Chicago
Saturdays 1–4PM
School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC)
112 S. Michigan Ave. room 920
Facebook invitation: http://www.facebook.com/events/339098822822962/
• required / + recommended reading
Film screening: May 2012
• Last Party 2000 (2001)
Week 1. May 26, 2012
Marx and democracy
• Dick Howard, selections from The Specter of Democracy (2002)
+ Howard, “Philosophy by other means?” (2001) (original version of Chapter 13 of The Specter of Democracy)
+ Benjamin Constant, “The liberty of the ancients compared with that of the moderns” (1819)
+ Karl Marx, On Bruno Bauer’s The Jewish Question (1844)
+ Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme (1875)
+ Chris Cutrone, “Lenin’s liberalism” and “Lenin’s politics” (2011)
Week 2. Jun. 2, 2012
Communist Party of Great Britain debates Platypus
• Selected articles from Weekly Worker, May 12 – August 11, 2011
+ Original pages of Weekly Worker
• Ben Lewis, “Chicago school” (letter in Weekly Worker 914, May 17, 2012)
• Chris Cutrone, letter in response to Ben Lewis (May 17, 2012)
+ Danny Hammill, “Debate, controversy and comradeship” (on the 2011 CPGB Communist University summer school, Weekly Worker 879, September 1, 2011, p. 11)
+ Spencer Leonard, “Adam Smith’s profoundest reader: Marx” (Weekly Worker 895, December 22, 2011, pp. 12–14)
June 16 – July 28
Trotsky and Trotskyism
Recommended preliminary readings:
+ Tariq Ali and Phil Evans, Introducing Trotsky and Marxism / Trotsky for Beginners (1980)
+ Nicolas Krassó, “Trotsky’s Marxism” (1967)
• Platypus Historians Group, “The dead Left: Trotskyism” (2008)
• Richard Rubin, “The decline of the Left in the 20th century: 1933″ (2009)
• Ian Morrison, “Trotsky’s Marxism” (2011)
• Mike Macnair, Bryan Palmer, Richard Rubin, and Jason Wright, “The legacy of Trotskyism” (2011)
• Grover Furr, “Learning from the Communist Movement of the 20th century: A response to Richard Rubin”(2012)
+ Spartacist League, Lenin and the Vanguard Party (1978)
+ Richard Appignanesi and Oscar Zarate / A&Z, Introducing Lenin and the Russian Revolution / Lenin for Beginners (1978)
+ Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet: Trotsky biography (three volumes: 1954, 1959, 1963)
The Russian Revolution, which Lenin held up as the torch-light of emancipation for the world proletariat, is being run into national socialist channels. . . . “The Russian proletariat,” said Lenin, “cannot single-handed bring the socialist revolution to a victorious conclusion. But it can give the Russian revolution a mighty impetus such as would create most favorable conditions for a socialist revolution, and would, in a sense, start it. It can help to create more favorable circumstances for its most important, most trustworthy and most reliable collaborator, the European and American proletariat, to join the decisive battles” (“Farewell letter to the Swiss workers,” 1917).
Boston, Chicago, London, New York, Philadelphia
Video will be broadcast live and available as recordings at: http://www.livestream.com/platypusaffiliatedsociety
Saturdays 1–4PM CST
School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC)
112 S. Michigan Ave. room 920
Chicago Platypus Facebook invitation: http://www.facebook.com/events/140497572752262/
Saturdays 2–5PM EST
The New School
6 E. 16th St. (between Union Square West and 5th Ave.) room 1001
• recommended / + supplemental reading
Recommended preliminary readings:
+ Tariq Ali and Phil Evans, Introducing Trotsky and Marxism / Trotsky for Beginners (1980)
+ Nicolas Krassó, “Trotsky’s Marxism” (1967)
• Platypus Historians Group, “The dead Left: Trotskyism” (2008)
• Richard Rubin, “The decline of the Left in the 20th century: 1933″ (2009)
• Ian Morrison, “Trotsky’s Marxism” (2011)
• Mike Macnair, Bryan Palmer, Richard Rubin, and Jason Wright, “The legacy of Trotskyism” (2011)
• Grover Furr, “Learning from the Communist Movement of the 20th century: A response to Richard Rubin”(2012)
+ Spartacist League, Lenin and the Vanguard Party (1978)
+ Richard Appignanesi and Oscar Zarate / A&Z, Introducing Lenin and the Russian Revolution / Lenin for Beginners (1978)
+ Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet: Trotsky biography (three volumes: 1954, 1959, 1963)
Week 1. Jun. 16, 2012
1879–1905
lecture: video recording | audio recording
• Tariq Ali and Phil Evans, Introducing Trotsky and Marxism / Trotsky for Beginners (1980)
• Leon Trotsky, Results and Prospects (1906)
Week 2. Jun. 23, 2012
1905–17
lecture: video recording [glitches after ~32:00] | audio recording [without glitches]
+ Trotsky, 1905 (1907)
Week 3. Jun. 30, 2012
1917–23
lecture: video recording | audio recording
• Trotsky, Terrorism and Communism (1920)
• Trotsky, The Lessons of October (1924) [PDF]
+ Trotsky, Literature and Revolution (1924)
+ Bret Schneider, “Trotsky’s theory of art” (2011)
Week 4. Jul. 7, 2012
1923–33
lecture: video recording | audio recording
+ Trotsky, Where is Britain Going? (1925)
