> >Well I could mean that, yes, I guess. But it wasn't the example I was
> thinking
> >of though. I sell something to my employer, without a doubt, but it would
> be
> >really hard to see that as labour in Marxist terms.
>
> Unfortunately I'm not familiar with the terms of your relationship to your
> employer. You'll have to spell it out for me.
Well, it seems I mostly sell my general association with the dept. I mean, right now. Sure I teach X hours, but pretty much X is something I negotiate through a teaching budget which is allocated in kind of vague terms and can make =0. What I have to do in my current agreement is a) publish things and/or win grants & b) design courses that generate a certain number of enrolments. While that's my effort being used to advantage my employer, and I am not pretending that I don't work hard, it's really not as simple as me selling my labour to USyd. For eg, it is possible for me to, in a whole range of ways, negotiate myself out of (b) and to variously reconfigure what (a) is or implies. I have to say, any version of Marxism that wanted to pretend my current work had the same relation to "capital" or "profit" as making sandwiches for a living would be a pretty useless political perspective.
> >I did not grow up or learn to work with anything like the same "relations
> to
> >production" I have now (given that that is once more the hardline credo of
> the
> >month on lbo). It would be nothing short of useless stupidity to imagine
> that
> >my relation to my employer and their profit margin now was the same as it
> was
> >when I worked as a teller, a clerk, selling Avon or clothes, reading tarot
> >cards, or when i was unemployed (among other things I could list).
>
> So what has changed? And what are you suggesting that implies in terms of
> class?
I actually never meant to do my job-of-the-month life story or anything. Have I answered the question? If not I'll be more specific, but that looks like enough to me.
> >Well, I guess I'm a bit cranky this weekend. I'm so damned hot. Though, at
> >least moisture-in-the-air hot, not the insane desert stuff.
> >
> >But if you like we can be cranks together. I probably need the practice if
> I'm
> >going to even marginally fit in here.
>
> Well here together we'd be rat-bags, not the American "cranks". Unless you
> mean by "here" the LBO list? I'm not sure you can learn to be a rat-bag
> though. You've either got it or you haven't. Everybody says I've got it.
> ;-)
I get by, in that respect.
> We got a drop of rain here today though. Not enough to get the ground wet,
> but just enough to cool the air a fraction. Saturday was hell, I stepped
> outside to check on the animals and it was like stepping into an oven, a
> fan-forced oven, there was a hot wind blowing and the sky was was tinged with
> the red smoke of a far-away bushfire. So we drew the curtains and kept the
> doors and windows closed to delay the inevitable, but by evening the heat had
> permeated through the insulation. Couldn't get to sleep until way into the
> wee hours. Its going to be a long summer.
Last week my train was cut four times by fire, and the skies are orange most every night. The ocean, right now, looks and feels so good. I have the fan on, but am too hot to sleep. Have to be in Sydney by 10 to see a real estate agent. That's not much motivation for a sleepless night. I'm animal-free right now, except for a cat (they're people any way), so I don't have to negotiate that kind of mute distress. Unless it's immanent in the cockroaches or something (ah NSW).
> But you can't be middle class if you don't have air-conditioning Catherine!
> Admit it, you're a fraud. ;-)
See, there's a thing. My houses have had airconditioning for some years now. Right now I'm in my mother's house and no such thing has ever been on the cards. Airconditioning is an alien thing in these suburbs. I could say that kind of thing is just an element of class mobility, yes, but if there is no class stratification then how the hell do I explain mobility between them? Or the relative power I have over my "work" conditions compared to everyone here. I sure as fuck don't own anything that generates profit and nor do I (comparatively) make much money, so it's not about that.
Gah. It's too hot. Kell could help me, if she wanted (?).
Catherine
------------------------------------------------- This mail sent through IMP at ArtsIT: http://admin.arts.usyd.edu.au/horde/imp/