[act-ma] Thurs, 8/20, "Russia 1917: The Socialist Revolution" with Kevin Murphy, award-winning author

[tom arabia]

Russia 1917: The Socialist Revolution
HISTORY FOR ACTION - CHALLENGING THE STRUCTURES OF POWER AND OPPRESSION
    with Kevin Murphy

7pm, Thursday, August 20th
@ Haymarket People's Fund
42 Seaverns Ave, Jamaica Plain

sponsored by Boston's International Socialist Organization

Facebook Event Page - mark "attending" and invite friends!

Kevin Murphy is author of Revolution and Counterrevolution: Class
Struggle in a Moscow Metal Factory (Haymarket Books, 2007), which won
the 2006 Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize. Based on
painstaking research in four factory specific archives, it is, as
publisher Haymarket Books claims, "unquestionably the most thorough
investigation to date on working class life during the revolutionary
era." He teaches at the University of Massachusetts in Boston.

******

We
live in a historical moment defined by international capitalist crisis
and chronic imperialist war, in which the first Black US President
soared to his election with promises of hope and change. While the far
right wing of the health care debate tries to paint health care reform
as "socialist" and Obama as a "communist," the idea of socialism has
been pushed back into mainstream discourse. Millions are probing for
answers to questions like: 

          - How can we end the threat of economic crisis, poverty, and war? 
          - Do we need to get rid of capitalism? 
          - What is socialism? Is it really the alternative we need? 
          - What can challenge the vast class and national divisions, the oppressive power-structures in society? 
          - What concretely can we do right now to achieve these goals?

Described
by some as the only successful socialist revolution, examining the
Russian Revolution of 1917 can provide valuable insight into these
questions. Hotly debated from left to right, it is one of the defining
events of modern history, in which the Russian masses took center
stage, smashed both Russian monarchy and capitalism, and radically
transformed society in their own interests. As a renowned scholar of
the Russian Revolution, Kevin Murphy can address questions on this
subject with all-too-rare clarity and historical accuracy. We encourage
you to participate in this discussion with questions and insights of
your own.

******

SUGGESTED READING (for this meeting and beyond!):

By Kevin Murphy:

Revolution and Counterrevolution: Class Struggle in a Moscow Metal Factory 
http://www.haymarketbooks.org/product_info.php?cPath=41&products_id=1633

"Can we write the history of the Russian Revolution?" 
the Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize Lecture
http://www.isreview.org/issues/57/feat-russianrev.shtml

General interest:

80 Years Since the Russian Revolution, Ahmed Shawki
[a great introduction to the topic!]
http://www.isreview.org/issues/03/russian_revolution.shtml

Ten Days That Shook the World, John Reed
http://www.haymarketbooks.org/product_info.php?products_id=998

History of the Russian Revolution, Leon Trotsky
http://www.haymarketbooks.org/product_info.php?products_id=1587


******

www.socialistworker.org



      
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://act-ma.org/pipermail/act-ma_act-ma.org/attachments/20090818/28a2ffc6/attachment.html>