+ Trotsky, Problems of the Chinese Revolution 1927–31 (1932)
+ Trotsky, writings on the rise of Hitler and the destruction of the German Left (1930–40), especially “To build communist parties and an international anew” (1933)
Week 5. Jul. 14, 2012
1933–40
lecture: video recording | audio recording
• Trotsky, “Stalinism and Bolshevism” (1937)
• Trotsky, The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International (1938)
+ Trotsky, “Trade unions in the epoch of imperialist decay” (1940)
+ Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed (1936)
+ Trotsky, In Defense of Marxism (1939/40), especially “Letter to James Cannon” (September 12, 1939)
+ Trotsky, “Art and politics on our epoch” (1938)
+ Mary McCarthy, “My Confession” (1954)
Week 6. Jul. 21, 2012
1940–53
lecture: video recording | audio recording
+ James Cannon, “The coming American revolution” (1946)
+ C.L.R. James, Raya Dunayevskaya, et al., “Program of the minority tendency of the Workers Party/U.S.” (1946)
+ C.L.R. James, “Dialectical materialism and the fate of humanity” (1947)
+ Herbert Marcuse, “33 Theses” (1947)
+ Earl Browder and Max Shachtman with C. Wright Mills, “Is Russia a socialist community?” (1950)
+ Ernest Mandel, “The theory of ‘state capitalism’” (1951)
+ Michel Pablo, “On the duration and the nature of the period of transition from capitalism to socialism” (1951)
+ Pablo, “Where are we going?” (1953)
Week 7. Jul. 28, 2012
1953–63
lecture: video recording [ends ~4:00 prematurely] | audio recording [complete]
+ Cornelius Castoriadis, “The workers and organization” (1959)
• Cliff Slaughter, “What is revolutionary leadership?” (1960)
• Revolutionary Tendency of the Socialist Workers Party/U.S., “In defense of a revolutionary perspective”(1962)
+ Tony Cliff, “The coming Russian revolution” (final chapter of Russia: A Marxist Analysis, 1964)
+ Hal Draper, “The two souls of socialism” (1966)
+ Isaac Deutscher, “Marxism in our time” (1965)
+ Murray Bookchin, “Listen, Marxist!” (1969)
• Spartacist League, “Genesis of Pabloism” (1972)
2012–13
Primary Marxist reading group
I. What is the Left? — What is Marxism?
• required / + recommended reading
Week A. Aug. 4, 2012
• epigraphs on modern history and freedom by James Miller (on Jean-Jacques Rousseau), Louis Menand (on Edmund Wilson), Karl Marx, on “becoming” (from the Grundrisse, 1857–58), and Peter Preuss (on Nietzsche)
+ Rainer Maria Rilke, “Archaic Torso of Apollo” (1908)
+ Robert Pippin, “On Critical Theory” (2004)
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality (1754) PDFs of preferred translation (5 parts):[1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
• Rousseau, selection from On the Social Contract (1762)
Week B. Aug. 11, 2012
• G.W.F. Hegel, Introduction to the Philosophy of History (1831) [HTML] [PDF pp. 14-128]
Week C. Aug. 18, 2012
• Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Use and Abuse of History for Life (1874) [translator's introduction by Peter Preuss]
Week D. Aug. 25, 2012
• Nietzsche, selection from On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense (1873)
• Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals (1887)
Week E. Sep. 1, 2012 Labor Day weekend
• Martin Nicolaus, “The unknown Marx” (1968)
• Moishe Postone, “Necessity, labor, and time” (1978)
• Postone, “History and helplessness: Mass mobilization and contemporary forms of anticapitalism” (2006)
+ Postone, “Theorizing the contemporary world: Brenner, Arrighi, Harvey” (2006)
Week F. Sep. 8, 2012
• Juliet Mitchell, “Women: The longest revolution” (1966)
• Clara Zetkin and Vladimir Lenin, “An interview on the woman question” (1920)
• Theodor W. Adorno, “Sexual taboos and the law today” (1963)
• John D’Emilio, “Capitalism and gay identity” (1983)
Week G. Sep. 15, 2012
• Richard Fraser, “Two lectures on the black question in America and revolutionary integrationism” (1953)
• James Robertson and Shirley Stoute, “For black Trotskyism” (1963)
+ Spartacist League, “Black and red: Class struggle road to Negro freedom” (1966)
+ Bayard Rustin, “The failure of black separatism” (1970)
• Adolph Reed, “Black particularity reconsidered” (1979)
+ Reed, “Paths to Critical Theory” (1984)
Week H. Sep. 22, 2012
• Wilhelm Reich, “Ideology as material power” (1933/46)
• Siegfried Kracauer, “The mass ornament” (1927)
+ Kracauer, “Photography” (1927)
Week 1. Sep. 29, 2012
• Chris Cutrone, “Capital in history” (2008)
• Cutrone, “The Marxist hypothesis” (2010)
Platypus Marxist reading group
June 5 – August 14, 2010
Saturdays 1–4PM at:
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
112 S. Michigan Ave. room 707
Marx and Marxism
- Marx and Engels at work together
Readings pp. from Robert C. Tucker, ed., Marx-Engels Reader (Norton 2nd ed., 1978) (* at marxists.org)
June 5
Karl Marx on the history of his opinions (from Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy), pp. 3–6
Marx, To make the world philosophical, pp. 9–11
