Join us for a weekly discussion-based reading group at Harvard, where we work through the historical concept of the Left and the problems that it confronts. Readings consist mainly of transcripts from public fora intersecting the activist and academic left concerning questions raised by the disorientation of the present. What has the Left been, and what can it yet become?
Please find reading list below. Notifications are also posted on our Facebook page. For the schedule for MassArt, please click here.
When: Every Tuesday 6:30 PM
Where: 205 Robinson Hall, Harvard University (http://g.co/maps/nwvjy)
Week 1 {Feb. 7}
• Cutrone, “Symptomology: Historical transformations in social-political context”
• Cutrone, “Capital in history: The need for a Marxian philosophy of history of the Left”
Week 2 {Feb 14}
• Kolakowski, “The concept of the Left”
• Adorno, “Imaginative excesses”
Week 3 {Feb 21}
• Blumberg, Cutrone, Khan, Leonard, and Rubin, Forum: The decline of the Left in the 20th century
Week 4 {Feb 28}
• Anderson, Cutrone, Kreitman, Postel, and Turl, Forum: Imperialism: What is it, why should we be against it?
• Albert, Cutrone, Duncombe, and Holmes, Forum: The 3 Rs: reform, revolution and “resistance:” The problematic forms of “anti-capitalism” today
Week 5 {March 6}
• Brennan, Davis, Hendricks, Mujica, and Rubin, Forum: What is a movement?
• Hendricks, Hughes, Mwaura, and Thindwa, Forum: Left behind: The working class in the crisis
Week 6 {March 20}
• Platypus Historians Group, Catastrophe, historical memory, and the Left: 60 years of Israel-Palestine
• Ibish, Kovel, and Rubin, Forum: Which way forward for Palestinian liberation?
• Goodman and Rubin, Forum: Marxism and Israel
Week 7 {March 27}
• Farrow, Gabrellas, Mucciaroni, and Wolf, Forum: Which way forward for sexual liberation?
• Nogales, Pereira Di Salvo, and Rojas, Forum: Politics of the contemporary student Left
• Brennan, Klatt, Petcoff, and Weger, Forum: Ideology and the student Left
Week 8 {April 3}
• Bernstein, Cutrone, Goehr, and Horowitz, Forum: The relevance of Critical Theory to art today
• Cutrone, Feenberg, Westerman, and Brown, Platypus convention plenary: The politics of Critical Theory
Week 9 {April 10}
• Horkheimer, selections from Dämmerung
• Adorno, “Resignation”
• Cutrone, “The Marxist hypothesis”
• Cutrone, “The Left is dead! — Long live the Left!” Vicissitudes of historical consciousness and the possibilities for emancipatory social politics today
Week 10 {April 17}
• Cutrone, Morrison, and Rubin, Platypus convention plenary: The Platypus synthesis: History, theory, and practice