In light of worsening income inequality, job insecurity, and a looming climate crisis, recent years have seen a return to Marxism’s examination of the impact of capital’s drive to valorize value and maximize profits. At the same time, new developments in critical race theory, postcolonial critique, and intersectionality studies have given us new insights into the social, psychological, and cultural dimensions of anti-black racism and ethnic discrimination.

These two strands of radical thought rarely speak to each other, but they need to be taken together if we are to have a full picture of the present reality and how to transcend it, especially after the threats to all of humanity that have emerged since the 2016 US election. While, the logic of capital is one factor (among others) that helps shape racial attitudes and race relations, it is also necessary to critique class reductionist approaches to the subject.

Speakers:

Albert Terry, III: is a native of the historic community of Africatown in Mobile, Alabama and has been active in organizing and activism in since 2011. Terry will be discussing his article “A Few Words on Marxism and Identity Politics”, which was published by Left Voice in January 2017. In this piece, he explains how organizing the working class today requires a dialectical understanding of the relationship between class and political identity, because these political identities are a material result of specialized forms of oppression inflicted on particular sections of the proletariat intended to exacerbate alienation and class divisions

Peter Hudis: teaches at Oakton Community College in the Chicago area. He is the author of Frantz Fanon: Philosopher of the Barricades and Marx’s Concept of the Alternative to Capitalism and the General Editor of The Complete Works of Rosa Luxemburg, as well as the co-editor of Power of Negativity (selected writings of Raya Dunayevskaya).

Sponsored by: The International Marxist-Humanist Organization (IMHO)
Email: ariseinternationalmarxisthumanist.org
Website: www.imhojournal.org