SOCIOL 748 : Critical Theory and Social Change
Arts
2022 Semester Two (1225) (30 POINTS)
Course Prescription
Investigates the social forces and forms of thought currently producing progressive social change out of the contradictory realities of the existing social situation. Considers the immanent possibilities for radical change at the present moment of late capitalism, the grounds on which social change might be justified and the practical steps that might be taken to realise them.
Course Overview
ROBINSON CRUSOE, OR, THE ABSURDITY OF CAPITALIST REASON
SOCIOL748 CRITICAL THEORY AND SOCIAL CHANGE 2022
Lecturer
Associate Professor Campbell Jones
58 Symonds Street (building 435), level 6
Email: campbell.jones@auckland.ac.nz
Lectures
Mondays 10.00am-1.00pm, 18 July to 22 August and 12 September to 17 October 2022
Location: Humanities Building (building 206), room 210
Office Hours
Weekly office hour: Fridays 11.00am-12.00midday, or by appointment
Writing Laboratory
A second weekly office hour will be offered as a “Writing Laboratory.” This will focus solely on writing skills and the writing process. The proposed time for this is Thursdays or Fridays starting in week two, although we can discuss timing of the writing laboratory in our first session together.
Calendar Course Description
This course investigates the social forces and forms of thought currently producing progressive social change out of the contradictory realities of the existing social situation. It considers the imminent possibilities for radical change at the present moment of late capitalism, the grounds on which social change might be justified and the practical steps that might be taken to realize them.
Purpose
This is an advanced seminar in critical theory and social change, focusing on the most important historical and contemporary developments in radical thought and projects for progressive social change. It functions as a developmental workshop for not only deepening knowledge and intellectual skills but equally for the sharpening of analytic, disputation and writings skills. Each year we have one shared theme, although each participant is encouraged to develop their specific theoretical and political interests. This means that there will be an effort to find unity while emphasizing multiplicity, and allowing each to come at critical theory and social change from different places. There is no pure beginning: “We must begin wherever we are” (Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, p. 162).
Course Background
Since it was established in its current form in 2013, the content of the seminar has changed every year. Understanding this changing context will help participants to gain a sense of the nature of this seminar. This section therefore outlines the historical development of this course.
We commenced in 2013 with the theory of the subject. The seminar for this year was organised around a reading of the theory of the subject in four thinkers: Hegel, Lacan, Althusser and Badiou. A distinction was drawn between two ways of understanding the subject. On the one hand, some theories of the subject frame “the subject” as the result of the subjection or subjectification of individuals to ideology, discourse or power. On the other hand, other theories of the subject find that “the subject” is a transindividual principle of political struggle and social transformation from below. Based in a thoroughgoing critique of the former (broadly Althusserian/Foucauldian) conception of the subject as a subjected individual, this seminar elaborated the latter theory of the subject out of our reading of Hegel, Lacan and Badiou. On this latter conception, the subject is always “metaphysical,” in the sense that it is radically opposed to, and in excess of, the objective world of what is, and with this “the subject” always exceeds the confines of the individual. In doing so, this year we outlined the grounds for a critical sociology in which the descriptive sociology of domination is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a politics of emancipation. A politics of emancipation based on a transindividual conception of the subject brings to centre stage the existing collective efforts that surround us and that are pressing, in various different ways, in the direction of radical social change.
From the theory of the subject, we turned in 2015 to the theory of the other. This theme was developed through a critical reading of the other in the thought of Hegel, Levinas, Derrida, and Lacan; and further in historical materialism, feminism and anti-racist thought. This seminar also offered a preliminary sketch of some of the foundational ideas in my book The Work of Others. In this seminar we developed, as in other years, an advanced comprehension of one central concept – the other – but beyond this work of theoretical formalization, we brought this concept of the other into close contact with political economy and with socialist, feminist, anti-racist and decolonial struggles. This year we also developed two further features that have characterised the seminar every year. First, this seminar introduced a reversal of perspective, such that otherness is not taken as a principle of oppression or domination, but is rather the basis for the always already existing agency of “the other,” to which power responds. Second, the concept of “the work of others” was introduced as an integrative and border-crossing concept, one that arises at the intersection of multiple social struggles. In doing so, as in other years, this seminar stressed the importance of seeing the potential and actual solidarities between diverse emancipatory political struggles.
The seminar of 2016 sought to respond to contemporary skepticism regarding the value of thought. Rejecting on the one hand a mysticism in which thought is reduced to the particularities, opinions, and experiences of individuals, and on the other hand the technocratic scientism which subjects thought to the demands of what is, this seminar sought to identify and scrutinize the enemies of thought today. We worked on articulating the triangular relations between opinion, knowledge, and truth. Following Badiou, we argued that while opinion reduces thought to the finite mortal individual and knowledge subordinates thought to the construction of an encyclopedia of what is, truths in all of their variety seize and traverse the individual human being. Based again on a close reading of Hegel, Lacan and Badiou, but here focusing on the question of thought, we located the enemies of thought in the metaphysics of the finitude and limitation; in the idea that thought comes to us from a position transcendent to this world; and in the idea that the human being is little more than a mortal body with its limited particular desires and interests. While contemporary culture and politics constantly seek to put thought “in its place,” this seminar sought to clarify how thought in the proper sense is always out of place and always demands of each of us something that exceeds any particular, finite, and limited place and any particular, finite, and limited individual.
