| ID | 174038 |
| Title Proper | Passing through difference |
| Other Title Information | C.L.R. James and Henry Lefebvre |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Smith, Andrew |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) | This essay offers a comparative analysis of the work of Henri Lefebvre and C.L.R. James, both key contributors to the emergence of a humanist form of Marxism in the twentieth century. Independently of each other, both writers, I show, developed a mode of critique which emphasised capitalism’s dehumanizing social effects, and which rejected a merely instrumental or utilitarian political response. Consequently, both writers placed critical emphasis on those longings and demands made evident in the insurgent politics of everyday life and popular culture; in what both conceptualised as a search for ‘happiness‘. But at the same time, the comparison is important because it makes evident the extent of the divisive intellectual legacies of empire within European Marxism. Lefebvre’s work bears in itself the marks of a racialised understanding of human relations; the ’human’ of which he speaks is limited in ways that James challenged consistently. |
| `In' analytical Note | Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power Vol. 27, No.1; Feb 2020: p.38-52 |
| Journal Source | Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 2020-02 27, 1 |
| Key Words | Humanism ; Marxism ; Popular Culture ; Henri Lefebvre ; Imperialism ; CLR James |