STUDENTS' RESPONSES TO MARX
The immediate and consistent problem for me seems to be the definition of terms, which is typical when jumping right into the middle of someone's thinking. Even seemingly simple terms like "relations of production" can pose problems. What is the difference between the "relations of production" and the "social forces of production" (44)? I also need a more concrete idea of what exactly "products" and "productive forces" are. (Seth Warren)
I seem to remember that despite Hegel's mighty musing, he included the actual physical activity of humans in his philosophy of history. (Seth Warren)
I didn't know that a communist could be a hunter in the morning, fisherman in the afternoon, a shepherd in the evening, and a critic after supper. I thought a communist had to make the shoes for every other communist. (Joe Tennis)
The Hegelian aspects of Marx and Engels's thought are rampant in the study of religion as well as music. Very familiar to me are the notions of something being born of its opposite. The concept of externalizing human-created things--such as social norms, religion, government--is also prevalent in the study of religion. (Joe Tennis)
Distinctions drawn in The German Ideology remind me of a somewhat similar debate among music theorists and musicologists. Musicologists tend to favor Marx and Engels's idea that vague abstractions (or in this case analyses of works of music) have little value unless they are done with an historical eye. They might argue that a composer's "consciousness" is informed by his existence in the material world. Music theorists, by contrast, often see a work of music as a closed system of sorts; they feel that an analysis need not contain biographical information or other historical information to be valuable. Musicologists, accordingly, are much more interested than music theorists in the social and political events that surround a work of music, though this is not exclusively the case. (Steve Rodgers)
I wonder why Marx and Engels go to such great lengths to appear scientific and empirical. What (historically, culturally, ideologically) leads them to place so much importance on data and verifiability? (Steve Rodgers)
The German Ideology was written when Marx and Engels were young. How did their ideas change as they matured? (Steve Rodgers)
What next?