Following our investigation of thought and its subjects, we turned in the next year to the question of whether or not the economy can be thought. Opening with a sketch of capital, finance and work today, we offered a formalization of the different conceptions of thought in Hegel, Lacan and Badiou. We then moved to a detailed investigation of the reduction of thought to the finite individual in liberalism. This was operationalized by a reading of the work of F. A. Hayek and related thinkers in the liberal and neoliberal traditions. This enabled us to assess the repudiation of thought in liberalism from Locke through Hayek to contemporary neoliberalism, in which the economy is treated as ultimately unknowable to the individual. While accepting the premise that the economy as a whole cannot be grasped by any single individual, we scrutinised and ultimately rejected the false premise of liberalism which holds that thought is reducible to the sense perception and internal cognition of an individual. Outside and beyond the individual human body, thought and in particular truths are always transindividual; they are always intertwined with the thought and experiences of others. Thought always involves thinking with and of others, while for regimes of thought such as liberalism that are grounded in the unwavering premise that the subject is the individual, thinking is not so much thinking with and of others, but is reduced to the cogitation of an inward-looking self that is concerned first and foremost with its own interests. The identification, analysis and critique of this idea of the sovereignty of the individual and against this, an emphasis on the sociality of reason and the transindividuality of thought is now taken as a foundational premise of this course.
In 2018 we turned to a detailed study of Hegel, via a reading of the Phenomenology of Spirit and the Encylopedia Logic. The seminar for this year began with a contextualizing account of Hegel’s relationship to, and transformative reading of, the philosophy and political economy that came before him. We then entered into a detailed analysis of (1) Hegel’s logic, and with this his understanding of contradiction and the dialectic; (2) Hegel’s conception of reason and the distinction he draws between the understanding and reason; and (3) Hegel’s account of the subject and with this his critiques of the individual, atomism and liberalism. We then turned to the relevance of Hegel for the critical theoretic analysis of the present. This involved a study of what Hegel can contribute to both comprehending and extending Marx’s critique of political economy; Hegel’s unique understandings of work and need; and what Hegel’s conceptions of logic, truth and the subject offer to practical questions of radical politics, with a particular focus on the question of economic planning.
Following our reading of Hegel, in the next year we turned to Marx. Together we read the Grundrisse, Marx’s 1857-58 draft of Capital that was first translated into English in 1973. We read this alongside the development of value theory, analyses of the value-form, the rise of the New Marx-Reading and the new protocols for the reading of Marx that have arisen following the publication of the Marx-Engels Gesamtausgabe (MEGA2). We also emphasized the importance of reading Marx from here, living and working as we do in a capitalist settler colony. As with all of the other thinkers we read in this seminar, we emphasized the dual demands of, on the one hand, the task of developing, extending, and stretching Marx; and on the other hand, the demand for the utmost rigour in reading and understanding what Marx actually wrote.
These themes were developed further in 2020 though a critical reading of capital in Aotearoa. We set ourselves two tasks: First, to develop a concept of capital, focusing on the specificity of capitalist social forms, and the forms of refusal that capital solicits and to which capital responds. Second, we sought to comprehend the arrival of capital in Aotearoa alongside the specific forms of refusal concomitant with the subsumption of this country under capital, focusing on these refusals because of their promise for the future economic transformation of Aotearoa in its transition through and out of the capital-relation. We restricted our reading to two books, offering a parallel reading of volume one of Marx’s Capital and Brian Easton’s Economic History of Aotearoa New Zealand. We read both of these books in the light of contemporary critical theory and contemporary political struggles, subjecting them to feminist and decolonial critique while also developing a concept of capital and the economic history of Aotearoa New Zealand in order to enrich, strengthen, and develop feminist, decolonial and socialist projects for social change.
In 2022 we will read Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. We will read this book in both historical and contemporary context, reading it with support from contemporary critical theory, in particular decolonial and Marxian theory, and in the light of contemporary political struggles against capital, slavery, and white supremacy. We read Robinson Crusoe today in order to grasp what can be identified as the absurdity of capitalist reason, the outlandish barbarism of colonial capitalism historically and today. From the optics of the colonial gaze to modern slavery and the contemporary cult of the entrepreneur, we find that Robinson Crusoe is our contemporary, speaking to many of our theoretical and political challenges. This seminar will draw out two themes of particular contemporary relevance: First, we consider the interrelated questions of white supremacy, colonization, and enslavement; along with the ways in which these have been papered over for the past three hundred years. Second, our reading digs deep into the capitalist conception of value, the astonishing treatment of Robinson Crusoe in neoclassical economics, and the contemporary realities of “ordinary entrepreneurial psychosis.” As always, while we have one unifying theme and a set of questions regarding that theme, all participants are encouraged to elaborate this theme in relation to their own specific conceptual concerns and political commitments, but also with a view to that which exceeds each of us as individuals.
Course Outline 2022
Daniel Defoe’s The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe is, by most accounts, an important work of world literature. First published in 1719, this book was so popular on first publication that it was reprinted numerous times and was followed almost immediately by two further volumes on Crusoe. Robinson Crusoe is often considered to be the first British novel, it is the second most widely translated book ever, is standard fare in the teaching of economics at all levels, and in 2019 was named by the BBC as the greatest British novel of all time.
We propose to read Robinson Crusoe this year in order to comprehend the absurdity of capitalist reason. We therefore propose to read Robinson Crusoe as a cipher through which to grasp some of the most pressing contradictions of contemporary society. The very absurdity of this book and its vision of isolation and mastery sheds considerable light on the absurdity of our age, a comprehension of which is essential if we are to understand the universe of ordinary psychosis that can be so painfully witnessed in figures such as Donald Trump and Elon Musk.
Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe stages in a very precise way some of the key dilemmas of our age: the consequences of colonization and slavery; capitalist ideologies of work and reward; the depth of white supremacy in western culture; the varieties and contradictions of critiques of finance; the theory of value and its relation to the individual; questions of mastery, command and political sovereignty; relations to the earth and to non-human animals; the presumptions of dispossessive individualism; contemporary misogyny and the fear of otherness; the religious metaphysics of salvation; and the question of deep interior work on one’s self.
