Marxian Thought: Understanding Society and Social Change

Marx's Methodology of understanding social change: Historical Materialism (aka Dialectical Materialism)

Essay 1: Marx - Summary (maximum 3-5 pages)
Your goal in this paper is to demonstrate that you understand Marx by summarizing one of the topics below by using the readings, the lecture notes,(try to use provided material) . What are the most important things Marx says about society in relationship to the topic you pick? In a three page paper you cannot cover everything a theorist says, so the main challenge here is selection and synthesis. You should support your main points with grounded analysis that includes effective summaries, paraphrasing, and short, direct quotations from the appropriate texts. A good paper will reflect a close and grounded analysis of the readings rather than offering general or vague observations such as “Marx was an important thinker,” “According to Marxism, society is complex,” etc. Pick one of the topics of Marxist thought to explore and analyze in your paper:
•    Marx's Methodology of understanding social change:  Historical Materialism (aka Dialectical Materialism)
•    Marx's understanding of class conflict
•    Marx's understanding of alienation
•    Marx's understanding of commodity fetishism
•    Marx's understanding of communism and what type of society communism will bring about.

Paper Guidelines    
•    Papers must be submitted via Blackboard.  You do not have to bring a hard copy to class.  You must upload the document as a microsoft word document or a pdf or add the text directly to blackboard. 
•    Papers should be at least 3 pages (no more than 5) double-spaced (2x). Please use Times New Roman with a size 12 font.  Margins should remain normal.
•    Your paper should be in your own voice, which means using quotations selectively and only when necessary.
•    Simple citations and a works cited page is ok for this essay.  Simple footnotes, or endnotes are ok and counted as works cited. Feel free to utilize more official forms of citation if you want: where you can format your citations and bibliography using Chicago, ASA or APA style. The bibliography does not count toward the page requirement.
•    Please proofread your paper.

Themes
•    Marx's Theoretical Contributions
    Materialism
    Historical Materialism
    Exploitation
    Alienation
    Class Conflict
•    Marx's Methodological Contributions
    Dialectical Materialism 
•    Deepening Marx
    Conflict Theory
    Thinking theoretically about race and class
    Slavery as a mode of production

Notes:
1. For the article: Introduction to a Contribution to the critique of Hegal's Philosophy of Right.
•    Watch the video on Historical Materialism (materialism vs idealism before reading this)
•    Try to read the whole thing but here are some notes to help you get through it.
•    Think about this article in 3 sections
    Critique of religion/Critique of ideology (page 1)
    Critique of German philosophy and politics (pages 2-6)
    What will bring about the German revolution (pages 6-9)
•    The most important thing to read and try to understand is the first section above (page 1)

2.  For the article: The German Ideology
•    Watch the video on Historical Materialism (materialism vs idealism before reading this)
•    Try to read the whole thing but here are some notes to help you get through it.
•    This article is in 4 sections:
    (1)The Illusions of German Idealism (basically more materialism vs idealism)
    (2)First Premises of Materialist Method (basically the historical materialism from the video)
    (3)History: Fundamental Conditions
    (4)Private Property and Communism