Popular beliefs are themselves material forces needing political education

Evidence

In addition, a class will always have its spontaneous, vivid but not coherent or philosophically elaborated, instinctive understanding of its basic conditions of life and the nature of the constraints and forms of exploitation to which it is commonly subjected. Gramsci described the latter as its “good sense.” But it always requires a further work of political education and cultural politics to renovate and clarify these constructions of popular thought—“common sense”—into a more coherent political theory or philosophical current. This “raising of popular thought” is part and parcel of the process by which a collective will is constructed, and requires extensive work of intellectual organization—an essential part of any hegemonic political strategy. Popular beliefs, the culture of a people, Gramsci argues, are not arenas of struggle which can be left to look after themselves. They “are themselves material forces” (PN, 165). — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 125

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces Gramsci’s ‘good sense’ as distinct from ‘common sense’ — the instinctive understanding of exploitation that needs renovation.
• XREF: The claim that popular culture is ‘material forces’ feeds directly into cultural-studies accounts of how Islamophobic common sense is manufactured through cultural politics. — connects to: People need an organizing theory or map, not raw facts, to form political positions. — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 1101
• DEEPTHINKING: The inversion — that popular culture isn’t a passive arena to be won but itself material force needing organized intellectual labor — is the hinge of Gramscian cultural politics.