Respectability and its discontents: Sexuality and marginalisation in the Marxist tradition in the United States

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (20) ◽  
pp. 79-108
Author(s):  
Paul C. Mishler
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Working Class ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
Social Ideology ◽  
Democratic Rights ◽  
The One ◽  
Moral Economic

Since modern radicalism emerged in the wake of the French revolution, radicals and revolutionaries have held divergent perspectives regarding the relationship between personal and social transformation. On the one hand, radicals recognised that the institutions of bourgeois democracy would never allow the working class to achieve the moral, economic and social standards of respectable life, due to poverty, lack of democratic rights, racism and exploitation. For these revolutionaries, the organisation of the working class would allow working-class families to achieve respectable families and community life. On the other, becoming a social revolutionary involved a transformation of personal life as well as social ideology. This was expressed in a critique of conventional sexuality and family life, and experimentation with nonrespectable practices in their daily lives. This article explores the ways that this conflict played out over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It assesses the notion of 'respectability' – especially its 'democratisation' – among communists in the United States, and engages with questions of how respectability was to be achieved for the working class, where the notion of respectability came from, how it applied to sexuality, and whether it was challenged by a desire for personal liberation amongst those committed to the revolutionary project.

A Bifurcated Enclave

Global Edge ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 102-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alejandro Portes ◽  
Ariel C. Armony
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Spatial Dimension ◽  
The United States ◽  
Poverty Rate ◽  
National Average ◽  
The Other ◽  
The One ◽  
Cuban Population

Of all the major ethnic groups making up metropolitan Miami's population, Cubans have pride of place, not only because of their demographic dominance, but also because they played a pivotal role in the area's economic and social transformation. However, beginning in the 1980s, things took a rather different turn for the Cuban population of the United States. By 2010, its average income had descended below that of other Latin American groups and its poverty rate exceeded by a significant margin the national average. This chapter discusses how the Cuban population of Miami became divided into two distinct blocs: older Cubans, the creators of the business enclave and their American-born children, on the one hand, and Mariel and post-Mariel arrivals and their offspring, on the other. Like all urban phenomena, this bifurcation had a spatial dimension. This bifurcation also took place silently and without major confrontations between the two Cuban communities.

America: Democracy Native and Imported

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. R. Palmer
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Indigenous Movements ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The French Revolution ◽  
The Revolution

This chapter first discusses the impact of the French Revolution on the United States. The development was twofold. On the one hand, there was an acceleration of indigenous movements. On the other, there was an influence that was unquestionably foreign. The latter presented itself especially with the war that began in Europe in 1792, and with the clash of armed ideologies that the war brought with it. The warring powers in Europe, which for Americans meant the governments of France and Great Britain, attempted to make use of the United States for their own advantage. Different groups of Americans, for their own domestic purposes, were likewise eager to exploit the power and prestige of either England or France. The chapter then turns to the impact of the Revolution on the “other” Americas.

scholarly journals Al-Mughtaribun

1997 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 116-118
Author(s):  
Omar Altalib
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Hate Crime ◽  
The United States ◽  
Muslim Community ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
Court Records ◽  
Hate Crime Legislation ◽  
The Status ◽  
Crime Legislation ◽  
The One

The focus of this book is on "the gradual transformation of American Muslims'perceptions and self-identification, coaxed by the ways American civillaw has penetrated and come to dominate their daily lives" (p. vii). Hence, thebook attempts to show the link between law and society by using Muslims inthe United States as a case study. It is of interest to sociologists, legal historians,political scientists, and scholars of religion and touches on the themes ofcivil rights, freedom of religion, social change, the status of minorities, andassimilation.Moore shows how Muslims in the United States have been affected byAmerican immigration law (chapters 2 and 3), religious liberty laws affectingMuslims in prison (chapter 4), hate crime legislation affecting mosques (chapter5), and zoning laws that affect mosques (chapter 6). The sources Mooreuses are historical: court records, interviews, magazine articles, and newspaperstories. She points out that there has been a great transformation in theAmerican legal system's attitude toward Islam. In 1811, the New YorkSupreme Court ruled (in People vs. Ruggles) that the "religion of Mohammed"is an impostor religion, a superstition, and is equally false and unknown(p. x). ln 1962, on the other hand, the District of Columbia U.S. District Courtruled (in Fulwood vs. Clemmer) that Muslims believe in Allah as a supremebeing and as the one true god. It follows, therefore, that the Muslim faith is areligion {p. 82).Have American legal institutions been responsive to the Muslim community?Has the American legal setting transformed the Muslim community? Theanswer to the first question, according to Moore, is that in the 1800s, "No"; butgradually the courts have become more responsive and continue to be moreresponsive as time passes and as Muslims become more politically active. Theanswer to the second question is "Yes."How has the American legal setting transformed the Muslim community?It has limited the numbers of Muslims in the United States (through immigrationrestrictions). It has increasingly allowed Muslims in prison to pray jum'ah,wear kufis on their heads, eat nonpork foods, and obtain copies of the Qur'an.It has protected Muslim mosques from vandalism through stiffer penalties forpeople committing such a crime. It has also restricted the establishment of ...

