Jacobin Radio

Latest Episodes:

Introducing Antibody, a Dig special series on COVID-19. May 29, 2020

Show notes

From The Dig and Jacobin: a new narrative series about how COVID-19 has changed everything and nothing at all. The first of three episodes is coming soon.

Casualties of History: Eager to Discuss the Differential Calculus May 29, 2020

Show notes

Chapters eight and nine of EP Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class. Additional reading: Aaron Benanav, "Automation and the Future of Work—1" https://newleftreview.org/issues/II119/articles/aaron-benanav-automation-and-the-future-of-work-1 Aaron Benanav, "Automation and the Future of Work—2"https://newleftreview.org/issues/II120/articles/aaron-benanav-automation-and-the-future-of-work-2 E.P. Thompson, "Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism" https://www.sv.uio.no/sai/english/research/projects/anthropos-and-the-material/Intranet/economic-practices/reading-group/texts/thompson-time-work-discipline-and-industrial-capitalism.pdf

Jacobin Radio: Set the Night on Fire with Mike Davis and Jon Wiener May 28, 2020

Show notes

Suzi talks to historians Mike Davis and Jon Wiener, touching on some of the many intersecting stories they tell in their long awaited and absolutely compelling history, Set the Night on Fire: Los Angeles in the Sixties.

Here we see Los Angeles as a hotbed of political, social and cultural upheaval — from the Watts rebellion to the Chicano Blowouts, the anti-war movement, youth protests and strikes, the women’s and gay movements, the cultural flowering and media expressions, including KPFK, the Los Angeles Free Press and the Ashgrove — as well as the ferocious, racist and violent police response at every turn. Their account of the ever increasing mass protests and the movements behind them convey that “special excitement that occurs when a group of people can see and visibly measure their potential power for the first time.”

The Dig: Ebola in West Africa with Adia Benton May 23, 2020

Show notes

Dan interviews anthropologist Adia Benton on the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa and what its politics reveal about the Covid-19 pandemic today.

Please support this podcast with your money at patreon.com/thdig

Casualties of History: When We Burn Down Your Barn May 23, 2020

Show notes

We're on to Part II of The Making of the English Working Class. We cover chapter six and seven--"Exploitation" and "The Field Labourers," plus discuss the 1986 film Comrades, which follows the Tolpuddle Martyrs, a group of laborers who were transported to Australia for organizing an early trade union.

No secondary reading this week, though if you can find Comrades online, watch it! In the United States at least, it's available on Vimeo.

Behind the News: Green New Deal, Vaccines May 18, 2020

Show notes

Thea Riofrancos, co-author of this book, on why the Green New Deal is more urgent than ever. Then, Alexander Zaitchik, author of this article, on how the profit-driven drug industry is an obstacle to developing a vaccine.

The Dig: Science for the People with Nafis Hasan and Frank Rosenthal May 17, 2020

Show notes

Dan interviews Frank Rosenthal on the history of the radical science organization Science for the People and Nafis Hasan on everything about a left-wing politics of science.

Subscribe to Science for the People at magazine.ScienceForThePeople.org

Please support this podcast with your money at Patreon.com/TheDig

Casualties of History: "Are We Not Always in an Exceptional Situation?" May 14, 2020

Show notes

With guest Asad Haider, we discuss at length the theoretical polemic of E.P. Thompson against Louis Althusser. What was the historical context for each side of this conflict (in which Althusser never participated directly)? What was Thompson’s critique? Asad argues that Thompson did not understand Althusser correctly, or even provide a satisfactory conceptual account of what was best about his own empirical research. The two, may have been closer to each other than Thompson understood. A humanist, he preferred the young Marx; Althusser, an anti-humanist, argued systematically for the importance of the mature Marx. Both, however, were reacting to the Stalinist ossification of their respective national Communist parties.

Readings discussed in this episode:

Louis Althusser, For Marx

https://www.versobooks.com/books/35-for-marx

Louis Althusser, “Contradiction and Overdetermination” (from For Marx)

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1962/overdetermination.htm

Louis Althusser, Etienne Balibar, Roger Establet, Pierre Macherey, and Jacques Rancière, Reading Capital

https://www.versobooks.com/books/2042-reading-capital

Louis Althusser, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses”

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1970/ideology.htm

Perry Anderson, “Origins of the Present Crisis”

https://newleftreview.org/issues/I23/articles/perry-anderson-origins-of-the-present-crisis

Perry Anderson, Arguments Within English Marxism

https://www.versobooks.com/books/576-arguments-within-english-marxism

Asad Haider, Mistaken Identity: Race and Class in the Age of Trump https://www.versobooks.com/books/2716-mistaken-identity

Karl Marx, Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/appx1.htm

E.P. Thompson, “The Peculiarities of the English”

https://www.marxists.org/archive/thompson-ep/1965/english.htm

E.P. Thompson, “An Open Letter to Leszek Kolakowski” https://www.marxists.org/archive/thompson-ep/1973/kolakowski.htm

E.P. Thompson, “The Poverty of Theory:Or, An Orrery of Errors” https://www.marxists.org/archive/thompson-ep/1978/pot/intro.htm

E.P. Thompson, “Outside the Whale”

https://www.marxists.org/archive/thompson-ep/1978/outside-whale.htm

The Dig: Beyond Economism with Nancy Fraser [From the archives] May 09, 2020

Show notes

Dan is playing catch up. Here's a fav interview from the archives: critical theorist Nancy Fraser on how a total analysis of capitalism requires analyzing capitalism's totality, including socially reproductive work that makes possible the world that capitalism exploits. This is painfully relevant today as people everywhere do the work of staying at home and social distancing to beat this pandemic while capitalists reap the rewards of the world's reproduction.

Please support this podcast at Patreon.com/TheDig

Casualties of History: The Ruffian Crew of Power May 06, 2020

Show notes

We cover Chapter Five, but first have an extensive discussion of the debate between Thompson and Perry Anderson and Tom Nairn over the history of social class and economic development in England, with sociologist Jonah Stuart-Brundage. What should we make of liberalism in England at the end of the eighteenth century and what it meant for the prospects of revolution?

Secondary readings:

Perry Anderson, “Origins of the Present Crisis” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I23/articles/perry-anderson-origins-of-the-present-crisis

Perry Anderson, “Socialism and Pseudo-Empiricism,” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I35/articles/perry-anderson-socialism-and-pseudo-empiricism

Arno Mayer, The Persistence of the Old Regime: Europe to the Great War https://www.versobooks.com/books/475-the-persistence-of-the-old-regime

Tom Nairn, “The British Political Elite” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I23/articles/tom-nairn-the-british-political-elite

Tom Nairn, “The British Working Class” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I24/articles/tom-nairn-the-english-working-class

Tom Nairn, “The Anatomy of the Labour Party: Part I” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I27/articles/tom-nairn-the-nature-of-the-labour-party-part-i

Tom Nairn, “The Anatomy of the Labour Party: Part II” https://newleftreview.org/issues/I28/articles/tom-nairn-the-nature-of-the-labour-party-part-ii

E.P. Thompson, “The Peculiarities of the English” https://www.marxists.org/archive/thompson-ep/1965/english.htm#n1