SHUM 408 Improvisational Economies
also ANTHR 407)
Fall. 4 credits. Limited to 15 students.
J. Mantz.
R 2:30-4:25.
Most of us are familiar with Marx’s arguments about the dehumanizing character of the industrial labor process, and how the commodification of labor in modern capitalism has forged systems of economic and social alienation, inequality, and regimentation. The most important implication of this argument for humanistic studies of political economy is the degree to which the capitalist labor process removes (or at least radically stratifies) the human potential for creativity and free expression. Critics of this notion sometimes argue that the categories of industrial labor that Marx discussed in the 19th century have less saliency in today’s post-industrial, or more recently, digital world; and new opportunities for human creativity and expression are emerging as we enter a new phase of informational experience. While the legitimacy of this claim is confronted by the fact that access to the liberties promised by digital technologies is highly disproportionate on any global scale, it is certainly true that the concept of labor needs rethinking for the contemporary era. In reworking the concept of labor for the digital age, this seminar considers the extent to which labor has been a site of human contestation over meaning and purpose; how laborers have forged new systems of economic improvisation and creativity, even under the most mechanized and exploitative of regimes; and what the impact of these divergent human labor experiences are for our contemporary world. We begin with a discussion of the different ways in which the concept of labor has been categorized and what implications the disciplinary division of labor has had for it. We then turn our attention to an analysis of socioeconomic types of labor, with the intent of exploring how different kinds of productive experiences are regimented, as well as how human beings in myriad ways attempt to establish meaning in their economic lives. Finally, we consider past and present attempts to obviate the state or regulatory authority altogether, and rely instead on innovation, creativity, and cooperation in more voluntaristic labor regimes.
Beginning in 2007, Jeffrey W. Mantz is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at George Mason University. From 2003-07, he was an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at California State University, Stanislaus, and from 2001-03, he was an Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Vassar College. He holds a PhD from the University of Chicago. His research interests are in the political, economic, and cultural changes underlying the digital age. He conducts research in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Caribbean, for which he has received many grants and published a number of articles.