Social Inequality In Charles Johnson's Exchange Value

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Charles Johnson, in his philosophical fable “Exchange Value” traces the cause of social inequality by illustrating two African American brothers, Cooter and Loftis’ fateful tragedy. Influenced by James Coleman, Jonathan Little, and Asraf Rushdy’s previous work, Linda Ferguson Selzer draws Karl Marx’s theory of commodity fetishism in her analysis of Johnson’s short story. In “Charles Johnson’s ‘Exchange Value’: Signifying on Marx” (2001), Selzer explains that under capitalism, the society praises the “exchange value” of an object over its “use value”, thus compelling one to prioritize his pursuit of objects at the expense of freedom, morality, or even life (Marx 126). Likewise, in Lauren Berlant’s “Cruel Optimism”, the brothers become excessively obsessed with the “promises” of wealth, so that instead of spending the money for the betterment of life, they “hoard against death” (Berlant 41). …show more content…

According to Selzer, Cooter thinks that Miss Bailey’s inheritance of her master’s wealth has been “misappropriated”, because “she didn’t earn it” (260). This indicates that exploitation is ultimately the reign over minds, in which the victims inherently agree with the capitalism theory so that they experience inequality without awareness. Nevertheless, while echoing Marx’s theory, Berlant concludes that the possession of large wealth creates a dilemma between choosing one’s “habituated life” and the unknown future that is “yet to be invented” (37). The lack of cultural capital minimizes people’s capacity of ownership, thus the possession of wealth alone will not change the state of living for poor people, because it is “too alive”

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