In addition to this bewildering range of themes that arise throughout the book, Robinson Crusoe also stages some of the key epistemological challenges facing the humanities and social sciences today, inviting readers as it does into an opaque world of falsity, deception and mistrust. At every turn Robinson Crusoe is a ruse, oscillating for example between actually being a novel and being a promotional catalogue for the Atlantic slave trade and nationalist capital accumulation. In addition to the concrete dilemmas it stages, the book powerfully offers itself to critical analysis of the nature of knowledge, truth, deception, and the subject.
In order to develop an advanced understanding of these themes, we will read Robinson Crusoe, commentary on this book, and contemporary critical theory. We propose here a reading that is both patiently textual but also at the same time a “social reading” of the text that follows the twists and turns of the reception of this book. We will therefore take Robinson Crusoe as a guide for reading the history and present of colonial capitalism. Here, the resources of sociology, critical theory, decolonial thought, and the critique of political economy show this book to be of pressing contemporary relevance and that Robinson Crusoe is very much our contemporary.
The approach to our reading can be described as one of critical interdisciplinarity. Critical interdisciplinarity emphasizes that the knowledges of different disciplines are not merely additive, nor do they reflect the open meeting grounds of free and equal individuals. Further, critical interdisciplinarity does not presume in advance the superiority of one discipline or form of knowledge over others. Critical interdisciplinarity seeks to bring different and competing forms of knowledge into relation so that the grounds of different forms of knowledge are first drawn out and then scrutinised on the basis of a world that is larger than any of them. In this sense critical interdisciplinarity can be thought of as operating much like a particle accelerator, such that the speed and intensity of critical thought blows apart the previously imagined integrity of each of its elements and therefore transforms each of these elements upon impact.
Students will be invited to approach this book in relation to their own research interests, whether these be regarding capital, slavery, inequality, animals, racism, the nature of knowledge and deception, or any of the other many themes which the book raises. Hopefully this course will also encourage you to take up research questions that you have never considered in the past. A series of lectures and in-class discussions will work through the existing literature, leading to student presentations based on your own reading of Robinson Crusoe.
Session Content
The seminar for this year is divided into four parts, each with three weekly sessions. In the first part (weeks 1-3), we will read Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe. The first session will introduce the course and course participants, offering a framing of the seminar and the proposed critical reading of Robinson Crusoe. We will set the scene with a discussion of the contemporary rise of far right racist and capitalist violence, the idea of “cancel culture,” the place of world in economics, the languages of slavery and enslavement, and the intimacies of slavery and liberalism. In preparation for sessions two and three we will read Robinson Crusoe and discuss the content of the book in class. At the end of week three all participants will be invited to prepare a short summary of the book (more details on assessment can be found below).
Part two of the course (weeks 4-6) will read Robinson Crusoe in light of the historical and contemporary experiences of white supremacy, colonization, and slavery. Session four will investigate the role of slavery and white supremacy in Robinson Crusoe, situating the book in the context of Defoe’s defense of enslavement and the South Sea Company, in order to comprehend the representation of slavery and the optics of the colonial gaze in the eighteenth century. Session five then turns to the historical experience of slavery in the nineteenth century through a study of the translation of Ropitini Kuruho in te reo Māori that appeared in 1852 at the express instruction of Governor George Grey, along with the the history of slavery, mōkai and taurekareka in Aotearoa. In session six we then dig deeper into the representation of enslavement in Robinson Crusoe. For this session we will be joined by guest lecturer Dr Christina Stringer from the Centre for Research into Modern Slavery at the University of Auckland to discuss modern slavery, slavery in Aotearoa, and the prospects for anti-slavery legislation in Aotearoa today, before turning to questions of reparations for racist and capitalist violence.
Part three (weeks 7-9) will turn to economic questions. Week seven will analyze both Defoe’s ostensible critique of finance and “stockjobbing,” before turning to a study of all of the moments that Robinson Crusoe and its author appear in the writings of Marx and Engels. This reading will seek to identify the specific targets of Marx and Engels’ critiques of economic “Robinsonades,” emphasizing the role of value and the figure of the individual in representations of Robinson Crusoe in nineteenth century political economy. Session eight then investigates the disappearance of the world of Robinson Crusoe that takes place in the invention of an economic “Robinson Crusoe” in neoclassical economics from the 1870s through to the present. Session nine takes on the figure of the individual in Robinson Crusoe, in economics, and entrepreneurship theory and practice, closing in on the ways in which these all represent an imagined break from the symbolic order that is reflective of and productive of “ordinary entrepreneurial psychosis.”
Part four (weeks 10-12) will offer an assessment of the reading of Robinson Crusoe that appears in the final year of Jacques Derrida’s teaching, which opens powerful questions regarding solitude, world, and the relations between the human and the animal, even though it forecloses many of the questions we pose this year regarding enslavement and capital. We take this combination of brilliance and foreclosure of discussions of white supremacist capitalist violence to be symptomatic of the state of university discourse today. This double bind will also help us to clarify the tasks that lay ahead of us. The seminar will close after weeks eleven and twelve, which will consist of presentations by class participants that will outline in draft form the ideas that will be fully written up as the final essay for the course.
Session Summary
Following this structure, the sessions for this year can be summarized with titles as follows:
PART ONE: ROBINSON CRUSOE
Robinson Crusoe, Our Contemporary (18 July)
Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Part One (25 July)
Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Part Two (1 August)
PART TWO: WHITE SUPREMACY, COLONIZATION, AND ENSLAVEMENT
1719: Enslavement and Robinson Crusoe (8 August)
1852: Colonization and Ropitini Kuruho (15 August)
2022: Enslavement and Reparation (22 August) (guest lecturer Christina Springer)
PART THREE: VALUE, ECONOMICS, AND PSYCHOSIS
Marx and Engels on Robinson Crusoe, Robinsonades, the Individual and Value (12 September)
Robinson Crusoe and Robinson Crusoe in Neoclassical Economics (19 September)
Ordinary Entrepreneurial Psychosis (26 September)
PART FOUR: ASSESSEMENTS
Jacques Derrida on Political Sovereignty, Solitude and the Animal in Robinson Crusoe (3 October)
Student Presentations (10 October)
Student Presentations (17 October)
Learning Outcomes
At the end of this course you should:
Have developed your ability to comprehend and communicate complex ideas;
Have a solid understanding of Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe based on a first-hand reading;
Be able to identify ideas from Robinson Crusoe in concrete contemporary social situations;
Be able to develop, through independent research, these themes into critical social analysis;
Be able to advance an independent and morally defensible position regarding white supremacy, colonization, and enslavement; and
Be able to advance an independent and morally defensible position regarding capital, value, and entrepreneurial psychosis.
