Fetishism

[Essential Insignificance]

The Fetishism of Commodities

What is meant by fetishism, in relation to Marxian terminology? Most will conclude from the usage of the word fetishism: being excessively preoccupied with consumer goods or material possessions in general. This is, in orientation to Marxian terminology strictly false; however, I think it would acceptable to use the word fetishism to explain the above.

"Simply in the fact that the commodity reflects the social characteristics of peoples own labour as objective characteristics of the products of labour themselves, as socio-natural properties of these things, hence also the social relations of the producers to the sum total of labour as a social relation between objects which exist apart from the producers…It is just definite social relation between people themselves which assume her, for them, the phantasmagoric form of a relation between things." Karl Marx

Thereby, the above denotes the depiction of characteristics of material items which they have by virtue, of their being the terms of social relations as intrinsic, natural bodies.

Marx has listed two focal cases of this.

There are, in few words. The fetishism consists of;

1. Primarily, that the social labour that produces use-values is represented as an intrinsic property of them.

2. It consists in the fact that the behavior of commodities, which stems from the relation between different individual labours, is stemming from the relation between the objects themselves.

Representation

Proposition 1. A mode of representation which is practically lucid in the case of money.

Proposition 2. In particular, their market behavior.

I could (try) go on explaining the peculiarities; but I feel as if I am not quite at that level yet.

Any questions, ask away.

[Valkyrie]

good post!

In lay terms, it means that the producers relationship to the commodity is within the characteristics of the commodity itself, it's fetishes,(ex. water -the labor of bottling water, it's label, marketing, profit, etc ) rather than it's main purpose, i.e. use-value, that of need for water. and wage and exploited labor is concealed within those properties of cash-value, rather than in the value of labor employed from it and implies a social relationship between those things.

Atleast that is how I understand it in my own simple-minded way.

[Essential Insignificance]

The question of the "fetishism of commodities" recourses back to what makes a commodity an commodity.

That the use-value, produced by concrete, private labour—human labour-power, which is exchanged with comparable use-values—which thereby the labour-power expended into the product comes under the "banner" of social labour and the relation of the labour to the sum total becomes manifest.