{"title":"Race and Reification","authors":"Matthew Dimick","doi":"10.1163/1569206x-bja10016","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article uses Marx’s idea of commodity fetishism and subsequent theories of reification to understand the social construction of race. Race is typically defined as a socially-constituted category that is mischaracterised as a natural one. The goal of this article, in contrast, is to explain how this mischaracterisation arises. In addition to this main objective, the article uses this explanation of race to contest recent attempts that locate the ‘persistent entanglement’ of race and capital in their functional relationship. Finally, the article engages with related, commodity-based theories of race and racism and concludes with thoughts on what the socially-constructed category of race can teach us about the nature of value and capitalism.","PeriodicalId":46231,"journal":{"name":"Historical Materialism-Research in Critical Marxist Theory","volume":"13 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.9000,"publicationDate":"2023-10-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"3","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Historical Materialism-Research in Critical Marxist Theory","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1163/1569206x-bja10016","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"PHILOSOPHY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 3
Abstract
Abstract This article uses Marx’s idea of commodity fetishism and subsequent theories of reification to understand the social construction of race. Race is typically defined as a socially-constituted category that is mischaracterised as a natural one. The goal of this article, in contrast, is to explain how this mischaracterisation arises. In addition to this main objective, the article uses this explanation of race to contest recent attempts that locate the ‘persistent entanglement’ of race and capital in their functional relationship. Finally, the article engages with related, commodity-based theories of race and racism and concludes with thoughts on what the socially-constructed category of race can teach us about the nature of value and capitalism.
期刊介绍:
Historical Materialism is an interdisciplinary journal dedicated to exploring and developing the critical and explanatory potential of Marxist theory. The journal started as a project at the London School of Economics from 1995 to 1998. The advisory editorial board comprises many leading Marxists, including Robert Brenner, Maurice Godelier, Michael Lebowitz, Justin Rosenberg, Ellen Meiksins Wood and others. Marxism has manifested itself in the late 1990s from the pages of the Financial Times to new work by Fredric Jameson, Terry Eagleton and David Harvey. Unburdened by pre-1989 ideological baggage, Historical Materialism stands at the edge of a vibrant intellectual current, publishing a new generation of Marxist thinkers and scholars.