Marx on Immigration: Workers, Wages, and Legal Status

2017 ◽  
Vol 68 (9) ◽  
pp. 20 ◽  
Author(s):  
David L. Wilson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
The United States ◽  
Immigrant Workers ◽  
Monthly Review ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

Given the intense and often bitter debates over immigration now taking place in the United States and Europe…. [Marx's thoughts on the subject have] received surprisingly little attention from the modern left.… [Marx wrote about immigrant workers] nearly 150 years ago, and he was certainly not infallible, but a great deal of his analysis sounds remarkably contemporary.… [And among his insights, largely ignored by economists and activists alike, is] the one Marx considered "most important of all": the way immigration can be used to create "a working class divided into two hostile camps."Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.

Middle-Class Victorian Street Arabs: Modern Re-creations of the Baker Street Irregulars

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dominic Cheetham
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Children's Literature ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Street Children ◽  
Children’S Literature ◽  
The United States ◽  
Sherlock Holmes ◽  
Upward Shift

In three of Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories there are brief appearances of the Baker Street Irregulars, a group of ‘street Arabs’ who help Holmes with his investigations. These children have been re-imagined in modern children's literature in at least twenty-seven texts in a variety of media and with writers from both Britain and the United States. All these modern stories show a marked upward shift in the class of the Irregulars away from the lower working class of Conan-Doyle's originals. The shift occurs through attributing middle-class origins to the leaders of the Irregulars, through raising the class of the Irregulars in general, and through giving the children life environments more comfortable, safe, and financially secure than would have been possible for late-Victorian street children. Because of the variety in texts and writers, it is argued that this shift is not a result of the conscious political or ideological positions of individual writers, but rather reflects common unconscious narrative choices. The class-shift is examined in relation to the various pressures of conventions in children's literature, concepts of audience, and common concepts of class in society.

Looking for Something to Signify

Screen Bodies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-37
Author(s):  
David Yagüe González
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
The United States ◽  
The One

The behaviors and actions that an individual carries out in their daily life and how they are translated by their society overdetermine the gender one might have—or not—according to social norms. However, do the postulates enounced by feminist and queer Western thinkers still maintain their validity when the context changes? Can the performances of gender carry out their validity when the landscape is other than the one in Europe or the United States? And how can the context of drag complicate these matters? These are the questions that this article will try to answer by analyzing the 2015 movie Viva by Irish director Paddy Breathnach.

Corruption as a Political Issue in Modern Societies: France, Great Britain and the United States in the Long 19th Century

Public Voices ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Ivo Engels
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Great Britain ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
Political Corruption ◽  
The United States ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Political Issue ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Bureaucratic State

The so-called “long 19th century”, from the French Revolution to the First World War, ranks as the crucial phase in the genesis of the modern world. In the Western countries this period was characterized by the differentiation of the public and the private spheres, the birth of the modern bureaucratic state and the delegitimation of early modern practices such as clientelism and patronage. All these fundamental changes are, among other things, usually considered important preconditions for the modern perception of corruption.This paper will concentrate on this crucial phase by means of a comparative analysis of debates in France, Great Britain and the United States, with the aim to elucidate the motives for major anti-corruption movements. The questions are: who fights against corruption and what are the reasons for doing so? I will argue that these concerns were often very different and sometimes accidental. Furthermore, an analysis of political corruption may reveal differences between the political cultures in the countries in question. Thus, the history of corruption serves as a sensor which enables a specific perspective on politics. By taking this question as a starting point the focus is narrowed to political corruption and the debates about corruption, while petty bribery on the part of minor civilservants, as well as the actual practice in the case of extensive political corruption, is left aside.

Can India Balance China in Asia?

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Holslag
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Economic Reforms ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Military Power ◽  
Regional Power ◽  
Political Fragmentation ◽  
Strong Interest ◽  
The One

The chapter argues that India has a strong interest to balance China and that the two Asian giants will not be able grow together without conflict. However, India will not be able to balance China’s rise. The chapter argues that India remains stuck between nonalignment and nonperformance. On the one hand, it resists the prospect of a new coalition that balances China from the maritime fringes of Eurasia, especially if that coalition is led by the United States. On the other hand, it has failed to strengthen its own capabilities. Its military power lags behind China’s, its efforts to reach out to both East and Central Asia have ended in disappointment, and its economic reforms have gone nowhere. As a result of that economic underachievement, India finds itself also torn between emotional nationalism and paralyzing political fragmentation, which, in turn, will further complicate its role as a regional power.

Raanan Rein, Fútbol, Jews and the Making of Argentina, trans. Marsha Grenzeback. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2014. 166 pp.

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
The United States ◽  
Orthodox Jewish ◽  
Literary Representations ◽  
Stanford University ◽  
Common Theme ◽  
American Jews ◽  
The Common ◽  
The One

This chapter reviews the books Fútbol, Jews and the Making of Argentina (2014), by Raanan Rein, translated by Marsha Grenzeback, and Muscling in on New Worlds: Jews, Sport, and the Making of the Americas (2014), edited by Raanan Rein and David M.K. Sheinin. Rein’s book deals with the “making” of Argentina through football (soccer), while Muscling in on New Worlds focuses on the “making” of the Americas (mainly the one America, called the United States) through sports. Muscling in on New Worlds is a collection of essays that seeks to advance the common theme of sport as “an avenue by which Jews threaded the needle of asserting a Jewish identity.” Topics include Jews as boxers, Jews and football, Jews and yoga, Orthodox Jewish athletes, and American Jews and baseball. There are also essays about the cinematic and literary representations of Jews in sports.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document