This is a very well-thought-out analysis of a thinker I have never heard of but which is the best explanation of things going on in the middle east that I have read in a while. I was thinking how well Gramsci's concept of hegemony fits with the relationship between colonizer and colonized you outlined.
As a Latin American Americanist who went to Nicaragua when the Front lost the election, I have never understood Ortega's transformation. Your analysis explains it, I think. I appreciated the read. (P.S. In Peru they call traffic lights semaphores. So poetic.).
You get me Thomas, you really do. I've given it a lot of thought and I am trying to set a holistic integrated picture of how power works. And each piece is like part of a mosaic that all fits together to give the whole. This is because, I struggle with how Economics wants me to do things in pieces, separate, compartmentalised. This I believe is why we cant solve any real problems. We don't connect the dots. On the middle east in general I wouldn't claim that the story that Veblen tells is all of it, its too complex a world, but I think it plays some part.
The Ortega's the Sandinista's and Nicaragua are a sad, sad story that far too many people don't know much about. Promised a lot, delivered absolutely zero.
Veblen is the thinker behind the phrase "conspicuous consumption." The phrase comes from a book called the Theory of the Leisure Class. He combines sociology with economics to tell a more holistic story that I think is very relevant. And yes, semaphores sounds far more poetic than robot!
i am very happy you are a reader-I don't feel so mad.
I do get you and I am happy to find a like-minded spirt here on Substack. I know what you mean about "economics" and I love how Cabral aislates the four pilars of oppression, the economic, the social, the cultural, and the historical --as you pointed that out in your post on that interesting thinker this morning. Those four aspects of opression remind me a little of Emmanuel Wallerstein's system theory, although Wallerstein talking about the sixteenth century. Wallerstein was someone who connected the dots and people are still using his model to understand coloniality (as Quijano framed it). You have probably seen the Journal of World-Systems researh, but just in case: https://jwsr.pitt.edu/ojs/jwsr. I still need to get to Veblen whose ideas you painted the other day seem very intresting.
i didn't know about the journal, so thank you. Of course I know WST and use it as the opening unit for a course I teach on capitalism. I will have a good look at it. Thanks again.
I think in part Veblen was speaking about himself, he wasn't Jewish, but he was a Norwegian American and in his time very much outside of the mainstream. The other thing that I was thinking was about West Indians in the USA at the time of the Harlem Renaissance - hugely disproportionate in influence. Glad you enjoyed it.
This is a very well-thought-out analysis of a thinker I have never heard of but which is the best explanation of things going on in the middle east that I have read in a while. I was thinking how well Gramsci's concept of hegemony fits with the relationship between colonizer and colonized you outlined.
As a Latin American Americanist who went to Nicaragua when the Front lost the election, I have never understood Ortega's transformation. Your analysis explains it, I think. I appreciated the read. (P.S. In Peru they call traffic lights semaphores. So poetic.).
You get me Thomas, you really do. I've given it a lot of thought and I am trying to set a holistic integrated picture of how power works. And each piece is like part of a mosaic that all fits together to give the whole. This is because, I struggle with how Economics wants me to do things in pieces, separate, compartmentalised. This I believe is why we cant solve any real problems. We don't connect the dots. On the middle east in general I wouldn't claim that the story that Veblen tells is all of it, its too complex a world, but I think it plays some part.
The Ortega's the Sandinista's and Nicaragua are a sad, sad story that far too many people don't know much about. Promised a lot, delivered absolutely zero.
Veblen is the thinker behind the phrase "conspicuous consumption." The phrase comes from a book called the Theory of the Leisure Class. He combines sociology with economics to tell a more holistic story that I think is very relevant. And yes, semaphores sounds far more poetic than robot!
i am very happy you are a reader-I don't feel so mad.
I do get you and I am happy to find a like-minded spirt here on Substack. I know what you mean about "economics" and I love how Cabral aislates the four pilars of oppression, the economic, the social, the cultural, and the historical --as you pointed that out in your post on that interesting thinker this morning. Those four aspects of opression remind me a little of Emmanuel Wallerstein's system theory, although Wallerstein talking about the sixteenth century. Wallerstein was someone who connected the dots and people are still using his model to understand coloniality (as Quijano framed it). You have probably seen the Journal of World-Systems researh, but just in case: https://jwsr.pitt.edu/ojs/jwsr. I still need to get to Veblen whose ideas you painted the other day seem very intresting.
i didn't know about the journal, so thank you. Of course I know WST and use it as the opening unit for a course I teach on capitalism. I will have a good look at it. Thanks again.
A refreshing take that provides food for thought across a wide range of issues.
I think in part Veblen was speaking about himself, he wasn't Jewish, but he was a Norwegian American and in his time very much outside of the mainstream. The other thing that I was thinking was about West Indians in the USA at the time of the Harlem Renaissance - hugely disproportionate in influence. Glad you enjoyed it.