To achieve these learning objectives you will need to:
Read the assigned readings, and use language and reference dictionaries to clarify complex, technical and at times historically dated words and concepts;
Actively seek to understand all of the readings, which will involve reading beyond the text and bringing questions of clarification to class;
Attend the weekly lecture and actively participate in posing questions and the discussion of readings;
Organise your time independently;
Prepare and submit the short essays in a timely fashion; and
Prepare and submit your long essay on time.
Commitment
For those taking the course for credit, this is a 30 credit paper, which is equivalent to 20 hours per week. The 20 hours per week for this course can be broken roughly into: lectures (3 hours per week), writing lab or office hours (1 hour), writing every day (6 hours per week) and reading (10 hours per week).
Readings
This year we will read one book closely, carefully, and almost certainly more than once. All of the readings that are mentioned here are designed to help you in your reading of Robinson Crusoe. Please note that I have identified here all of the resources that you are likely to need this year, and you need to manage your time so that the amount of reading does not become overwhelming. Please try to read all required readings, and the supplementary readings in light of your research interests.
Since its original publication in 1719, numerous editions of Robinson Crusoe have appeared. For the past quarter of a century the standard critical edition has been:
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe: An Authoritative Text, Contexts, Criticism, ed. Michael Shinagel. 2nd edn. New York: Norton, 1994.
This edition is beautifully presented and includes a carefully curated collection of important historical essays and commentaries on Robinson Crusoe. This is the preferred edition, so please purchase or borrow this edition.
The most recent and authoritative critical edition of Robinson Crusoe is:
Defoe, Daniel. The Complete Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, ed. Maximillian Novak, Irving Rothman and Manuel Schonhorn. 3 vols. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 2022.
Because this 2022 edition is hard to find and currently out of print, by preference please read the Norton Critical Edition.
Our reading will focus on the first volume of Robinson Crusoe, the full original title of which is The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. Unless otherwise stated, we will refer to this first volume simply as Robinson Crusoe. The other two volumes, which you will almost certainly need to consult, are titled: The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (volume two) and Serious Reflections During the Life and Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe with his Vision of the Angelick World (volume three). All three volumes appear in the Bucknell University Press edition mentioned immediately above and also in the Owens and Furbank collection The Novels of Daniel Defoe (see below).
Readily available paperback editions of Robinson Crusoe include:
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe, ed. Thomas Keymer and James Kelly. Oxford Classics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe, ed. John Richetti. Penguin Classics. London: Penguin, 2003.
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe. Popular Penguins. London: Penguin.
You may also be able to find these or other editions second hand.
Note also that some commentaries on Robinson Crusoe refer to other editions. For example, the translators of Derrida’s final seminar refer to this edition:
Defoe, Daniel. Robinson Crusoe, with an introduction by Virginia Woolf. New York: Modern Library, 2001.
The University of Auckland holds hardback copies of the Pickering Masters series of the works of Daniel Defoe, which is the standard “collected works” of the writings of Defoe. This is organised thematically into the following volumes:
Defoe, Daniel. Political and Economic Writings of Daniel Defoe, eds. W. R. Owens and Philip Nicholas Furbank. 8 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2000. (Library: 823.51Eo, also available electronically for 3 users via the library catalogue)
Defoe, Daniel. The Novels of Daniel Defoe, eds. W. R. Owens and Philip Nicholas Furbank. 10 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2000-2001. (Library: 823.51 Eon)
Defoe, Daniel. Religious and Didactic Writings, eds. W. R. Owens and Philip Nicholas Furbank. 10 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2001. (Library: 823.51 Eor)
Defoe, Daniel. Writings on Travel, Discovery, and History, eds. W. R. Owens, Philip Nicholas Furbank and John McVeagh. 8 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2000-2001. (Library: 823.51Eow)
Defoe, Daniel. Satire, Fantasy and Writings on the Supernatural, eds. Philip Nicholas Furbank, W. R. Owens, Geoffrey M. Sill, David Blewett, Peter Elmer and George A. Starr. 8 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2003-2005. (Library: 823.51Ds)
The key recent biographies of Daniel Defoe are:
Furbank, Philip Nicholas and W. R. Owens. A Political Biography of Daniel Defoe. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2006
Novak, Maximillian. Daniel Defoe, Master of Fictions: His Life and Ideas. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.
Richetti, John. The Life of Daniel Defoe: A Critical Biography. Oxford: Blackwell, 2015.
The most useful and rigorous collections of recent commentary on Robinson Crusoe include:
Mueller, Andreas K. E. and Glynis Ridley, eds. Robinson Crusoe After 300 Years. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 2021.
Richetti, John, ed. The Cambridge Companion to “Robinson Crusoe.” Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.
For readings emphasizing the economic aspects of of Robinson Crusoe the essential source is:
Grapard, Ulla and Gillian Hewitson, eds. Robinson Crusoe’s Economic Man: A Construction and Deconstruction. London: Routledge, 2011.
The works mentioned above will form the core works that we will study this year. For each week, we will focus on the following specific suggestions for readings.
