On the Gilded Genesis of Structure and Discourse

Bibliographic Data

ID6427164
AuthorsTor Hammer (0000-0003-4051-0374, Doctoral Researcher, Mid Sweden University https://dx.doi.org/6311 Sundsvall Sweden), Magnus Granberg (0000-0002-5065-8973, Associate Professor of Sociology, Mid Sweden University https://dx.doi.org/6311 Sundsvall Sweden)
Year2025
Volume33
Issue1
Pages119-148
Publication date2025-07-21
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistorical Materialism (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1465-4466 • E-ISSN: 1569-206X
PublisherBrill (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1163/1569206x-bja10083
OpenAlexW4412583757
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited17

This article contributes to a form-genetic critique of post-Marxist discourse theory. We argue that the concepts of sign value, equivalence and the empty signifier project the logic of the value-form onto social reality in general. We trace the roots of the concept of sign value in structural linguistics to the Lausanne school of marginalism and reconstruct its permutation in post-Marxist discourse theory as developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. We argue that the projection of the value-form through the key concepts of discourse theory relates to how discourse theory inherits the marginalist premises of structural linguistics. Drawing on Genevieve Vaughan’s theory of commodity exchange as a one-word language, we suggest that the empty signifier reflects the objective conceptuality of the money form of value, not a universal aspect of social and political reality. This projection of the value-form eternalises capitalist social forms and promotes a politics which discounts proletarian and ‘popular’ self-activity

Aesthetics · Art · Epistemology · Gilded Age · Political science · Sociology · Historical and Linguistic Studies · Law · Linguistics and language evolution · Philosophy

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