Anna Myers
Presenter
University of North Texas
Reinventing the Metaphor of the Edifice: Charting the Relationship Between Culture and Economy in the Work of Sylvia Wynter
The base/superstructure model has been considered one of the key contributions of Marxist theory. According to Karl Marx, the base is composed of the totality of the relations of production. The superstructure consists of the cultural and ideological elements of society. The economic base conditions the possibilities of the superstructure. However, less research has been performed to chart the effectiveness of the base/superstructure model in the context of plantation or colonial societies. This paper derives from a study of the plot-plantation dichotomy as understood by Sylvia Wynter. In plantation societies, the base is often dislodged from the superstructure. Utilizing Wynter’s cultural analysis of the plantation complex, this paper argues that the base/superstructure rupture indicates something about the primal nature of capitalism which not only depends on labor exploitation, but relies on processes of dehumanization. The author concludes that by attending to race, gender, and class in the plantation archives, Wynter reinvents the base/superstructure model to propose a structural model necessary for the imagining the possibilities of resistance and revolution in the Caribbean.