Methods in Marxist Feminism
STUDY BLOCK: PHILOSOPHY
Image: Clara Zetkin and her comrades at the 2nd International Congress of Communist Women, Moscow, 1921
STUDY MATERIALS
“Only in Conjunction With the Proletarian Woman Will Socialism Be Victorious,” by Clara Zetkin
In this speech given on October 16 1896 at the Party Congress of the Social Democratic Party, Clara Zetkin makes clear the difference between the struggle of bourgeois and working class women. She describes the different economic, social, and ideological realities faced by those in the bourgeois and working classes, and pushes for greater effort for the organization of working women from her comrades. When reading this speech, consider the time and place in which it was given, and see if you can draw connections to the conditions of struggle we face today.
“How Lenin Studied Marx” by Krupskaya
In this short pamphlet, Krupskaya elaborates Lenin’s approach to studying Marx’s works. She emphasizes that his approach was to “consult” Marx rather than to simply read his texts. She also elaborates Lenin’s commitment to applying dialectical historical materialism in his studies. This text is a good reminder that we do not study Marx for the simple accumulation of knowledge, but rather to help us develop strategy for revolutionary action. Most importantly, it is a reminder that the way we study, and the kinds of questions we ask while studying are just as essential as the object of study itself.
DISCUSSION PROMPT
We’re reading these essays for ways to analyze the world we are in – and to better understand our ongoing relations of exploitation and oppression. We’re reading them to think through and alongside the movements we are part of, and the challenges our movements face. We’re studying revolutionary feminist methods to think about how we can build better alliances, and how to better see the class/gender/sexuality/race stakes of our political goals. Given those embedded stakes in our politics, revolutionary feminist methods can help to sharpen our long-term strategies, and short-term tactics.
Choose an object in your immediate surroundings that, in your opinion, either supports patriarchal oppression or resists patriarchal oppression— or that symbolizes elements of both (support of and resistance to). Reflect a little about your objects, whether objects of resistance to patriarchy, or objects of patriarchal domination and support. They might carry both qualities.
If you are taking this course with a group, describe your choice to the group – and what it signifies for you. If you are taking it alone, reflect on the questions below.
Consider the objects—what are their commonalties, differences, overlaps between these objects, the thought process behind them, their context, etc.?
*What generalities, or abstractions can you draw out of these connections and differences?
*What theories of domination are embedded in your discussions about the objects? What theories of resistance emerge?
*What are important relations of power embedded in your objects? What human relations are embedded in you objects?
*What kinds of labor and work make your objects possible?
*What are sites of contradiction in these objects? Your discussion may include contradictions between the liberatory promises of an object and its exploitative relations of production. They could be contradictions between the object’s use and its raced, classed or gendered demands on the person who uses it.