Stephen Dozeman (5:28)

Yeah, critical and dynamic reevaluation and reappropriation of the tradition. So kind of continuing with this, I'm wondering if you could tell us a bit about what sets this book series apart from other book series on Marxism or critical theory more broadly. What do you hope you're achieving with these titles that readers and researchers might struggle to find elsewhere?

Babakamini (5:51)

Right, so the series. Oh, it's. It's a little bit difficult to. To compare series when they, you know, their output starts to be quite significant in terms of quantity and also quality. But generally the series tends to include research on works of Marx and Engels and Marxist authors and tradition of the 19th, 20th and 21st century re examination of labor and social movements and Marx's analysis of contemporary issues and also the reception of Marxism in the world. So these are some of the foci of this series. Although there are some titles that broaden this. This sort of framework and perspective. It includes titles focusing on the. The overall Marx and Engels, which utilize the scholarly achievement of the ongoing research on Marx and Angles, the collective works of Marx and Engels in German and other sort of frontiers of research on Marx and Engels around the world. It seeks to publish books focused on reception studies and Marxist national traditions, so to enable the worldwide Anglophone community to understand the variety of intellectual and political traditions through which Marx and Engels have been received in local contexts. And it really pays attention to authors that are lesser known in English speaking countries for various reasons, including, and primarily for linguistic reasons and barriers.

Stephen Dozeman (7:39)

Yeah, Speaking to that, one thing I do like about the series is it has a great emphasis on translating authors from outside the usual Anglo American academic sphere. Could you maybe speak to this international approach the series has taken and what you hope readers can glean from these titles about and from parts of the world traditionally neglected by English language scholarship?

Babakamini (8:04)

Right, yes, that is indeed, one of the primary aims of the series is to create a space for the English language editions of notable contributions that have already been published in other languages. As you know, this is a notoriously difficult process for many reasons, including complications around obtaining copyrights. But these issues have deprived the English speaking audience of access to important interventions in non English speaking world. Inversely, scholars in other parts of the world, including some of the most influential and original scholars, find it very difficult to get their books and contributions available to the English speaking audience. So our series has been able to play a role in creating a bridge. Well, a bridge that ideally needs to be made much wider in the direction of international exchange of ideas at the frontier of studies of Marx and Engels and Marxism. And I think such internationalizational debate to pull intellectual activities from various linguistic, geographical, political, disciplinary backgrounds together is really required for any serious re examination of Marxism and its historical development and its contemporary potentials. And this is what the series have been actively engaged in over the years.

Stephen Dozeman (9:26)

Yeah. On top of that, in addition to monographs and translations, there are a number of anthologies covering a variety of figures and topics. So given the increased logistical difficulties I imagine are involved in putting some of these anthologies together, it's noteworthy that the editors clearly are really excited by the idea of pulling together a number of scholars around particular topics. Could you tell us a bit about some of these and what sorts of projects or themes the editors get really excited about?

Babakamini (9:59)

Right. Well, I mean, there are basically two subcategories under what you call sort of anthologies. One, we do have several titles who are sort of classical ontologies, you know, bringing together writings of, for example, Marx's Writings on Alienation is a new anthology put out by Marcello Musto, which brings together sort of writings of Marx, specifically on Alienation. Beyond sort of the early manuscript of the 1844 notebooks. We also have other anthologies on various Marxist thinkers and scholars. So that is one category that we are engaging and has its own logistical difficulties I can speak to if you want. But also we focus on the editorial works and edited volumes, which, as you said, are a thorny topic for various reasons, including logistical reasons of bringing together cohesive volumes. We do have very high standards for our projects that engage in that kind of editorial or edited volume editorial activities, because in some ways it is very easy to put together, very easy to put together collected work. And also it could be tremendously difficult to make it a cohesive and rigorous approach from multiple perspectives on a specific topic. Marcello Musto and I have been working on several edited books ourselves. Marcello is a very skillful editor in his own accounts. I've done several very influential edited books on Marx in recent years, and he maintained that kind of standard of rigorous and cohesive volumes when it comes to edited sort of volumes and projects. Yeah, so it is. Although, you know, in the academia, in the industry, edited volumes are seen with a little bit of a grain of salt, let's say. But we think they do serve an important role in bringing together contributions not from one sort of a singular voice, but multiple voices with multiple perspectives on a specific topic. Now, enforcing a cohesion onto the project requires an engagement with the editors and the authors, and that's something that we do as part of our editorial work on the series.

