HOW DID HUBERT GET BABY LENIN BADGES? ON TODAY’S EPISODE…

Historical Materialism – Colonialism – Black Nationalism

In this session we discussed the limits of the historical materialist ontological framework when thinking the racial architecture of colonialism. What motivated the discussion of the topic is the prevailing presence of historical materialism in the critical discourses on global configurations under capitalism. The main points of departure for this session were the works of Denise Ferreira da Silva “Toward a Global Idea of Race” and Cedric Robinson’s “The Limits of Western Radicalism: The Making of Black Radical Tradition”. An example of such a limit would be how the value produced in the colonial slave system as well as the dispossession of land of Indigenous peoples has been considered as outside the capitalistic mode of production and categorised instead as “primitive accumulation” – placing them as the pre-history of capital. Another limit would be the question of resistance of the global subaltern to being politically represented as a unified working class subject. 

Presenting: Hubert Gromny

Commenting: Flavia Palladino, Amit Rai, Ian Nolan, Litchi Ly Friedrich, Liu Chao & Hannah O'Flynn