What America Made of Marx

No, Studying Marx Is Not Elitist

Reading Marxist theory isn’t just for highfalutin academics — just ask the millions of workers whose ideas about the role they could play in changing the world were transformed by both study and practice.

What America Made of Marx

The young cigar maker in New York City attended a few socialist meetings in the 1870s. But he longed to hear “constructive” ideas about how to achieve a better life for himself and his fellow workers. Then an older craftsman, who was a veteran of the European left, offered to take him through “something tangible” that “will give you a background philosophy.” That something was The Communist Manifesto.The document, recalled his untutored protégé,…

A history of materialism, Part 4: The materialism of Marx

This is the fourth of a four-part series on the history of materialism. The first part is here, the second part is here, and the third part is here.