Stephen Dozeman (12:53)

So as a final question for people who maybe are just learning about the series for the first time and are looking for maybe a place to start or a recommendation, do you have any that you have particularly enjoyed or been surprised by or any on maybe some particular subtopics within or under the Marxist umbrella?

Babakamini (13:13)

Yeah, so for political reasons, I'm gonna skip the, you know, naming my. My own favorite titles, and I have many favorite titles. I just wanted to point out that the book series has currently 62 volumes published and about 4, 60 other titles under contract and forthcoming. So it is a very massive kind of series now with many, many titles and many subcategories that they can be organized under. But for audiences who are going to want to get a glimpse of the.

Stephen Dozeman (13:53)

Series.

Babakamini (13:55)

One of the kind of the flagships of this series is, of course, designation and Reception Studies, and we have a number of fascinating titles under this category. For example, our first Volume in the series, Terry Carver and Daniel Blank work on German ideology is a very good place to start to see the frontiers of dissemination studies now in Marxism Marxist analysis. Joseph Vacco's book Alternative Modernity is a. Is a philological study of Antonio Gramsci and some of his fundamental concepts seen in a philological terms. Konkangal's work on Engos and the Dialectic of Nature also falls within that category of dissemination and reception studies. So those are, you know, perhaps three titles that the audience can start with if they are interested in that, you know, branch of research in Marxism. Also we have excellent titles under what you can call heterodox Marxist thinkers. Books on Gramsci Zhugit, for example, Zygmun Krakauer, Rosa Luxembourg Danielevskaya and Jean Juress for example, and you know, and many more. Benjamin, another title that is forthcoming. So you know, kind of bringing those voices that are kind of not heard as much and not studied as much into the English speaking world is one of the contributions of the series and we have a number of titles under this category. We also have quite interesting titles on the political theory for, you know, those who are interested in that topic, especially the very hot topic nowadays in political theory that re examines the relation or the. Dialogue between Marxism and liberalism. And quite a few titles can be found in our series. For example, August NIMT's Marxism versus Liberalism or Iacono's book on the bourgeois and the savage looks at this kind of dialogue between liberalism and Marxism and many other titles that I can name. We also have quite a number of books on political economy and Marxian economics. For example, we have Szepanski's work on financial capital in 21st century or Juan Rodriguez book on revisiting new liberal capitalism in Chile. So sometimes we have titles that are focused on regional developments and also books that are looking at Marx and economics more broadly. For example, Melo and Sabadini's work on financial speculation and fictitious profit looks at presents a Marxist analysis of financialization at a theoretical level. We also have quite exciting titles under post Colonial Perspectives, for example, Vigita's book on Ambatkar and the question of socialism in India or Ranabi Samadar's book on Marx and postcolonial age. And I know that postcolonial studies is now quite an important development in social sciences. And you know, we are trying to kind of present intervention in that debate and broaden the perspective by introducing the contributions that Marxism can bring into that important debate. We have also a number of forthcoming books that I invite your audience to check out as they come in this year and the following year, including Paolucci's book on Purdue and Marx. An understudied topic, Bourcio has been kind of, you know, adopted by inequality studies or sort of Weberian tradition. So looking at the intervention or the overlaps between Bourdieu and Marx is quite an important, exciting research. We have very exciting book coming out by Piranha Santella on Marx, social movement, Marxism, social movement and collective action. Again within social movement studies. This is a topic that is picking up some traction and this intervention is excellent in, in presenting new frontiers in this debate. I can go on, but I don't want to exhaust the patience of, of your audience. But it is quite clear that, you know, the audiences with various interests would find at least couple of titles in the series to dig into and hopefully have a critical engagement with new debates.

Stephen Dozeman (19:13)

Yeah, very diverse and dynamic. So thank you very much for this short little conversation.

Babakamini (19:19)

Babak, thank you very much for having me. And I hope to see, you know, I know that you're planning to feature some of the books in the series, so I'm excited to hear your conversation with these authors.

Stephen Dozeman (19:32)

Yeah, absolutely.