On Marx: An Introduction to the Revolutionary Intellect of Karl Marx

99 Pages·2007·34.807 MB·English

by  Paula Allman

KEY CRITICAL THINKERS | N EDUCATION
011MaI'X V, ' ‘
, . .
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, TSeriesEditor's:
MichaelA.Peters ' . - -
UniversityofIllmozsatUrbana—Champazgn USA
Tina(A. C.)Besley
CaliforniaState Universitv, SanBernardmo USA
Scope:
. This series is an editiOn dedicated to the revival ofthe Critical approaches 0fkey. 7
thinkers whose thought has strongly 1nfluenced and shaped educatiOnal theory: 7 ;
Rousseau, Marx, Gramsci, Dewey, Marcuse Rogers Freire, Derrida, Foucault,
SaidandButler. I11 this first edition the seriesincludes elevenmonographs 111total,
each approximately Sixty pages long with three Chapters, a brief introductlon a
bibliographical essay, aglossaryandgenes ofstudyquestions. The aim is designed ' E
to prOVide cheap and acceSSible texts for students that giVe clear- accounts ofthese _ -- I
' thinkers andtheir Slgnificance for educational theory. The monographs are Written. f . f
by a group Of internationally renown scholars whose own work embodies the . ' * '
critical ethos. . - »
On Marx ‘
An Introductzon to theRevolutzonaty Intellect ofKarlMarx
Paula Allman ._
VNottmgham UK
SENSEPUBLISHERS
_ ROTTERDAM/TAIPEI
IsBN97890 8790 192 9(paperback)
ISBN978 90 8790-193 6(hardbaek)
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forexclusiveusebythepurchaseroftheWork . . - .. . . .
T0 Tzppzzy P.K. & Tabztlza . . .
(far theirunrelenting love andsupportas wellas theirequally unrelenting
pestering) ' ' - . .

i;,~j‘TABLEOF comm“ *4 “
‘ Seriesmeword I * ‘ '
- -'ix_.
Acknowledgements .I _*Xii
7 Intredfictlon '-
-11
.1....-2'--1_' Marxon capltal/capltallsffi
:31--
2 '- Marxenconscmusness .
' [-51
3 IMlarxoneducatlen '
. __ 69
Blbllographlcal-essay 2
'73.
Glossary/Index
8.3-I
Vii

I SERIES“FOREWORD -
' It is entirely fitting that Paula Allmans: book On Marx An Introduction to the
Revolutionary Intellect ofKarl Marx Should be the Ifirst in our neW series Key ~
' Critical Thinkers in Education Who better could grace the opening ofthe series
andwho else has betterclaimtothe mantle of.’key critical thinker Marxhastobe
reinvented and reread for each new generation AS Foucault suggests Marx like
Freud andNietzsche is 'a figure ofdiscurswity meaning thatMarx3 Work founded
_ a discurswe tradition that is both riChand complex and is to be measured by the
number (if novel interpretations and and readings it generates By this measure
there is no doubt that Marx'sapproach from radical political economy to capital 1
andcapitalism has asmuchrelevancetodayasithadwhenMarx was writinginthe
. mid-nineteenth century even ifthe ham ofindustrial capitalismhas begun to shift
and we noW hear talk of the 'knowledge economy His critical orientation is.
Significant in thateVerymajorthinkerinterestedinpolitical economy 0r.-soc1al and
_ )cultural history must either adopt a sympathetic fiamework 0r differentiate
” themselves againstMarx. _' _ :.- --
I We CanthinkofnebodybetterthanPaulaAllmanto authorthe firStin our Series
. Paula Allman has been actively involved in critical educatiOn for many years. ,
. {Paula has written extenswely on Freire and GramSCI and she has cOntributed a ‘
number of books to the critical tradition including Revolutionary Social
Transformation Democratic Hopes,-PoliticalPosszbilztzes and CriticalEducation
(1999) and Critical Education Against Global Capital Karl Marx and .
Revolutionary CriticalEducation (2001). Herapproachto Marx inthis critical text .
1s to focus on capital/capitalism consc10usness and education—«three mines that ~
comprisethe main body ofthe book Which together With a bibliographical essay
definesthe conceptbehindtheseries. . . 7
As:thegeneral editors wedeCidedto deVelop aseries onKeyCritical Thinkers in
EduCation for a number of-reasons. First we Wanted to develop this series as a '
counterpomt to an emerging ibrm of research in the field of education that .
acquiesces intheface ofpowerandgrowing inequalities This is aformofresearch
that underlies prevalent notions ofscience in the-UUS. andU.K“generally it tries
hard to emulate the hardsciences choosing as its modelthird-generation cognitive I
0r brain science 0r medical science where answers are Sought internally andj
indiv1dua11y rather than culturally, historically er Socially, and polic1es and
pregrams are designed as interventions Such soience is oriented to longitudinal
studies eVidence-based experimentalordouble-blind andbest-practice Itisbased ‘
on the out—dated assumptions that soience progresses gradually through the ”
accumulation of 'data or information and mOStly it is funded by government ‘
agencres Which means it takes a reaCtiVe form, sticking to the evaluation of ,
existing programs or policies. It is as thOugh the historical and Social studies Of‘1
. science initiated by Thomas Kuhn in 1962 With the launch Of TheStructure of.
Scientific Revolutions has meant nothing. Against this State—funded reVival ofthe
Worst sort of crude positiVism that now motivates the university in its Search of.
ix .