Robinson Crusoe, Our Contemporary
In this session we will discuss how we propose to read Robinson Crusoe. In advance of this session please (1) get yourself a copy of Robinson Crusoe, (2) read the course outline, and (3) read the following list of readings carefully, familiarizing yourself with this literature. Further, in advance of our first session, by way of background, please read:
Novak, Maximillian. “Ch. 22. The Year Before Robinson Crusoe: Intellectual Controversies and Experiments in Fiction,” and “Ch. 23. Robinson Crusoe and the Variability of Life,” in Daniel Defoe, Master of Fictions: His Life and Ideas. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 513-563.
Richetti, John. “Ch. 6. Robinson Crusoe,” in The Life of Daniel Defoe: A Critical Biography. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005, pp. 174-212.
Supplementary reading:
As further background reading, you may find it useful to read, at some point during this term:
Lowe, Lisa. “Chapter 1. The Intimacies of Four Continents,” in The Intimacies of Four Continents. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015.
If you are interested in the philosophical and religious grounds of Robinson Crusoe you will probably find it useful this year to read:
Tufayl, Ibn. Hayy Ibn Yaqzān: A Philosophical Tale, trans. Lenn Evan Goodman. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2003 (orig. early twelfth century CE), pp. 95-166.
Please also familiarize yourself with this resource, which will be useful throughout the entire semester:
Defoe, Daniel. Political and Economic Writings of Daniel Defoe, eds. W. R. Owens and Philip Nicholas Furbank. 8 vols. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2000. (Library: 823.51Eo, also available electronically for 3 users via the library catalogue)
Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Part One
While Robinson Crusoe was not originally divided into chapters, the book can conceptually be divided into two halves, with the second half commencing on Crusoe’s discovery of a footprint in the sand. We will commit two weeks (weeks 2-3) to reading and discussing the content of Robinson Crusoe. In this first week we will read up to the paragraph that ends “at last I was obliged to shoot them, and did kill a great many; at length they left me with this Attendance, and in this plentiful Manner I lived; neither could I be said to want any thing but Society, and of that in some time after this, I was like to have too much”. This break appears approximately half way through the book, on p. 126 of the Oxford Classics edition. Whichever edition you are reading, open your volume and read at least half way, or until you find a footprint in the sand.
Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Part Two
If the second part of Robinson Crusoe begins with the discovery of a footprint in the sand, this week we will read from p. 126 (Oxford) through to the end of the book.
1719: Enslavement and Robinson Crusoe
Please read the following essays by Daniel Defoe, either in the editions identified here, or in the Eighteenth Century Collections Online (in the library catalogue search for author: Daniel Defoe, and the title you want to find):
Defoe, Daniel. “The Villainy of Stock-Jobbers Detected,” in W. R. Owens and P. N. Furbank, eds. Political and Economic Writings of Daniel Defoe, vol. 6. London: Pickering & Chatto, 1712/2000.
Defoe, Daniel. “An Essay on the South Sea Trade,” in W. R. Owens and P. N. Furbank, eds. Political and Economic Writings of Daniel Defoe, vol. 7. London: Pickering & Chatto, 1712/2000.
Supplementary reading:
Paul, Henry J. The South Sea Bubble: An Economic History of its Origins and Consequences. London: Routledge, 2011.
de Goede, Marieke. Virtue, Fortune and Faith: A Genealogy of Finance. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2005.
Sherman, Sandra. Finance and Fictionality in the Early Eighteenth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
Jones, Campbell (2011) “What Kind of Subject is the Market?’ New Formations, 72: 131-144. Reprinted in David Bennett, ed. Loaded Subjects: Psychoanalysis, Money and the Global Financial Crisis. London: Lawrence & Wishart.
On the South Sea trade and bubble see the useful resources at:
South Sea Bubble Research Portal. “The South Sea Bubble, 1720,” Harvard Library Curiosity Collections. Online at https://curiosity.lib.harvard.edu/south-sea-bubble
1852: Colonization and Ropitini Kuruho
Banks, Joseph. “1769 April 13,” in The Endeavour Journals of Sir Joseph Banks. Available online at: https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0501141h.html#apr1769
Todd, Dennis. “Robinson Crusoe and Colonialism,” in The Cambridge Companion to “Robinson Crusoe,” ed. John Richetti. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Defoe, Daniel. He korero tipuna no mua, Ropitini Kuruho, tona ingoa, trans. Henry Tacy Kemp with a preface by George Grey. Wellington: Independent Office, 1852. (Library: Early New Zealand Books: http://www.enzb.auckland.ac.nz/docs/2012_files/Defoe1/pdf/defoe1000.pdf)
Hunter, Lani Kavika. Spirits of New Zealand: Early Pakeha Writings on Maori. University of Auckland: Unpublished PhD Thesis, 2014
Rogers, Shef. “Crusoe Among the Maori,” Book History, vol. 1 (1998): 182-195.
Stafford, Jane. “The Renowned Crusoe in the Native Costume of Our Adopted Country,” in Worlding the South: Nineteenth-Century Literary Culture and the Southern Settler Colonies, eds. Sarah Comyn and Porscha Fermanis. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2021.
Watson, Matthew. “Crusoe, Friday and the Raced Market Frame of Orthodox Economics Textbooks,” New Political Economy, vol. 23, no. 5 (2018): 544-559.
Vayda, Andrew. “Maori Prisoners and Slaves in the Nineteenth Century,” Ethnohistory, vol. 8, no. 2 ( Spring 1961): 144-155.
Petrie, Hazel. Outcasts of the Gods: The Struggle Over Slavery in Māori New Zealand. Auckland: Auckland University Press, 2015.
2022: Enslavement and Reparation
Walk Free Foundation. The Global Slavery Index 2018. Online at: https://www.globalslaveryindex.org/resources/downloads/
Stringer, Christina and Snejina Michailova. “Why Modern Slavery Thrives in Multinational Corporations’ Global Value Chains,” Multinational Business Review, vol. 26, no. 3 (2018): 194-206.
