Due date: Monday, 9/23, handed in class.
NOTE: This reading has 2 parts. You should read all two parts. The first part provides historical and intellectual context. The second reading is the actual essay by Marx and Engels Note, we will discuss the material in both parts, so make sure you study all of the assigned pages in the reading, not just the essay by Marx.
READ – Karl Marx: “The Communist Manifesto”
Study questions – to be handed in class
Study Questions(these are the questions you should answer in your paper for this assignment)
NOTE: Papers have to be typed, in paragraph length and brought to class. We will weave your responses in our class discussion, so be prepared to explain, backup, motivate your answers to these study questions.
Also, remember that these are study questions, the point is not necessarily to answer them correctly, but to give it your best shot, think of it as homework and preparation for our in-class discussion.
- How do you understand what Marx and Engels call “class struggle”? Give an example of a class struggle?
- Why can’t these classes get along, why does there have to be strife and struggle between them? What makes such a struggle inevitable? Hint: think about the classes they give as examples: Freeman and slave, Lord and serf, etc… What kind of a relationship is set up by such pairs of classes?
- Could you briefly summarize the “origin of bourgeois society”? What events made it possible for bourgeois (capitalist) society to emerge and become globally dominant?
- What would you say are the key differences between the bourgeoisie and the proletarians?
