Transitions: Methods, Theory, Politics : : Methods, Theory, Politics / / Tom Brass.

• Superior document: Studies in Critical Social Sciences ; 230
• VerfasserIn: Brass, Tom,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden ;, Boston : : Brill,, 2022.
• Year of Publication: 2022
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Language: English
• Series: Studies in Critical Social Sciences ; 230.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (307 pages)

Examined here is political discourse about the pattern and desirability of economic development, extending from historical and contemporary views about race, culture, and labour regimes, to how the same themes inform travel writing.

The focus of this volume is on political discourse about the pattern and desirability of economic development, and how/why historical interpretations of social phenomena connected to this systemic process alter. It is a trajectory pursued here with reference to the materialism of Marxism, via the mid-nineteenth century ideas about race, through the development decade, the ‘cultural turn’, debates about modes of production and their respective labour regimes, culminating in the role played by immigration before and after the Brexit referendum. Also examined is the trajectory followed by travel writing, and how many of its core assumptions overlap with those made in the social sciences and development studies. The object is to account for the way concepts informing these trajectories do or do not alter.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements -- List of Figures and Tables -- Introduction (Steps Forward or Backwards?) -- Reified Notions, Fantasmic Representations? -- Transition, Critique, Silence -- Marxist Methodology? -- A Lesser Status and a Distant Place? -- A Distant Place as a Greater Status -- Themes -- part 1 -- Travelling On -- 1Racisms (Home and Away) -- Introduction: A Place in the World -- Blood of the Founders -- The Good Things of This World -- Music, Speech, Passion -- A Faint Uneasy Movement -- They Are Our Brothers -- One’s Own Free Will -- To See with Distorted Vision -- Avoiding the Question / Samuel Smiles Revisited -- A Dearth of Workers -- Steady Work, Job Security -- Conclusion -- 2Anti-capitalisms (Lessons Unlearned by Postmodernists) -- Introduction: The Anti-capitalism of Pro-slavery Discourse -- For the Mutual Benefit of Both -- Pro-slavery and/as (Conservative) Anti-capitalism -- Forging New Chains for Themselves -- All Capital Is Created by Labour -- (Pro-slavery) Contradictions, (Postmodern) Similarities -- Pro-slavery, Postmodernism, and Identity Politics -- Empowering Populism -- Conclusion -- 3Transitions (Real and Imagined) -- Introduction: Simple Transitions? -- The Parting to Come? -- Trading Places -- Feudalism, but Not Yet … -- Free but Tied? -- Workers, or Tenants? -- Modes and Beams -- How Do We Know? -- Since the Beginning of the World -- Conclusion -- 4Trajectories (to and from Unfreedom) -- Introduction: Quo Vadis, Domine? -- 1950 to 1980 -- 1980 to 2000 -- 2000 to the Present -- Theory, Methods, Problems -- India: 18th Century Onwards -- India: 1960s Onwards -- UK: 2015 Onwards -- Conclusion -- part 2 -- On Travel -- 5Travellers, or Tourists? (Journeys Outside Europe) -- Introduction: An Instinctive Simplicity, a Thoughtless Idealism -- Hello, I Must Be Going -- Tourists Who Are Not Tourists -- The Ruin(s) of Time, the Time of Ruin(s) -- Is Your Journey Really Necessary? -- Traveller’s Tales -- Ragpickers of History -- Unevolved People -- Pristine Other, Untouched Land -- Conclusion -- 6Tourists, or Travellers? (European Journeys) -- Introduction: Songs of Travel -- City and Countryside -- Class, Race, Blood -- Away from Home -- Always Defeated? -- Land, Politics, Fascism -- Peasants, Ancient and Modern -- Conclusion -- 7Arrivals, Not Departures (on Never Leaving Venice) -- Introduction: Venice, Tourism and the Agrarian Myth -- The Ox Spoke -- It Is Not Easy to Do One’s Duty / Loaded Pistols, Ominous Chatter -- Real and Loveable? -- A Dream Long Lost -- Conclusion -- 8Other Worlds (Neo-populist Journeys) -- Introduction: Worlds of Difference? / Chayanov: The Economic Case / Chayanov: The Economic Case Against / Chayanov: The Political Case Against -- Undiscovered Country? -- Journeys: Space, Time, Politics -- Valuable Warnings, Wholesome Reprimands -- Conclusion -- Conclusion (Better Worlds?) -- Bibliography -- Author Index -- Subject Index.