Burmester, Brent, Snejina Michailova, Christina Stringer and Thomas Harré. “Modern Slavery and International Business Scholarship: The Governance Nexus,” Critical Perspectives on International Business, vol. 15, no 2/3 (2019): 139-157.
Stringer, Christina, D. Hugh Whittaker and Glenn Simmons. “New Zealand’s Turbulent Waters: The Use of Forced Labour in the Fishing Industry,” Global Networks, vol. 16, no. 1 (2015): 3-24.
Stringer, Christina, Brent Burmester and Snejina Michailova. Toward a Modern Slavery Act in New Zealand – Legislative Landscape and Steps Forward. White Paper. University of Auckland Centre for Research on Modern Slavery (September 2021). Online at https://cdn.auckland.ac.nz/assets/business/about/our-research/research-institutes-and-centres/CReMS/CRMS%20Toward%20a%20Modern%20Slavery%20Act%20v1.1%20WEB.pdf
National African-American Reparations Commission. “Reparations Plan,” Online at: https://reparationscomm.org/reparations-plan/
National African-American Reparations Commission. “HR 40,” Online at: https://reparationscomm.org/hr-40/
Supplementary reading:
Collins, Francis and Christina Stringer. “Temporary Migrant Worker Exploitation in New Zealand” Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, 2019. Online at https://www.mbie.govt.nz/dmsdocument/7109-temporary-migrant-worker-exploitation-in-new-zealand
Kitchin, Tom. “Joseph Auga Matamata Sentenced to 11 Years for Human Trafficking and Slavery” RNZ. Online at https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/422102/joseph-auga-matamata-sentenced-to-11-years-for-human-trafficking-and-slavery
Marx and Engels on Robinson Crusoe, Robinsonades, the Individual and Value
Marx, Karl. The Poverty of Philosophy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 6. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1847). Read pp. 111-113 and p. 143.
Bastiat, Frederic. “Something Else,” in Economic Sophisms and “What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen.” in Collected Works of Frederic Bastiat, ed. Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean and David M. Hart. Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press, 2016 (orig. 1848), pp. 226-233.
Marx, Karl. “[Addenda to the Chapters on Money and on Capital]” in Outlines of the Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 29. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1857-1858). Read p. 217.
Marx, Karl. “Value” in Outlines of the Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 29. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1857-1858). Read p. 252-253.
Marx, Karl. “Bastiat and Carey” in Outlines of the Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 28. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1857-1858). Read p. 5-16
Marx, Karl. “Introduction” in Outlines of the Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 28. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1857-1858). Read p. 17-48.
Marx, Karl. “Section 4: The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof” in Capital: A Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 34. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1864). pp. 81-94.
Engels, Friedrich. 1878. “Subject Matter and Method” and “Theory of Force” from “Part II: Political Economy” in Anti-Dühring: Herr Eugen Dühring’s Revolution in Science in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 25. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1878). pp. 135-154.
Supplementary reading:
Marx, Karl. “The Industrial Newspaper Company (Limited),” in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 20. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1847). Read pp. 380-383.
Marx, Karl. “Formal Subsumption of Labour under Capital” in “Chapter Six: Results of the Direct Production Process” in Outlines of the Critique of Political Economy in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 34. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1864). Pp 424-428.
Engels, Friedrich. 1869 “Engels to Marx, 19 November 1869,” in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 43. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1869). pp. 377-382
Engels, Friedrich. 1877. “From Engels’ Preparatory Writings for Anti-Dühring,” in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 25. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1878). pp. 135-154.
Engels, Friedrich. 1884 “Engels to Karl Kautsky, 20 September 1884,” in Marx Engels Collected Works, vol. 47. London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1976 (orig. 1869). pp. 193-195.
Winter, Yves. “Debating Violence on the Desert Island: Engels, Dühring and Robinson Crusoe,” Contemporary Political Theory, vol. 13, no. 4 (2014): 318-338.
Robinson Crusoe and Robinson Crusoe in Neoclassical Economics
Grapard, Ulla. “Robinson Crusoe: The Quintessential Economic Man?” Feminist Economics, vol. 1, no. 1 (1995): 33-52.
Watson, Matthew. “Competing Models of Socially Constructed Economic Man: Differentiating Defoe’s Crusoe from the Robinson of Neoclassical Economics,” New Political Economy, vol. 16. no. 5 (November 2011): 609-626.
Karagöz, Ufuk. “The Neoclassical Robinson: Antecedents and Implications,” History of Economic Ideas, vol. XXII, no. 2 (2014): 75-100.
Söllner, Fritz. “The Use (and Abuse) of Robinson Crusoe in Neoclassical Economics,” History of Political Economy, vol. 48, no. 1 (2016): 35-64.
Supplementary reading:
Please read, according to your research interests, a selection from:
Grapard, Ulla and Gillian Hewitson, eds. Robinson Crusoe’s Economic Man: A Construction and Deconstruction. London: Routledge, 2011.
Ordinary Entrepreneurial Psychosis
Santisteban, Sebastian and Campbell Jones (2022) ‘Ordinary entrepreneurial psychosis’ Organization, online first, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/13505084221079007.
Schonhorn, Manuel. Defoe’s Politics: Parliament, Power, Kingship, and Robinson Crusoe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
Supplementary reading:
Lacan, Jacques. The Seminar of Jacques Lacan, Book III: The Psychoses, 1955-56, trans. Russell Grigg. London: Routledge, 1993.
Jacques Derrida on Political Sovereignty, Solitude and the Animal in Robinson Crusoe
Derrida, Jacques. The Beast and the Sovereign, Volume II, trans. Geoffrey Bennington. The Seminars of Jacques Derrida. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Supplementary reading:
Naas, Michael. The End of the World and Other Teachable Moments: Jacques Derrida’s Final Seminar. New York: Fordham University Press, 2015.
