"The Making of the English Working Class" and Marxist History

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses how Thompson's "The Making of the English Working Class" can be considered 'bottom up' history in its concern to rescue the working people of the Industrial Revolution from the economic conditions of the time. It looks at how, central to Thompson's work, is the theme of the emergence of a conscious working class between 1780 and 1832 in the context of the proletarianization and political repression. It also examines how Thompson's work fits into Marxist thinking and how Thompson is a good example of a cultural Marxist.

From the Paper:

"Marx does not focus on cultural history either, but rather economic history and class relationships for this "grand, overarching evolutionary theory of human history rested upon a dialectic of economic transformation" . For Marx what we do is the basis of who we are. Marx's theory is also an example of a 'systematic theory', in that it tries to explain how all parts relate to the whole in their system. There are several main tenets of Marxist theory which I will explain now in order to establish a framework in order to evaluate E.P. Thompson's work. Marx saw society as being evolutionary in that it moved and would continue to do so through successive stages of economic development or modes of production."

Sample of Sources Used:

• E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, Vintage, (1963)
• E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, (1963) Preface
• David Rollison 'Marxism' in Garthine Walker (ed.) Writing Early Modern story, Oxford University Press, (2005)
• Karl Marx, Introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, Pluto Press, (1971 ed.)
• Anna Green and Kathleen Troup, The Houses of History, Manchester University Press, (1999)

More papers on "The Making of the English Working Class" and Marxist History:

• Book Review # 92633 : "The Making of the English Working Class"
• Book Review # 34110 : "The Making of the English Working Class" and Social Order"
• Book Review # 54741 : "The Making of the Mosaic"

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