Just a thought about "Estranged Labour." As I read Marx's ideas about the correlation between production and alienation, a clear example of this (to me) is the movie "The Help." Obviously, Marx was writing during a time when slavery was a part of the society (1844), and he was perhaps initially motivated to speak out against the ideologies that (for us anyway) are most obviously unjust. Of course he doesn't limit his philosophies to the slave/owner relation of production but extends this idea to many other modes that might not be as apparent to us. I mention this because "The Help" is about civil rights which reflects the struggle that began with slavery. That's probably why it immediately came to mind as I read "Estranged Labour."
When Marx says, "The worker becomes all the poorer the more wealth he produces," the products the maids were producing was the upbringing of white babies. These babies were literally the products. As they grew up in this high-class society while black maids served them, they would grow and have children who would hire the children of these maids, continuing the cycle. Also, Marx says, "This fact expresses merely that the object which labour produces--labour's product--confronts it as something alien, as a power independent of the producer...Labour's realization is its objectification." I thought of Skeeter and Hilly, two 20-something white women in "The Help" who have very different perspectives of maids. Hilly, having also been raised by a black maid, was "above" the affection between maid and child, and it's easy to see how she as a product was alienated from the worker who "produced" her. In contrast, Skeeter loved her maid who was fired by Skeeter's mother at the expense of social esteem. Would this be an exception to the idea of alienation between worker and product? However, you could also look at Skeeter not being an exception to Marx's idea but exemplifying it, as she was the one "going against the grain" of society, upsetting the bourgeois/proletariat mode which was ultimately the "solution" (and I use that word tentatively) to civil rights.
Part of the movie revolves around this child-maid relationship and deals with the tokens of estrangement and a loss of reality which Marx discusses. If you haven't seen the movie, I would recommend it. It might be a good touchstone to discuss Marxism in class. In suggesting this, am I a victim (culprit) of furthering culture industry?
I'd like to consider "The Help" in terms of estranged labor by questioning the seemingly heroic actions of Skeeter. Brian, you mention Skeeter possibly exemplifying Marx's idea and I find this an interesting notion. Though she compiles a text about the hardships of Southern servitude, the housekeepers who provide her with the narrative source material for the text remain anonymous and without a true stake in the property of the book. Skeeter appears saintly when she shares the monetary profits of the book with the housekeeper community, and her decision to author the book anonymously makes it seem as if she is aligning herself with the community she depicts, but her actions obscure the true profit which is kept only for herself. By the end of the movie, Skeeter’s escape from Jackson, Mississippi shows her power as the true property owner and exploiter. Within the frame of the movie, Skeeter is in a position to profit the greatest by way of the accumulated hardships of the housekeeper community. Skeeter's actions may not be degrading to others, but they are certainly capitalistic. This makes her no different than the households she condemns throughout the movie. Skeeter’s role as exploiter is more abstracted than the other women of Jackson who are building separate bathrooms for their servants. Skeeter doesn’t require a separate bathroom. She requires a separate city. Certainly, it could be argued that the real profit for the housekeeper community is an eventual change in societal perspective over time, a profit suggested at the end of the movie. Does Marxist thought consider the possibility of a non-monetary profit in the form of being socially accepted? Does this amount to a use-value for the soul?
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, the events within the "The Help" become a mirror for the present day production of the movie itself. It is a film created from a decidedly Caucasian perspective and seems to represent the exact exploitation mentioned above: the depiction by the privileged of poverty and struggle in an effort to turn a profit. Does the"terrible awful" committed by the character of Minny by way of a symbolic pie become the overarching metaphor for the content and form of the movie?