Readings: Marx, Selection from Capital
Bourdieu, Selection from Distinction
Butler, Selection from Gender Trouble

1. What does Marx mean by use value and exchange value?

2. What, according to Marx, is the relationship between labor and value? How does capitalism lead to the alienation of labor?

3. How, according to Marx, are commodities fetishized? Why is this a major feature of capitalism?

4. Bourdieu states, "Taste classifies, and it classifies the classifier" (6). What does he mean by this? (Hint: consider how Bourdieu defines taste, how people acquire taste, and how taste relates to status.)

5. What is Bourdieu's notion of culture? How is culture acquired? What role do education and social origin play in this acquisition?

6. How, according to Bourdieu, do objects for consumption express sociological differences? How do individuals decide what to consume? What are the strengths and weaknesses of Bourdieu's argument?

7. Butler writes, "And the feminist subject turns out to be discursively constituted by the very political system that is supposed to facilitate its emancipation.... In such cases, an uncriticcal appeal to such a system for the emancipation of 'women' will clearly be self-defeating" (2). What does she mean? Do you agree with her argument?

8. Butler critiques the sex/gender distinction that has been central to much of feminist theory. What problems does she identify with this distinction? Do you find her analysis persuasive?

9. In advancing a theory of gender as performance, Butler writes, "There is no gender identity behind the expressions of gender; that identity is performatively constructed by the very 'expressions' that are said to be its results" (25). What does she mean? What, in your opinion, are the strengths and weaknesses of thinking of gender as a performance?

 

Question for Response Paper #7 (optional): Engaging Marx

Both Butler and Bourdieu draw on Marx's ideas, directly and indirectly. Your assignment for this week asks you to pick either Butler or Bourdieu and then analyze how the author you have picked engages with elements of Marx's analysis of the social and economic processes of capitalism. Questions you might consider include: Exactly how does the author you have picked use Marx (directly or indirectly, explicitly or implicitly)? Is that use compelling or valid, in your opinion? Does the author identify weaknesses in Marx's approach? Add productively to Marx's theory? Highlight the strengths or weaknesses of Marx's analysis?

For tips about crafting response papers, click here.

 

For more information, contact:  aleshkow@holycross.edu