“Education is, before everything else, the process of giving to the ordinary members of society its full common meanings, and the skills that will enable them to amend these meanings, in the light of their personal and common experience.”
Raymond Williams, ‘Culture is Ordinary’
Culture is indeed ordinary, it includes most human activities: the arts, religion, sport, science and technology, TV/ radio and other media, the internet, eating and drinking, etc. etc. All of these topics have political dimensions involving struggles and negotiations over meanings and values. On this hub are articles on cultural activities apart from the arts, which are to be found on the arts hub, surprisingly enough.
Keith Flett considers the various references to the role beer played in the lives of Marx and Engels. There have been many and varied attempts over the... Continue reading
Tom Walker discusses how corporate profiteers are capturing a vital social resource – information about ourselves. How can we de-commodify our everyday lives and even our resistance?... Continue reading
Professor John Storey outlines Marx and Engels’ theoretical contributions to cultural theory. Although Karl Marx did not have a fully developed theory of culture, it is possible... Continue reading
What would a radical, socialist culture policy look like? Last September I reported on The World Transformed festival, organised by Momentum alongside the Labour Party conference in... Continue reading
David Betteridge gives a personal account of reading Marx, with drawings by Bob Starrett. Fifty years ago, when I was training to be a teacher at Neville’s... Continue reading
Richard Clarke reviews The Bleeding Edge, by Bob Hughes, New Internationalist 2016 A discussion paper published by the (left-leaning) Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) at the... Continue reading
James Crossley argues for the importance of the radical Christian tradition as an important resource for the revolutionary transformation of the world. On becoming leader of the... Continue reading
Richard Clarke outlines how religion, like any other cultural activity, is capable of both promoting political and social liberation, and being manipulated and controlled by ruling classes... Continue reading
Peter Doran points to the way buddhist concepts are being corrupted by the commodifying pressures of capitalist culture, and outlines the ways in which true mindfulness practices... Continue reading
In the second essay in the series, Roland Boer discusses the relationship between religion and capitalism. The essay is also available as an ebook, and is part... Continue reading