Gramsci’s censorship-driven vocabulary distinguishes fundamental classes from castes
Evidence
Gramsci tends, for reasons of censorship, to avoid using the word class in contexts where its Marxist overtones would be apparent, preferring (as for example in this sentence) the more neutral “social group”. The word “group”, however, is not always a euphemism for “class”, and to avoid ambiguity Gramsci uses the phrase “fundamental social group” when he wishes to emphasise the fact that he is referring to one or other of the major social classes (bourgeoisie, proletariat) defined in strict Marxist terms by its position in the fundamental relations of production. Class groupings wh ich do not have this fundamental role are often described as “castes” (aristocracy, etc.). The word “category”, on the other hand, which also occurs on this page, Gramsci tends to use in the standard Italian sense of members of a trade or profession, though also more generally. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1796
Categorization
Category: Definitional Content
- DEFINE: Establishes Gramsci’s terminological distinctions: fundamental social group vs. caste vs. category, and why he evades the word ‘class’.
- XREF: Connects to the reader’s Islamophobia toolkit: the deliberate vocabulary of describing social groups under censorship parallels how contemporary scholars choose terms like ‘racialized group’ vs ‘community.’
- SEED: Angle: how censorship-forced vocabulary shapes what concepts a theory can name — a meta-point about how theory forms under constraint.