Politically engaged literary theory applies a market model of eclectic consumption

Evidence

Much of the avant-garde literary theory of today comes out of such moorings, intellecrual and political, with a distinctly consumptionist slant. Quite apart from the remarkable claim that politics resides mainly in radicalizing the practice of one’s own academic profession, there has grown, because of equal allegiance to irreconcilable pressures, that same kind of eclecticism among the politically engaged theorists as among the more technicist, conservative ones; it is not uncommon to find, say, Gramsci and Matthew Arnold being cited in favour of the same theoretical position, as if the vastly different political allegiances of these two figures were quite immaterial for the main business ofliterary criticism. In some of these radicalized versions too, thus, that same market-economy model of theory obtains. — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 285

Categorization

• XREF: Directly serves the reader’s aim of tracking Ahmad’s materialist critique of discourse-first postcolonial theory that obscures class structures. The ‘market-economy model of theory’ anticipates his later charge that strategic essentialism reduces identity to consumable positionality. — connects to: Reference-style consumption of scholarship obscures its broader thematic value — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting…, 1312; Contemporary critical theory now reproduces rather than analyzes immediacy’s market logic — Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late…, 249
• SEED: An essay angle: how citation eclecticism (Gramsci alongside Arnold) masks political allegiance behind the ‘marketplace of ideas’ model — the same flattening Spivak warned strategic essentialism could undergo.

Broader Connections

• Reference-style consumption of scholarship obscures its broader thematic value #corroborates (0.85) — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1312
• Contemporary critical theory now reproduces rather than analyzes immediacy’s market logic #expands (0.82) — Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late…, 249