Is there a proposed "curriculum" or can someone recommend something like that? Basically I'm looking to see if there's a recommended list of theory books ordered in a way that would be intended to go from one to the next? I downloaded the Mega file of theory and I'm familiar with some archive sites of books/essays. But I find I'm at kind of a loss on where to start. Sometimes the author is responding to a previously written work, and sometimes I start something where it feels like I missed a prerequisite book.

It doesn't help that I don't have great reading comprehension and definitely struggle with 1800s English language terms. I'm aware that there's a lot of variety in theory and thought within "the left" but I'm having a really tough time navigating it.

Sorry for the lib framework of this question, any help is greatly appreciated!

  • PermaculturalMarxist [they/them]
    ·
    4 years ago

    There's the Basic Study Plan from Movimiento Anti-Imperialista which is popular online among MLs. As others have said, a reading list isn't totally necessary but I share the feeling of wanting one. For me, I just want to have a discrete goal for my theory-reading.

    • VladimirLenny [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Awesome, thank you, this looks pretty promising. I appreciate that it's subdivided into a few categories. So much of this theory seems so esoteric to me because growing up there was virtually no "left" presence in my life. My mom is like a classic "the View" liberal and anyone I knew with any remotely left views basically boiled down to conspiracy theories and ending the war on drugs (basically Joe Rogan stuff) but with no real framework to learn from.

      • PermaculturalMarxist [they/them]
        ·
        4 years ago

        Yeah, the categories are based on the idea that Marxism has "three component parts": scientific socialism, dialectical materialism, and a critique of political economy. Breaking it down that way really helps understand, even if the categories do have overlap. I would recommend reading "Principles of Communism" by Engels along with the other intro material, but the two Lenin pieces in the intro really help give context to Marxism that helps you feel like you aren't just dropping into the middle of a debate with no context, since most Marxists tend to hash out their theories in reference (usually in opposition) to other theories.