September 6 at SIU Student Center (ROOM TBA)
Join Southern Illinois DSA and SIU YDSA to discuss the ideas we need to change the world — around class struggle, socialist feminism, queer Marxism and anti-racism.
Note: Readings are suggestions. Everyone is welcome regardless of whether they are able to do the readings.
Session One: The Communist Manifesto (11am - 12:30pm)
All history is the history of class struggles. Workers have the power to overthrow capitalism and create a truly democratic and egalitarian society, as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels outlined in their pamphlet, The Communist Manifesto. Join us to discuss how their arguments apply to today’s world.
Suggested Reading: Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto (1848)
Further Suggested Reading: Engels, Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (1880), Karl Marx, Capital, “Primitive Accumulation” (chapters 26-33) (1867)
Lunch (12:30pm-1:30pm).
RSVP for lunch by emailing us at southern.il.dsa@gmail.com.
Session Two: Socialist Feminism and Queer Marxism (1:30pm-3pm)
Sexism and gender norms are as old as class society; although those “norms” changed dramatically over time and in different societies. Capitalism depends on heterosexism to make sure that working-class families — especially women — maintain current and future generations of workers. This privatized “social reproduction” of labor is key to capitalist profits and exploitation. Working-class liberation, women’s liberation, queer and trans liberation are bound together.
Suggested Reading: Tithi Bhattacharya, “What is Social Reproduction Theory?” (2013).
Further Suggested Reading: Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884), Jules Gleason and Elle O’Rourke, “Introduction” from Transgender Marxism (2021), Holly Lewis, “Queer Marxism” from The Politics of Everybody: Feminism, Queer Theory and Marxism at the Intersection (2016) Anuradha Ghandy, Philosophical Trends in the Feminist Movement, pgs 75-99, Thomas Sankara, Women’s Liberation and the African Freedom Struggle
Break (3pm-3:30pm)
Session Three: Marxism and Black Liberation (3:30pm-5pm)
Capitalism and racism are intertwined — especially in the United States (a colonial-settler state founded on slavery and genocide). Racism was invented, in large part, to “justify” the slave trade, and continued after abolition to allow the capitalists to exploit Black and other non-white workers more than white workers, and to pit workers of different “races” against each other. Racism has also been central to the colonial and imperialist wars of countries like the United States. Ultimately, capitalism can’t be defeated without destroying racism, and racism can’t be defeated without destroying capitalism.
Suggested Reading: Keeanga Taylor, “Race, Class and Marxism” (2011)
Suggested Further Reading: Lenin, The Right of Nations to Self-Determination (1914), Paul D’Amato, “The Communist Party and Black Liberation in the 1930s, (1997)” Black Panther Party, “The Ten Point Program” (1966), Dan Georgakas and Marvin Sukrin, Detroit I Do Mind Dying (1975), chapters 1 and 2 (pages 23 - 51) J Sakai, Settlers, chapter 10, (1983), Harry Haywood, Black Bolshevik, chapter 8 (pages 218-244), (1978)
September 7 at Carbondale Township Hall (217 E. Main Street, Carbondale, IL)
Dinner and Movie: Finally Got the News (5pm-7pm)
A classic documentary about the League of Revolutionary Black Workers — organizers of a rank-and-file struggle in the Detroit auto factories in the late 1960s against racism and capitalism. Dinner is a potluck. Bring something if you can but everyone is welcome!