Lecture series to shed light on Marx

After the overwhelming public response to the series of lectures on the cultural legacy of the Mahabharata, academic Sunil P. Elayidom is planning to deliver five speeches on the relevance of German political philosopher Karl Marx to mark his 200th birth anniversary in May.

Mr. Elayidom told The Hindu on Sunday that he considers Marx to be a “contemporary thinker” even though his works date back to 19th century. “He had engaged with all spheres of modern human life and written about even subjects such as theology, feminism, and environment. However, in popular perception, his contributions are discussed in terms of the initial success and later failure of his philosophy in the form of a political establishment in the Soviet Union,” he pointed out.

Mr. Elayidom, an associate professor at the Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit, Kalady, said his efforts would be to explain how there was nothing called “true Marxism”. “ It was eminent historian Eric Hobsbawm who once wrote that Marxism is plural today. We need to look at it as a living tradition covering many subjects,” he said. Thus, the lectures would shed light on issues such as ethics, science, and sexuality to highlight Marx’s relevance in today’s times.

The five-day programme, organised by the Kozhikode Samskarika Vedi, will be held in the city from May 1. Mr. Elayidom’s five-part series on the Mahabharata were widely discussed in the cultural circles in the State and the videos of the lectures were viewed by thousands on YouTube.

According to functionaries of the samskarika vedi, the first lecture would deal with issues of class and class struggle. Second day’s topic would be the relevance of Marx’s philosophy in ecological politics at a time of unbridled capitalistic development. Feminism and sexuality, the meeting points between caste politics and class politics, and the Marxist approach to culture would be the topics in the next three days.