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Please join us for the third session of the Otago Socialist Society's 2026 Introduction to Marxism reading group! If you couldn't make previous sessions, it's not too late to hop on board.Our generous OSS member and reading group leader Dr Berkay Koçak has provided the following guide for our second session:
What happens to human labour when it is organised through the capitalist mode of production? This session examines Marx’s concept of alienation and its significance for understanding labour, human activity, and social reproduction. We will consider how alienation shapes workers’ relation to their own activity, to the products they create, and to one another, and we will trace the idea from Marx’s early writings to his later critique of capitalist production. The session also asks how the alienation of labour is connected to the appropriation of surplus labour—and what this reveal about capitalism as a system.
Core:
• Karl Marx – Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844 (in Early Writings – Penguin Edition), Estranged Labour (pp.322-345):
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/labour.htm
• Karl Marx – Grundrisse (Penguin Edition), The Fragment on Machines (pp. 690-712):
http://thenewobjectivity.com/pdf/marx.pdf
Suggested:
• István Mészáros - Marx’s Theory of Alienation, Chapter III - Conceptual Structure of Marx’s Theory of Alienation:
https://www.marxists.org/archive/meszaros/works/alien/meszaro3.htm
• Bertell Ollman - Alienation: Marx’s Conception of Man in Capitalist Society, Part III, Chapter 18: “The Theory of Alienation” (pp. 131–152):
https://www.scribd.com/document/776353572/Alienation-Marx-s-Conception-of-Man-in-Capitalist-Society-by-Bertell-Ollman#page=152
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Event venue
The Valley Project, 262 North Road, North East Valley,Dunedin, New Zealand
Tickets
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