Marxism in the Age of Social Media
Abstract
This article argues that Marxism must confront social media as a historically novel terrain of ideological formation rather than interpret it through categories inherited unchanged from earlier forms of mass communication. Garrido contends that Marxism is fundamentally a living and adaptive method whose vitality depends upon the concrete study of changing social conditions, and he criticizes contemporary Marxist dogmatism for substituting inherited conclusions for creative analysis. Drawing on Louis Althusser’s theory of ideological state apparatuses, Antonio Gramsci’s conception of hegemony, Henri Bergson’s reflections on technology, and contemporary theories of profilicity, the article advances the thesis that social media has become the dominant ideological apparatus of the present, profoundly shaping subjectivity, habits, political consciousness, and aesthetic sensibility. The article further critiques the failure of Marxist scholarship to adequately theorize social media, attributing this neglect partly to the institutional pressures of academic specialization and partly to a dismissive attitude toward digital content creation. Garrido argues that serious analysis of the medium requires practical participation in its forms and rhythms. Reflecting on his own experience as a content creator, he also revises aspects of Georg Lukács’s critique of irrationalism, emphasizing the importance of embodied, intuitive, affective, and pre-reflective dimensions of human experience. Social media communication, he argues, operates powerfully within this intuitive register, making questions of presentation, aesthetics, emotion, and cultural attunement indispensable to contemporary political struggle. The article concludes that Marxists must develop experimental and flexible forms of communication capable of contesting ideological hegemony in the digital sphere while remaining grounded in communist principles and political aims.
Keywords
Digital Culture, Hegemony, Ideology, Marxism, Social Media
