TITLE:
British New Left’s Multiple Paradigm Analysis and Theoretical Review of Marxist Cultural Theory
AUTHORS:
Xianyue Li
KEYWORDS:
British New Left, Culture, Paradigm, Marxist Cultural Theory
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.10 No.1,
January
24,
2022
ABSTRACT: Since the 20th century, culture has gradually become
the central discourse, becoming increasingly complex and difficult to
understand. The current academic research on Marxist cultural theory is more
based on the perspectives of cultural and political philosophy, while the
inspection from the perspective of paradigm has not been fully reflected. This paper
attempts to sort out the multi-dimensional paradigm analysis of Marxist
cultural theory by British New Left and clarify how they solve the cultural
crisis by reconstructing cultural concepts. Firstly, by re-exploring the
relationship between culture and the base/ superstructure theory model,
breaking the shackles of economic determinism and releasing the relative
autonomy of culture. Secondly, focus on the materialist view of culture,
criticize elitism, and stimulate the political liberation potential of culture. Finally, combine ideology and
hegemony theory to solve the cultural structure and subject dilemma. After the transformation of
multiple paradigms and theoretical disputes, British New Left has expanded the
interpretation space of Marxist cultural theory, but it has also gradually
fallen into the whirlpool of postmodernism and has drifted away from historical
materialism.