Marx, For the ruthless criticism of everything existing, pp. 12–15
Marx, Theses on Feuerbach, pp. 143–145
June 12
Marx, On The Jewish Question, pp. 26–52
June 19
Marx, The coming upheaval [see bottom of section, beginning with "Economic conditions had first transformed the mass"] (from The Poverty of Philosophy, 1847), pp. 218–219
Marx and Engels, Communist Manifesto, pp. 469–500
Marx, Address to the Central Committee of the Communist League, pp. 501–511
June 26
The tactics of social democracy (Engels's introduction to Marx, The Class Struggles in France), pp. 556–573
Marx, from The Class Struggles in France 1848–50, pp. 586–593
July 3
[break for Independence Day weekend]July 10
Marx, The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, pp. 594–617
July 17
Marx, On imperialism in India, 653–664 (available online as The British Rule in India and The Future Results of British Rule in India)
Marx and Engels, Europocentric world revolution, pp. 676–677 (available online as Marx to Engels October 8, 1858 and Engels to Kautsky September 12, 1882)
July 24
Marx, The Civil War in France, pp. 618–652
July 31
Marx, Inaugural address to the First International, pp. 512–519
Karl Korsch, The Marxism of the First International *
August 7
Korsch, Introduction to Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme *
Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme, pp. 525–541
August 14
Max Horkheimer, "The Authoritarian State" (1940) (in The Essential Frankfurt School Reader, eds. Andrew Arato and Eike Gebhardt, pp. 95–117)
* * *
August 28
Vladimir Lenin, "Karl Marx" (1914)
June 28 – August 16
Sundays 1-4PM at:
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
112 S. Michigan Ave.
room 707
Radical Bourgeois Philosophy: Kant-Hegel-Nietzsche
We will address the greater context for Marx and Marxism through the issue of bourgeois radicalism in philosophy in the 18th and 19th Centuries. Discussion will emerge by working through the development from Kant and Hegel to Nietzsche, but also by reference to the Rousseauian aftermath, and the emergence of the modern society of capital, as registered by liberals such as Adam Smith and Benjamin Constant.
“The principle of freedom and its corollary, ‘perfectibility,’ . . . suggest that the possibilities for being human are both multiple and, literally, endless. . . . Contemporaries like Kant well understood the novelty and radical implications of Rousseau’s new principle of freedom [and] appreciated his unusual stress on history as the site where the true nature of our species is simultaneously realized and perverted, revealed and distorted. A new way of thinking about the human condition had appeared. . . . As Hegel put it, ‘The principle of freedom dawned on the world in Rousseau, and gave infinite strength to man, who thus apprehended himself as infinite.’ ”
– James Miller (author of The Passion of Michel Foucault, 2000), Introduction to Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality (Hackett, 1992)
Weekly Reading Schedule:
6/28/09
1.) Robert Pippin, “On Critical Theory” [HTML Critical Inquiry 2003]; and Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
7/5/09
2.) Rousseau, selection from The Social Contract
7/12/09
3.) Adam Smith, selections from The Wealth of Nations
Volume I
Introduction and Plan of the Work
Book I: Of the Causes of Improvement…
I.1. Of the Division of Labor
I.2. Of the Principle which gives Occasion to the Division of Labour
I.3. That the Division of Labour is Limited by the Extent of the Market
I.4. Of the Origin and Use of Money
I.6. Of the Component Parts of the Price of Commodities
I.7. Of the Natural and Market Price of Commodities
I.8. Of the Wages of Labour
I.9. Of the Profits of Stock
Book III: Of the different Progress of Opulence in different Nations
III.1. Of the Natural Progress of Opulence
III.2. Of the Discouragement of Agriculture in the Ancient State of Europe after the Fall of the Roman Empire
III.3. Of the Rise and Progress of Cities and Towns, after the Fall of the Roman Empire
III.4. How the Commerce of the Towns Contributed to the Improvement of the Country
Volume II
IV.7. Of Colonies
Book V: Of the Revenue of the Sovereign or Commonwealth
V.1. Of the Expences of the Sovereign or Commonwealth
7/19/09
4.) Benjamin Constant, “The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with that of the Moderns;” and Kant, “What is Enlightenment? ,” and “Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View”
7/26/09
5.) Kant, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, and “On the Common Saying: That May be Correct in Theory, But it is of No Use in Practice” [HTML part 2]
8/2/09
6.) Hegel, Introduction to the Philosophy of History [HTML] [PDF pp. 14-128]
8/9/09
7.) Nietzsche, The Use and Abuse of History for Life [translator's introduction by Peter Preuss], and selectionfrom On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense
8/16/09
8.) Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals
