Reading Capital, continued (thread #4) Fetishism...

[blindpig]

BitterLittleFlower
01-18-2010, 04:29 PM

I appreciate this. I like to open up discussions with my students (you may know I teach high school art?) about just this kind of stuff but my terminology is different. One example come to mind: I show the kids a repro of Van Gogh's Irises and tell them a man in Japan paid 83 million dollars for it (true)...I don't state what I believe, but ask them what they think about a painting being given that kind of value...I will ask how much food that might buy, how many cars, etc., but try to let the kids have it out...

(I too love barns more than most paintings of barns, unless there is something extraordinary about the painting...)
I may write a little bit on bad/good art if I can find the image...who places the value?

[blindpig]

Kid of the Black Hole
01-18-2010, 04:44 PM

the relative character of different types of labor. I think it goes a long way to figuring out how "we" value things socially.

But its not necessarily germane to a discussion of value in the (for lack of a better adjective) Marxian sense because we are primarily talking about a critique of the capitalist system as it stands (and a critique is as much an expose as a criticism)

I do think that its important to ask how the "reproduction of labor as a commodity" takes into account the fact that you can only put in so many days of your life at a factory while you can pretty much warm a desk until you croak.

[blindpig]

BitterLittleFlower
01-18-2010, 04:45 PM

teachers too, all say its not art, bad art, but its "valued in the 6 or 7 digits...His work is often more about the thoughts behind it than the image...How is intellect given value? exchange or use? (for me, actually, beauty supplies me with sanity, does that mean, for me its value is more use value?)



Sorry Master Anax for the tangent here...

I've always had a hard time selling my art, I usually give it away or keep it (they are alive to me, I guess true fetishes...). Of course I don't produce much these days, if anything...

[blindpig]

BitterLittleFlower
01-18-2010, 05:09 PM

or a series of analysies which might entail many aspects. I do think that the conversation is hitting at the top of the capitalist hierarchy...The elite class member collects one of a kind objects that have been given very high exchange value...how capitalistic is that?

Anyway, that said, I concede this is a conversation for further down the road maybe...

As a teacher I'm starting to hit the wall, its more exhausting in all ways than factory line work... how does that fit in as labor commodity?

[blindpig]

curt_b
01-18-2010, 06:26 PM

Yes, I see how the critique of capitalism doesn't make that discussion necessary. The only thing that commodities have in common is the duration of labor expended, because the type of labor can't be measured empirically. As much as I get it, it just seems counter-intuitive to me. I understand it much better now (after our reading) than I did before. Just couldn't resist taking a cheap shot at Mr. Nice Guy.

[blindpig]

Kid of the Black Hole
01-18-2010, 06:32 PM

for the way we assess things and place importance and emphasis and bestow honorifics. Because otherwise "value" has at least two meanings and one of them is a misnomer..and I don't even know which one

Worth? Merit? Regard? Respect?

[blindpig]

anaxarchos
01-18-2010, 10:12 PM

It is written with an admirable economy of language and uses wordplay to make a point. Wage labor does indeed "produce" itself in the sense that wages are equal to the cost of reproduction of the laborer and are entirely consumed, regardless of their magnitude. The handful of exceptions prove the rule. The dilemma thus presents itself thus: the wage laborer has no option but to sell his labor at the "prevailing wage" but, by doing so, he also assures that Capital is ever enhanced while his relative position can only change for the worse. Even the various "Golden Ages" enjoyed by this Capital or that... these buy, at best, a temporary respite. In a phrase, we have just tagged the basis of reform and revolution. The former is simply not possible no matter how stridently one may wish for it.

The rest of the quote about estrangement, and the estranged labor becoming a hostile object in opposition to the laborer... and the effect of this on "consciousness"... this is the heart of the "alienation" discussions of the 1960s and 70s. 'Course its all true... but these days they'll take away your job and your house first.

The times kinda set the priority on which aspect of Capitalism we find ourselves focused on.

[blindpig]

Two Americas
01-18-2010, 11:35 PM

In music anyway, it seems to me that the better music is more a function of the amount of time put into training and practicing then it is about genius or talent. For every hour of performing, there are many hours of practice.

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Kid of the Black Hole
01-19-2010, 07:50 AM

can you refer me to the relevant Marx for something? I am not finding exactly what I'm looking for but I know its there somewhere. I'm blanking on where though.

I am looking for where Marx (or Engels or Lenin) talk about the idea that by trying to reduce the lag time in the circuit of capital from commodities into money involves reducing the amount of living labor invested and thus the capitalist is hememd in by the need/drive to expel from the process the very labor he seeks aggrandizement from.

I have been scouring the Manifesto for a day or so looking for this, but I am also remembering something a bit more thorough written about it as well.

[blindpig]

curt_b
01-19-2010, 08:22 AM

Yes, that's the point. Ignoring the concept of "better" for now, once music (like any art form) becomes a commodity, the pay-off comes when a piece of music is performed in a paid venue or sold as a recording. The real value lies in all the training, practice and even equipment needed to lead up to that moment, as well as the performance.

If music wasn't treated as commodity, then the value would be in a musician's accumulative labor, not in their perceived genius, intellectual property or a production company's marketing. Music then could be performed in all sorts of venues, for all sorts of people, and musicians can make a living.