BK on identity

christian11 at mindspring.com christian11 at mindspring.com
Wed Feb 28 06:07:07 PST 2001


Doug quoted BK:


> "All identity is social, but class is the quintessence of the social. Unlike race, sex, culture, or place of birth, class cannot be determined except by the positions of the individual in society, and cannot be reproduced except through participation in the functioning of the economic system" (p. 95).
>

I wonder if K is playing the old class v. identity politics. The last part of the second sentence says that class, among those other categories, cannot be reproduced _except_ thru participating in the economic system. I can't be sure 'cause I don't have context. But K could imply that sex, race, etc. are reproduced economically, but that they aren't reproduced there _only_. ie. There are other mechanisms of reproduction for sex, race, culture, in addition economic ones, whereas the economy is the royal road to class reproduction. In which case, this sounds like a reductive reading of class--and a more complex understanding of sex, race, culture etc.

Christian



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