Chrulew, Matthew and Chris Danta (eds) “Fabled Thought: On Jacques Derrida’s The Beast and the Sovereign,” special issue of SubStance, vol. 42, no. 2 (2014): 3-192.
Student Presentations
Students making presentations are invited to offer suggestions for readings that they have found most useful through this course.
Student Presentations
Students making presentations are invited to offer suggestions for readings that they have found most useful through this course.
Assessment
Grades for this course will be based on:
Four short essays, maximum 1,500 words (12.5% each, total 50%)
One longer essay due at the end of term, maximum 6,000 words (50%)
Short Essays
At this point in your scholarly career you should be writing regularly. To assist you in this, and also to provide regular feedback on your work, in weeks three to ten you are invited to write four short essays of no more than 1,500 words (including references). This is approximately one essay each fortnight. Each short essay must respond to the readings and lectures for the previous two weeks. Although you are welcome to apply the material to your own interests and you may bring in supplementary readings, your short essays must demonstrate engagement with the required readings and the themes discussed in the lectures.
All assignments submitted will be returned with written feedback. You may submit as many assignments as you wish on any Friday from week three through to week ten, with the additional option of submitting over the break, and on return from the break if you wish.
In week 3: Friday 5 August (focusing on weeks 1-3)
In week 4: Friday 12 August (focusing on weeks 3-4)
In week 5: Friday19 August (focusing on weeks 4-5)
In week 6: Friday 26 August (focusing on weeks 5-6)
In the break: Friday 2 September or Friday 9 September (focusing on any of the content from weeks 1-6)
In week 7: Friday 16 September (on any of the reading materials in weeks 6-7)
In week 8: Friday 23 September (focusing on weeks 7-8)
In week 9: Friday 30 September (focusing on weeks 8-9)
In week 10: Friday 7 October (focusing on weeks 9-10)
Your coursework grade for this half of the course will be based on the best four of the short essays you submit for grading. Thus, 50% of your final grade will be made up of the grades for your best four short essays (12.5% for each assignment).
Please submit by 5.00pm Friday by attachment to an email in either Pages, Word or PDF format. I will offer formatting guidelines in the Writing Lab in week 2, but in summary, your essay should be set out in:
12 point Times new roman
Double spaced
No paragraph indents, but use one complete line break between paragraphs
Provide a title, bold centred, at top of first page
No other section headings in short essays
Under your title place your name, the date and the course name or code
Do not use headers or footers, except…
Place page numbers at the bottom of every page
Provide either a reference list of sources referred to, or footnotes providing full details (in the latter case you do not need to provide a reference list)
For formatting guidance please consult the Chicago Manual of Style (17th edn.).
It is not permitted to resubmit any work previously submitted (such is self-plagiarism), so each assignment needs to be fully original. I will try to provide written feedback on all short essays within one week of the due date.
Student Presentations
In sessions eleven and twelve all class participants will be invited to make a presentation of the ideas that will be contained in their long essay. The format for this will roughly follow the protocols of sessions in an academic conference, with each presenter having no more than 20 minutes to present followed by 10 minutes of questions. Presentations will not be graded, but are intended as a developmental exercise for refinement of presentation skills and receiving feedback on ideas. Although presentations will not be graded, all class participants are strongly encouraged to present their ideas and take on feedback.
Long Essay
You are invited to write a final essay of no more than 6,000 words (including references), which should be submitted no later than 5.00pm on Friday 28 October, which is one week after the last day of term. Potential essay topics will be discussed in class. Please submit your term essay by attachment to an email in either Pages, Word or PDF format.
Lateness
Short essays will not be accepted late under any circumstances, because you will have the option to submit in the following week if you wish. In weeks nine and ten, short essays will otherwise be accepted late only on submission of a medical certificate (by email as scanned attachment), and will otherwise be penalized 2% per day of lateness (including weekend days). Late short essays will not be accepted more than one week after their due date under any circumstances.
Long essays will be accepted late only on submission of a medical certificate (by email as scanned attachment), and will otherwise be penalized 2% per day of lateness. Late long essays will not be accepted more than one week after their due date.
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is to give the impression that the work of others is your own. Plagiarism is a form of cheating and will be treated with the utmost severity. If you are tempted, think again. It is better to receive zero for one piece of coursework than to be excluded from the University.
Equity
It is the duty of everybody in the seminar to uphold the individual and collective mana of the group. Our actions, including speech, should acknowledge and enhance the mana of ourselves and others. There are consequences for actions that fail to do so. Actions that diminish the mana of others include any practice which aims at bullying, excluding, marginalizing, harassing, discriminating against, rendering insecure, exploiting, criminalizing, terrorizing, or harboring exterminatory fantasies against an identity group of people imagined as sharing a common determining feature. Speech or actions that are, for example, knowingly racist, sexist, ableist, ageist, homophobic, or transphobic are completely unacceptable in the classroom.
While free speech is a fundamental right in a democracy and we encourage respectful debate and discussion of diverse ideas, an abstract idea of free speech in general cannot and must not be used as a cover for specific instances of hateful speech or discrimination. Students in the course are expected to respect all other students and staff. If you witness hate speech or discrimination you are encouraged to raise this with the lecturer or the University Proctor.
The language of enslavement
We will follow the protocols developed in the Dickens Project at the University of Santa Cruz, which specifies:
“Our conversations will be free of hate speech regarding race, ethnicity, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, ability, religion, national origin, and socio-economic class or background. The use of slurs and epithets by either speakers or participants will not be tolerated and will result in removal from the webinar. Following the expertise and guidance of scholars in Black and African American studies, we will adopt the preferred language that addresses the racism of historically used terms. This includes enslaved person/worker/mother/child rather than “slave”; enslaver vs. “master” or “mistress”; mixed-race person vs “mulatto,” “quadroon,” etc. We will also name rape and other forms of sexual assault as such, particularly when referring to the rape and other sexual assault of enslaved people or literary characters, rather than using euphemisms such as “sexual affair” or “sexual intercourse.” We acknowledge that for some this may be new terminology, but we ask that you strive to follow best practices as we embrace anti-racist practices as an organization.”
