Cultural Theory: Althusser's Concept of Ideology

College course lecture from Ron Strickland.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Strickland
• Ideology
• Marxism
• Althusser
• Gramsci

[tomsega]

I like the way you say 'ideology', although at first it sounds a bit bizzare. 'Idi' - like in 'idiocy' - does the term more justice than pronouncing it like 'ideal'.

Indeed, many people, especially politicans, use 'ideology' as a positive thing; a 'world view'. When in fact, the sociological use of the word is generally very different. It is false consciousness!

[rlstrick]

I got into the habit of pronouncing it that way when I spent several months teaching and doing research as a grad student in London in 1985.... I suppose it might sound like an affectation, but, I'd have to make a conscious effort to say it the other way by now! But, one point to note from Althusser--though ideology is false consciousness, it's very nearly the only consciousness we have. It's very difficult--at some level, impossible--to think one's way out of this box.

[5uffy]

Hey, I'm a high school student and am rather pathetic at understanding complicated theory. I have a question for Mr. Strick or others: is Althusser basically implying that because individuals are forced to take up subject positions to serve society, the individual's place in society is to conform (because they have no other choice)? How could this be extrapolated and used in argument for the essential goodness of human nature and consequently (microcosm/macrocosm) the goodness of society? Thanks

[rlstrick]

Althusser does imply the bleak prospects for individual agency that you suggest. I find his theory most useful because it imposes a critical self-consciousness--if you begin with the assumption that the individual is in control of his/her destiny, you will probably not notice how that individual agency is overdetermined by ideology. It's a bit like "negative theology" in the Kierkegaard tradition. You assume that human nature is not essentially good; it's your responsibility to be good.

[robleblanc]

Thank you very much for your informative webcast. So, for Althusser, is it possible for an ideological group that wants to resist the state to produce a radical subject through interpellation of some kind? Or does any act of interpellation necessarily produce what Foucault called a docile body?

[rlstrick]

Althusser doesn't offer a way out of his interpellation box.... this is why many cultural studies theorists shifted toward Gramsci in the 1980s. Gramsci's conception of "hegemony" was seen as more useful than "interpellation" and Gramsci's "organic intellectual" could be a "radical subject." I think Althusser is most useful as a negative theorist. But I think also he can be creatively "misread" in a way that allows some slippage in hegemonic interpellation.

[Zarathustra06]

Excellent video, thanks so much for posting!

[kantiankarma]

i think that Althusser's notion that we are always-already interpellated as subjects tears down the myth of the free individual and accordingly obliterates any notion of moral agency. The Ruling Subject, i.e., the upper case 'S' subject or called Ideology, does not 'empower itself' but rather it only persists because the subjects submit themselves to it by themselves, since we are thus interpellated.

[jkbosh]

you rock professor!

[badger279]

wow! look at all those books! this guy must be really smart!

[myballwall]

Pretty boring shit!

[ButherLi55ett]

3) In the UK there is a 'welfare state', meaning unemployed, housing benefits and of course a national health care system although these are all under vicious attack at the moment. This probably means there isn't the level of desperation that there might be in the US. I mean it is possible to live - if you can call it that on whatever you can wring out of the state. Despite this there are very deprived areas in Britain which "The Voice of British Imperialism" - the BBC don't talk about much.

[ButherLi55ett]

2) Owners of capital will do all they can to split working people to keep wages and conditions down and profits up, which isn't some conspiracy or deed of evil men though they might be utter bastards but a requirement within the current mode of production. It's certainly true that not too long ago in certain parts of the Britain it was 'the army or the coal mine' once you got out of high school. Just like the US, the more deprived areas are sucked into the military just not on the same scale.

[ButherLi55ett]

@kaleo183rd 1) Yeah, I agree the working class is split, sometimes purposefully by the state and capitalists. One section gets played against another. It could be Latinos against African Americans or firefighters against teachers to take another example. Added to this wonderful mix are also different forms of nationalism, Islamic, black, conservative and so on. The only way we can get anywhere as a class is to overcome these ideologies, which is no easy task.

[kaleo183rd]

@ButherLi55ett Jea, I mean, I'm Latino, and Studying the current context, Non-whites in the US are 2nd class citizens, on the one hand (Even though there is a bourgoueis that is Black , Latino in each nation and in the US etc), But coming from NYC, the are many Latinos/Blacks who sign up, in the military, inspite of the knowledge that they are being screwed by the same system, Idon't know too much about the UK but The US military is actively always going to poor nieghborhoods

[ButherLi55ett]

@kaleo183rd That's what I meant by the term "economic conscript". Though you added some depth. Workers are indirectly forced to sign up. Of course the state uses propaganda and nationalism too. Especially in the US, where military recruiters go into schools and colleges etc. This I think would be frowned upon in the UK but that's not to say it hasn't happened (but isn't common). And of course there are children 'cadets' though I imagine not on the scale of similar US programs.

[kaleo183rd]

@ButherLi55ett also most of the time, where Im from at least, its a poverty draft, when people are from impoverished neighborhoods, with limited options , it becomes an indirect poverty draft

[Jaluzaga]

Thanks for sharing!