Marx’s theory of the value form provides an alternative to common sense—i.e. ideological—understandings of the relationship between culture and economy. Might it also be useful to unblocking the perceptual and political impasses characterizing our academic wars of position against the universal?

Colleen Lye teaches in English and Critical Theory at UC Berkeley. Most recently, she is the co-editor of After Marx: Literature, Theory and Value in the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge UP, 2022).