Hegemony and Education: Gramsci, Post-Marxism, and Radical Democracy Revisited

by Deb J. Hill

Overview

Hegemony and Education is written in opposition to the displacement of hegemony by recent post-Marxist scholarship from the historical materialist foundations that underpin Antonio Gramsci's own distinctive usage of the concept. The study centers upon the inevitable loss of the nuances of hegemony as a concept that highlights the problem of the pathological reach of a capitalist epistemology and ontology upon human identity. Author Deb J. Hill argues that it was precisely the impress of capitalism's economic and extra-economic aspect upon humanity's own cognitive and moral capacity_upon its relational and valuational capacity_that Gramsci's writings attempted to articulate. In this respect, Gramsci differentiated himself in Marxist circles by the depth of his insights into Marx's historical materialist method and the practical reasoning that this methodology simultaneously engendered. As Hegemony and Education reveals, Gramsci's entire written legacy reflects his historical materialist allegiance: the problem of 'education' as no less than the educative-formative problem of practical reasoning.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780739121672
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Publication date:	06/09/2008
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	286
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Deb J. Hill is a political philosopher of education at the University of Waikato, New Zealand.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction: "New Times," Turbulent Times
Chapter 2 Chapter 1: Locating Hegemony Against the Tide of Contemporary Struggle
Chapter 3 Chapter 2: Bourgeois Politics and the Poverty of the Public "Creative Spirit" in Italy: A Cognitive and Moral Problem Revealed (1910-1917)
Chapter 4 Chapter 3: Integral Politics as the Politics of the "Common Good:" The Problem of Citizenship as the Problem of Authoring the "Active" State (1917-1918)
Chapter 5 Chapter 4: Labor, Leadership and Production: Combating Minimal Ideas (1919-1926)
Chapter 6 Chapter 5: Educating Cognitive and Moral Defiance: Historicism and the Dialectic as a Form of Literacy (1926-1937)
Chapter 7 Chapter 6: Beyond Democracy as a Limiting Idea: Proletarian Hegemony as Neohumanistic Reform

Editorial Reviews

This study provides readers with a compelling and sharp critique of the principal positions of post-Marxism....Recommended.

Choice

This study provides readers with a compelling and sharp critique of the principal positions of post-Marxism....Recommended.

CHOICE

Deb Hill's new book is a welcome addition to the burgeoning literature on the uses and abuses of Gramsci. Her philological approach to both his early works and the Prison Notebooks leads into a trenchant and convincing critique of the voguish post-marxism that claims to take off from Gramsci. Hill exposes the uses of Gramsci—who today has surpassed even Machiavelli to be the most translated Italian theorist—by such luminaries as Laclau, Mouffe, and Mercer as either ill-founded and pretentious or, where she thinks they have a point, as merely restating what is better explained by Gramsci himself. She ripostes with an impassioned defense of Gramsci's own views and of the marxism behind them, to which he always remained loyal.

Alastair Davidson

Accepting the challenge posed by the gabs in much of 'traditional' Marxism, Deb J. Hill engages with the principal exponents of post-Marxism, mounting a sustained critique of decentred, detotalized structures and subjects from a Gramscian Marxist position. She puts Gramsci's central conception of hegemony to fruitful use, going against post-modernist interpretations by reinstating the essential class-based core of the notion. Particularly praiseworthy is the intelligent use she makes of Gramsci's pre-prison journalism. She skillfully draws on Gramsci's journalistic production to highlight his argument on education as providing an essential base, not only for questions of authentic citizenship, then as now a burning question, but also for 'counter-capitalist struggle' and movements. This book will provide a forum of debate from Gramscians and non-Gramscians, Marxists and non-Marxists alike..

Derek Boothman

This study provides readers with a compelling and sharp critique of the principal positions of post-Marxism....Recommended.

Choice Reviews

Hill's book offers both a trenchant critique of post-Marxism and a persuasive re-reading of Gramsci's democratic approach, with particular focus on his pre-prison writings. She shows with clarity and insight how Gramsci relates his analyses of culture, everyday life and history to his economic analysis of capitalism in a manner that leads to his particular political perspective, his critique of representation and his organizational concerns. By doing this, Hill has made Gramsci more valuable for contemporary politics.

Peter Ives

Hill's book offers both a trenchant critique of post-Marxism and a persuasive re-reading of Gramsci's democratic approach, with particular focus on his pre-prison writings. She shows with clarity and insight how Gramsci relates his analyses of culture, everyday life and history to his economic analysis of capitalism in a manner that leads to his particular political perspective, his critique of representation and his organizational concerns. By doing this, Hill has made Gramsci more valuable for contemporary politics.--Peter Ives, University of Winnipeg

Deb Hill's new book is a welcome addition to the burgeoning literature on the uses and abuses of Gramsci. Her philological approach to both his early works and the Prison Notebooks leads into a trenchant and convincing critique of the voguish post-marxism that claims to take off from Gramsci. Hill exposes the uses of Gramsci--who today has surpassed even Machiavelli to be the most translated Italian theorist--by such luminaries as Laclau, Mouffe, and Mercer as either ill-founded and pretentious or, where she thinks they have a point, as merely restating what is better explained by Gramsci himself. She ripostes with an impassioned defense of Gramsci's own views and of the marxism behind them, to which he always remained loyal.--Alastair Davidson, Latrobe University, Melbourne

This study provides readers with a compelling and sharp critique of the principal positions of post-Marxism....Recommended.--CHOICE

From the Publisher