Sunday, February 24, 2008

An Edwardian Response to Marxist Readings

Gramsci’s concept of hegemony, that is that the ruling class can exert and maintain its dominance not by physical force but by psychological and cultural manipulation of the populous, should not be a revolutionary idea to us. We’ve seen it all throughout history. In the antebellum South religious texts were presented in away that made the slaves think they should stay in their place and alleviated any fear the Masta might have had that he was somehow committing an inhumane act by holding scores of people against their will.

It’s even the central tenement of advertising according to A Marxist Reading of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”. Rudolph, Santa, the elves, et al. all stand as figures and embodiments of the Capitalist system and, through song and dance, they insidiously plant the seeds of acceptance to the subjugation of as a member of the proletariat.

But it’s a talking dancing reindeer. It’s made out of felt and glue and slapped together in five minutes. Does Rudolph really contain all that much beyond the fact we shouldn’t crack jokes on the guy with the glowing nose?

Well yes of course it does, all fiction is a byproduct of its culture and as such the ideas of that culture have a way of creeping into the work. But I found myself asking, isn’t this “reading” and all others like it just a manifestation of Marxist hegemony? A belief that anything and everything has been set up by the bourgeoisie to keep the masses under their thumb?

Yes, yes it is and Gramsci already told us that all levels of society can and do create their own hegemony which is why some people adhere to seemingly inflexible concept of Marxism.

They might have taught it like they mother in Kincaid’s Girl taught her daughter. Rigidly she imparts her worldview and like in Rudolph she starts at the earliest age but reason can really take hold in order to make her daughter’s subservience as complete as possible.

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