Triangle Marxist Forum study group information

The meeting on January 28th was very small, but a number of people said they were interested in this, so there will be a second meeting. What towns, venues, and times work for people who want to come? Unless I hear otherwise (here or by the local Alliance email), I am thinking of having it on a Saturday at the Center for Documentary Studies again, later this month or early in March.

My proposal for group is to start by following the eight thematic classes produced by Bill Bland of Britain's Communist League in the early 70's and some of Alliance's added suggested readings. After this we could either go deeper into some of the readings, look at modern issues like national questions in this country or why the USSR fell (what were the economic and political reasons?), or discuss non-Marxist, but possibly informative books like "What's the Matter With Kansas?" or whatever participants suggest.

The first course is on the evolution of society (the theory of historical materialism). The readings I propose are sections I and III of the Communist Manifesto (pages 482-496 and 506-517) , Sections I and II of Engels' The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State (pages 134-190), and Chapter 4 Section II (pages 105-132) of A Short History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolshevik), a theortical section. I probably haven't read the Engels reading before, so that will be new to me.

Is this too much reading? Unless we focus on the readings, just reading the Manifesto might be enough for the discussion. The courses have a question and answer format focusing on basics, rather than directly focusing on readings. Alliance recommends the Marx2Mao site for readings these works online, which I am told is now available from a European mirror site. The Marxist Internet Archive might also be useful.