Does Marxism Even Matter? New York

A Teach-in on the Communist Manifesto

 October 6, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A teach-in led by Platypus Affiliated Society Member Jamie Keesling on October 6, 2011, at the New School. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Description In the mid-19th century, Marx and Engels famously observed in the Communist Manifesto that a specter was haunting Europe the specter of Communism. 160 years later, it is Marxism itself that haunts us. In the 21st century, it seems that the Left abandoned Marxism as a path to freedom. [Read More]
Communist Manifesto  Karl Marx  Marxism 

Does Marxism Even Matter? A Teach-in on the Communist Manifesto, Halifax

 September 27, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Description In the mid-19th century, Marx and Engels famously observed in the Communist Manifesto that a specter was haunting Europe: the specter of Communism. 160 years later, it is Marxism itself that haunts us. In the 21st century, it seems that the Left abandoned Marxism as a path to freedom. But Marx critically intervened in his own moment and emboldened leftists to challenge society; is the Left not tasked with this today? [Read More]
Communist Manifesto  Karl Marx  Marxism 

Marx's Critique of Political Economy

Proletarian Socialism Continuing the Bourgeois Revolution?

 August 19, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A presentation by Platypus member Spencer A. Leonard on August 19, 2011, at Communist University, which took place from August 17th to August 20, 2011, at Goldsmiths, University of London.

Video Recording

Audio Recording

Mike Macnair’s Critique of Platypus

Cutrone, “Capital in history” (2008)

Cutrone, “The Marxist hypothesis” (2010)

Bourgeois  Bourgeois revolution  Goldsmiths  Karl Marx  Marxism  Proletarian  Proletarian revolution  Proletarian socialism  Socialism 

Capital in History

Marxism and the Modern Philosophy of Freedom

 August 16, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A presentation by Platypus member Chris Cutrone on August 16, 2011, at Communist University, which took place from August 17th to August 20, 2011, at Goldsmiths, University of London. Video Credit: Communist Party of Great Britain. Video Recording Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element What is progress if not the absolute elaboration of humanity’s creative dispositions… unmeasured by any previously established yardstick[,] an end in itself… the absolute movement of becoming? [Read More]
Becoming  Bourgeois  Capital  Capitalism  Freedom  Grundrisse  History  Karl Marx  Marxism  Proletarian 

History of Humanity

1600-1763

 July 27, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A lecture by Platypus member James Vaughn upon the history of humanity between 1600 and 1763, given as part of the Platypus summer 2011 radical bourgeois philosophy reading group. Held on July 27, 2011 in Philadelphia. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Description Platypus Summer Reading Group 2011: Radical Bourgeois Philosophy Rousseau-Smith-Kant-Hegel-Nietzsche We will address the greater context for Marx and Marxism through the issue of bourgeois radicalism in philosophy in the 18 and 19 Centuries. [Read More]
Philadelphia Media  Bourgeois  Bourgeois revolution  Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel  Immanuel Kant  Liberal  Liberalism  Karl Marx  Friedrich Nietzsche  Radical bourgeois philosophy  Jean-Jacques Rousseau 

The Marxism of Second International Radicalism

Lenin, Luxemburg, and Trotsky

 June 22, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

Panel held at the Marxist Literary Group Summer 2011 Institute on Culture and Society at the Institute for the Humanities, University of Illinois at Chicago on June 22, 2011 Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Panelists Chris Cutrone, Lenin Greg Gabrellas, Luxemburg Ian Morrison, Trotsky Moderated by Spencer A. Leonard. Description The legacy of revolution 1917-19 in Russia, Germany, Hungary and Italy is concentrated above all in the historical figures Vladimir Lenin, Rosa Luxemburg and Leon Trotsky, leaders of the Left in the Second International (1889-1914)—what they called “revolutionary social democracy” – in the period preceding the crisis of war, revolution, counterrevolution and civil war in World War I and its aftermath. [Read More]
Vladimir Lenin  Leninism  Leon Trotsky  Karl Marx  Marxism  Rosa Luxemburg 

Marxism and the Bourgeois Revolution

 June 20, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

Panel held at the Marxist Literary Group Summer 2011 Institute on Culture and Society at the Institute for the Humanities, University of Illinois at Chicago on June 20, 2011. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Panelists Spencer A. Leonard, “Marx’s critique of political economy: Proletarian socialism continuing the bourgeois revolution?” Pamela Nogales, “Marx on the U.S. Civil War as the 2 American Revolution” Jeremy Cohan, “Lukács on Marx’s Hegelianism and the dialectic of Marxism” [Read More]
Bourgeois  Bourgeois revolution  Karl Marx  Marxism  Marxist Literary Group 

After Hegel

After Hegel

 June 1, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

ON MARCH 14, 2011, Omair Hussain publicly interviewed Robert Pippin, on behalf of Platypus, at an event titled On the Possibility of What Isn’t at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Robert Pippin is a professor on the Committee on Social Thought and in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Chicago, and the author of numerous works on Kant, Hegel, and Nietzsche. What follows is an edited transcript of the interview. [Read More]
Art  Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel  Immanuel Kant  Karl Marx  Marxism  Robert Pippin  Enlightenment  Theodor W. Adorno 

The Legacy of Trotskyism

 April 30, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

One of the plenary sessions held at the third annual Platypus Affiliated Society international convention, hosted by the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from April 29–May 1st, 2011, set about exploring the legacy of Trotsky’s Marxism. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Transcript in Platypus Review #38 Panelists Mike Macnair, Communist Party of Great Britain (Oxford Univ. St. Hugh College) Bryan Palmer, Trent University [Read More]
Platypus International Convention 2011  Anti-Stalinism  Communism  Communist Party of Great Britain  CPGB  IBT  International Bolshevik Tendency  Leon Trotsky  Karl Marx  Marxism  Socialism  Stalinism  Trotskyism 

Marx and Engel's Marxism

 March 20, 2011  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

A panel discussion organized by the Platypus Affiliated Society held on March 20, 2011, at Left Forum, Pace University. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Panelists Benjamin Blumberg - University of Chicago Nathan Smith - The Platypus Affiated Society Pam Nogales - New York University Richard Rubin - Platypus Tana Forrester - The Platypus Affiliated Society Description Marx and Engels were not the preeminent socialists but rather socialism’s greatest critics, distinguishing their “communism” from “reactionary,” “bourgeois” and “democratic” socialism. [Read More]
Left Forum  Left Forum 2011  Friedrich Engels  Forum 2011  Karl Marx  Marxism  New York  NYC Other  Socialism  Bourgeois Revolutions