Module description
This module will explore the relationship between revolutionary thought and practice from the early 20th century to the present day. By reading a range of materials from classical Marxist theory to anti-colonial thinkers such as Frantz Fanon to the oral testimony of revolutionary peasant women in 1930s India, we will consider how various thinkers and militants have addressed questions such as the following:
- What is the relationship between intellectuals and ‘the masses’ in a revolutionary movement?
- Can revolutionary consciousness be taught—and if so, how? To whom? By whom?
- Who must lead the revolution, and who decides this question?
- What is the role of action in instigating and shaping revolutionary theory? Vice versa?
- Who or what is sacrificed on the way to the revolutionary society? How does this sacrifice appear in theory? In practice?
- How have theorists approached ‘false consciousness’, or the idea that oppressed people may fail to properly understand what is in their best interest?
- What are some of the conceptual blind-spots of past revolutionary theory and movements, and how might seeing these help us better understand the limitations of our current perspectives?
Students should be prepared to think critically about historical and current answers to these questions, even those that now circulate as obviously correct. The module will include a self-organised reading group component to encourage students to extend their engagement with these ideas beyond the university, where students will choose their own topic, readings and aims.
Assessment details
1 x 750-word reading group guide (15%). Reflections (blog post, video, podcast or other accessible format, 15%) and Exam (70%)
Alternative assessment available for semester one only study abroad students.
Educational aims & objectives
In Study and Struggle we will investigate the complex and at times conflicted relationship between revolutionary theory and action. By reading the voices of front-line militants in conversation with the thought of revolutionary leaders and intellectuals, students will explore the various ways these groups and perspectives have interacted—from the importance of collective study for oppressed groups to the failure of intellectual leadership to understand the will of the people at large. You’ll be encouraged to develop an historically informed understanding of these relationships, but also to interrogate and challenge the assumptions we hold about revolutionary consciousness, leadership, and theory in the present. Alongside the syllabus, students will hold a series of independent reading groups, to gain an experiential understanding of collective study as a model of critical engagement that has been crucial to movements organising for social change.
Learning outcomes
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Students will
- Develop an understanding of revolutionary thought from canonical origins to the work of thinkers across the Global South including texts Guinea-Bissau, Nicaragua, and India.
- Learn to read for and identify for methodological convergences across historical and geographical contexts.
- Develop organisational and communication skills that will allow for them to extend their engagement beyond the university setting.
- Develop and sustain an argument, drawing on appropriate resources (to be demonstrated through final essay).
- Identify and be able to discuss the political affordances offered by different genres and forms of anticolonial writing.