Croatian Leftist Critique and the Object of American Studies

Scientific paper - Other

• Author: Stipe Grgas
• Author's institution: University of Zagreb; Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences; (Department of English language and literature)
• Scientific / art field, discipline and subdiscipline: HUMANISTIC SCIENCES; Interdisciplinary Humanistic Studies

Abstract (english)

The article argues that one possible way of understanding the United States at the disposal of American Studies scholars working in the region of ex-Yugoslavia is by retrieving the leftist critique as it was articulated by members of the Croatian Praxis writers. The author begins with the contention that the prevailing representations of the United States today present it as the exemplary country of capitalism. Argu-ing that extant Americanist paradigms let this reality slip under their screen, he goes back to the said leftist critique and reads how they provide a conceptual frame with which to engage the United States. He elaborates this frame in three ways: first, he recalls the Praxis group’s engagement with the United States when the journal was being published; second, he draws attention to Vanja Sutlić’s and Ivan Kovačić’s pro-nouncements on the United States as the exemplary capitalist country; and third, he foregrounds the Praxis group’s Marxist engagement with Heidegger. It is this engage-ment that the author contends is of particular relevance for understanding the pres-ent mutation of capitalism and the place of the United States in the contemporary world. In conclusion, the author argues that a reading of the United States through Marx and Heidegger repositions the work of William Spanos within the archive of the discipline.

• Keywords (english): the United States; capital; Praxis; Heidegger; Marx; Spanos
• Language: english
• Publication type: Scientific paper - Other
• Publication status: Published
• Peer review: Peer review - international
• Publication version: Published version
• Journal title: Working Papers in American Studies. Vol. 1. Cross-cultural Readings of the United States
• Numbering: vol. 1, pp. 83-114
• e-ISSN: 1849-6180
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.17234/WPAS.2014.8
• URN:NBN: urn:nbn:hr:131:700054
• Publication: 2014
• Conference: Title: Cross-cultural Readings of the United States; Location: Zagreb, Croatia; Organizer: Hrvatsko udruženje za američke studije; Start date: 2014-05-24; End date: 2014-05-25
• Document URL: http://www.huams.hr/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/wpas_v1_huams_2014.pdf
• Type of resource: Text
• Access conditions: Open access
• Created on: 2021-03-08 17:42:12