Capabilities Developed in this Course
| Capability 1: | Disciplinary Knowledge and Practice |
| Capability 2: | Critical Thinking |
| Capability 3: | Solution Seeking |
| Capability 4: | Communication and Engagement |
| Capability 5: | Independence and Integrity |
| Capability 6: | Social and Environmental Responsibilities |
Graduate Profile:
Master of Arts
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course, students will be able to:
- Develop and demonstrate mastery of key developments in contemporary Marxian theory (Capability 1.1 and 1.3)
- Demonstrate the ability to understand and critically scrutinize complex theoretical argumentation (Capability 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3)
- Critically evaluate proposals for economic and social change (Capability 3.1 and 3.2)
- Develop skills in comprehension and the ability to explain complex ideas. (Capability 4.1 and 4.2)
- Develop the intellectual and political courage to take an informed independent critical position (Capability 5.1 and 5.2)
- Build social and political responsibilities aware of their location here in Aotearoa (Capability 6.1 and 6.3)
Assessments
| Assessment Type | Percentage | Classification |
|---|---|---|
| Short essay 1 | 12.5% | Individual Coursework |
| Short essay 2 | 12.5% | Individual Coursework |
| Short essay 3 | 12.5% | Individual Coursework |
| Short essay 4 | 12.5% | Individual Coursework |
| Long essay | 50% | Individual Coursework |
| 5 types | 100% |
Workload Expectations
This is a 30 credit course, which is equivalent to 20 hours per week. The 20 hours per week for this course will be broken roughly into time each week for lectures (3 hours), writing lab or office hours (1 hour), writing every day (6 hours) and reading (10 hours).
Delivery Mode
Campus Experience
Attendance is required at scheduled activities to complete the course.
Lectures components will be available as recordings, for the formal instructional aspects of the course. The remaining learning activities will not be available as recordings.
The course will not include live online events.
There is no exam therefore attendance on campus is not required for the exam.
The activities for the course are scheduled as a standard weekly timetable.
This course is not available for delivery to students studying remotely outside NZ in 2022.
Learning Resources
Course materials are made available in a learning and collaboration tool called Canvas which also includes reading lists and lecture recordings (where available).
Please remember that the recording of any class on a personal device requires the permission of the instructor.
Student Feedback
At the end of every semester students will be invited to give feedback on the course and teaching through a tool called SET or Qualtrics. The lecturers and course co-ordinators will consider all feedback and respond with summaries and actions.
Your feedback helps teachers to improve the course and its delivery for future students.
Class Representatives in each class can take feedback to the department and faculty staff-student consultative committees.
Each year the course is revised in light of student feedback.
Academic Integrity
The University of Auckland will not tolerate cheating, or assisting others to cheat, and views cheating in coursework as a serious academic offence. The work that a student submits for grading must be the student's own work, reflecting their learning. Where work from other sources is used, it must be properly acknowledged and referenced. This requirement also applies to sources on the internet. A student's assessed work may be reviewed against online source material using computerised detection mechanisms.
Class Representatives
Class representatives are students tasked with representing student issues to departments, faculties, and the wider university. If you have a complaint about this course, please contact your class rep who will know how to raise it in the right channels. See your departmental noticeboard for contact details for your class reps.
Inclusive Learning
All students are asked to discuss any impairment related requirements privately, face to face and/or in written form with the course coordinator, lecturer or tutor.
Student Disability Services also provides support for students with a wide range of impairments, both visible and invisible, to succeed and excel at the University. For more information and contact details, please visit the Student Disability Services’ website http://disability.auckland.ac.nz
Well-being always comes first
We all go through tough times during the semester, or see our friends struggling. There is lots of help out there - for more information, look at this Canvas page https://canvas.auckland.ac.nz/courses/33894, which has links to various support services in the University and the wider community.
Special Circumstances
If your ability to complete assessed coursework is affected by illness or other personal circumstances outside of your control, contact a member of teaching staff as soon as possible before the assessment is due.
If your personal circumstances significantly affect your performance, or preparation, for an exam or eligible written test, refer to the University’s aegrotat or compassionate consideration page https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/students/academic-information/exams-and-final-results/during-exams/aegrotat-and-compassionate-consideration.html.
This should be done as soon as possible and no later than seven days after the affected test or exam date.
Learning Continuity
In the event of an unexpected disruption, we undertake to maintain the continuity and standard of teaching and learning in all your courses throughout the year. If there are unexpected disruptions the University has contingency plans to ensure that access to your course continues and course assessment continues to meet the principles of the University’s assessment policy. Some adjustments may need to be made in emergencies. You will be kept fully informed by your course co-ordinator/director, and if disruption occurs you should refer to the university website for information about how to proceed.
Student Charter and Responsibilities
The Student Charter assumes and acknowledges that students are active participants in the learning process and that they have responsibilities to the institution and the international community of scholars. The University expects that students will act at all times in a way that demonstrates respect for the rights of other students and staff so that the learning environment is both safe and productive. For further information visit Student Charter https://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/students/forms-policies-and-guidelines/student-policies-and-guidelines/student-charter.html.
Disclaimer
Elements of this outline may be subject to change. The latest information about the course will be available for enrolled students in Canvas.
In this course students may be asked to submit coursework assessments digitally. The University reserves the right to conduct scheduled tests and examinations for this course online or through the use of computers or other electronic devices. Where tests or examinations are conducted online remote invigilation arrangements may be used. In exceptional circumstances changes to elements of this course may be necessary at short notice. Students enrolled in this course will be informed of any such changes and the reasons for them, as soon as possible, through Canvas.
Published on 20/07/2022 08:58 a.m.