Updates from section members, including new publications, PhD theses, promotions or transitions, etc.

2019 Marxist Section election results & award winners

Please join us in congratulating our distinguished section members who have been elected this year to serve in various positions as listed below: Chair-Elect: Dr. Hannah Holleman, Amherst College Council Member: Dr. Daniel Auerbach, University of Utah Council Member: Dr. Michael McCarthy, Marquette University Student Representative: Ms. Karen Xuan Zhang [...]

By |2019-07-16T16:02:06-04:00Jul 16, 2019|

2016 Elections: The Political Process as a Mechanism of Control

This article examines the US political process and the duopoly party system within a vast array of state strategies and elite manipulation. It contends that analyses of the political process as a real engine of change and that significant differences within the two-party system are flawed because they do not account that they serve as mechanisms for how power and dominance in maintained and reproduced.

By |2018-07-16T12:57:17-04:00Jun 8, 2018|

Publication: Montes on the U.S. State’s Strategy of Control

Central to this argument is the idea that segments of the population, including some of the most exploited and oppressed, derive material and ideological benefit from the misery associated with the inequalities that are rooted in the current established social order. It is this complexity that demands an explanation that can move beyond simple dichotomies (e.g., elite vs. non-elite) to a greater understanding to how individuals collaborate with a system that is rooted in inequality. This article examines one of the ways that the U.S. state facilitates the incorporation of millions of individuals into the rank-and-file of policing, correctional, national security, and military organizations. Coercive occupations are deeply embedded in U.S. society and contribute to a way of life for millions as premier job suppliers. Yet, allegiance cannot be reduced to economic motives and interests, because loyalty is also culturally contrived.

By |2018-07-16T13:08:37-04:00Jun 8, 2018|

Publication: Murphy on A Model of Abjection in Power Relations

Examination of the limit serves as a powerful tool for revealing the hidden characteristics of concepts, and also their relationship with other concepts. This article follows the processes of sovereign exceptionalism from Marx to the capitalist estrangement of labour from Marx to their limit figures. The paper builds on comparisons between the proletarian and the homo sacer; however, the focal point is not on the figures themselves, but their importance in understanding the effect of biopolitics on power relations. Building on the concept of pouvoir constituant as discussed by Carl Schmitt, this paper addresses the ways in which different types of constituent power form structures that can then be used against the constituents themselves. The limit figures suggest a process of abjection is co-created in the establishment of power structures, and that overcoming this process requires a conscious dis-agreement with the politics of policing.

By |2018-07-16T13:09:43-04:00Feb 20, 2017|

Publication: Murphy on a Marxist Critique of Soccer in Sub-Saharan Africa

Attempts to critique and problematize the inequalities embedded in international sporting codes fall short in their failure to integrate the Marxist discussion of capitalist imperialism. This paper brings into conversation current scholarship on soccer in Africa with the works of Lenin on Imperialism and emerging discussions on nonterritorial imperialism. By examining both historical and structural perspectives on the imperialist use of soccer in Africa, visibility comes to the inequalities within international sport and also the theoretical formation of capitalist imperialism.

By |2018-07-16T13:10:02-04:00Feb 20, 2017|

Publication: González Review of Film Criticism, The Cold War, and the Blacklist by Jeff Smith

As one of the most widely discussed and researched subjects within the field of film studies, the Hollywood blacklist makes for a difficult task to explore. Previous research in film studies generally examines how members within the Hollywood community came to become blacklisted, either on behalf of the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) directly or by their fellow artists. Furthermore, previous literature has simply expressed hypotheses as to the intent of anti-communist films: as propaganda or allegory. In Film Criticism, the Cold War, and the Blacklist, Jeff Smith provides a new perspective on the phenomenon by elucidating why anti-communist films functioned as they did, regardless of propagandistic or allegorical intent.

By |2018-07-16T13:10:38-04:00Jul 27, 2016|
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