancy fraser bits anyway, - that covers the massive gaps in his approach. None of which need the wider idea junking, but expanding. There's a proper book length thing on this on the way i believe.

edit: but yes, if you haven't please give The Great Transformation a go, it will reward you doing so. I must have a copy of this somewhere. Yes.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

There is some really interesting discussion in the recently published - Capitalism: A Conversation in Critical Theory - Nancy Fraser, Rahel Jaeggi - well the nancy fraser bits anyway, - that covers the massive gaps in his approach. None of which need the wider idea junking, but expanding. There's a proper book length thing on this on the way i believe.

edit: but yes, if you haven't please give The Great Transformation a go, it will reward you doing so. I must have a copy of this somewhere. Yes.

Not read the Fraser stuff but this looks very good. Nice one butchersapron

 

[chilango]

*bump*

That I've read:

• Society of the Spectacle - Debord
• Revolution of Everyday Life - Vaneigem
• The Communist Manifesto -M&E
• Ways of Seeing - Berger
• Distinction - Bourdieu

Having trudged wearily through Althusser, Laclau, Gramsci, Zizek, Foucault etc in recent months, ok for an essay reference but nowhere near making the "capsule"

Capital is top of my "to read" list. Followed by more Bourdieu (simply cos I don't get it enough yet). Federici's Revolution at Point Zero to follow. Streecks good so far, but I'm not sure will be "essential". Got some Meiskins Wood for down the line too. Mark Fishers Ghosts of my Life is good, but not as to the point as Capitalist Realism imo

Horrible feeling 'Ill be reading, and using, Baudrillard's System of Objects in the coming months too

 

[yield]

Trying to think of other theory books I enjoyed when I was younger and brighter

The Production of Space by Henri Lefebvre

Visions of Excess by Georges Bataille. Stalinist apologism though.

The Theory of the Leisure Class by Thorstein Veblen

Critique of Cynical Reason by Peter Sloterdijk

 

[tim]

Gebriel the third position fascist/holocaust denier of the brothers actually wrote it. That might be why.

As opposed to Daniel the paedophile

Pedophilia accusations haunt Green politician | DW | 04.05.2013

 

[Serge Forward]

Anyone for Marx's Class Struggle in France, 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon and Civil War in France? Dead readable (for Marx) and they set out the whole historical materialist schtick.

 

[redsquirrel]

Shameless bump

Just been looking through some old thread, spotted this one and thought it could be a very good time to come up with some suggestions.

(Also did you ever get the five sorted for your daughters danny la rouge?)

 

[danny la rouge]

Shameless bump

Just been looking through some old thread, spotted this one and thought it could be a very good time to come up with some suggestions.

(Also did you ever get the five sorted for your daughters danny la rouge?)

No. But thanks for the bump. Now is definitely a good time for it!

 

[redsquirrel]

One suggestion, what about Kroptokin's Mutual Aid, easy to read but a significant milestone in thought and still highly relevant today.

 

[chilango]

Roland Barthes - Mythologies
Jean Baudrillard - System of Objects

Both regularly plucked from my shelves to look something up.

 

[chilango]

I'd also add Mauss's The Gift.

 

[chilango]

...and am going through Bourdieu's Distinction - again - page by page, line by line. It's pretty dense.

 

[chilango]

I even read a bit of Lacan the other day. Didn't get much out of it tbh but one chapter in the 3rd volume of his seminars was really useful (for me at least)

 

[chilango]

also, much as I don't want to, I do find myself going back to Althusser far too often for my liking.

 

[chilango]

This, however, is very good and I'd actually recommend others to read it.

The housing monster - prole.info

A beautifully illustrated book by prole.info which takes one seemingly simple thing - a house - and examines the social relations around it. From the construction site to the city, from gender roles to unions, what starts as a look at the house broadens into a critique of capitalism as a whole.

libcom.org