Talkin' Bout Capitalism - Mark Fisher

Provenance

Self-transcribed from the recording's audio/video with Whisper ASR, then drawn from the frozen curation of the CCRU oral archive. The identifiers below fingerprint the exact source transcript files.

Listen

Adjudicated APPROVED 2026-07-11 (basis: owner ruling 2026-07-11: institutional recordings released except fee-charging course content; lane recent-institutional -> recent-institutional-released). Series: standalone. Source: audio original (.mp3).

Timestamped map

These jump targets come from timestamps preserved in the source transcript, so they work as navigational anchors rather than editorially invented section labels. Timings are approximate — they mark where a passage begins, not exact word timing.

• 00:00:00

  Okay, so we're ready to start and I'm really pleased to introduce you to Mark Fisher. Mark Fisher teaches Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths College. The title of today's talk is Capitalism and the Realist Capitalism. Capitalist Realism. Gosh, we've been talking about it up until now. Capitalist Realism and the slow…

• 00:10:57

  That interaction could happen. Because at that time... Art schools were where... You know, working class... Youth would go... You know, to have access... To resources of high culture. But I guess what was... Also significant about that moment... Was that then these... These... Members of the working class... Who…

• 00:21:00

  And a new representation of that present in, you know, in culture. You know, I think we're, those examples apart that I mentioned just now, we're really missing this capacity to articulate the present. In lots of ways, then, that means we don't really have a present anymore. That's because, you know, our experience…

• 00:30:12

  Um, and I think part of the significance of, um, you know, the, the upper-rightist thinkers, uh, Mario Tronti, et cetera, was to a positive first, um, first the movement towards communism. And first, you know, the, uh, the, uh, uh, agency of workers. And second, capitalism as a response to, as, as a response…

• 00:39:57

  Um, and, um, I think that how this has, has, the 80s was the key battleground, I think, then, when, um, when this combination of neoliberalism and neoconservativism, uh, won hegemony. You know, uh, one, uh, kind of ideological, one, one of the, one of the struggle for what would count as dominant reality now. Um…

• 00:49:27

  So they, one, there's two things in there. One, they build them so they'll collapse after a certain amount of time. Two, um, the nature of constantly updating technology means they don't want to function anymore. Um, all, you know, we're always being forced to upgrade or update, uh, our formats. And, uh, as we know…

• 00:58:04

  The effect of marketisation, so-called pseudo-marketisation, is one in which the, the, the, the, the, deprives, let's say, lecturers of confidence. Um, because you, they feel that situation's precarious, that, you, you, to constantly be marketing ourselves, market our programs in order to get them to compete for these…

• 01:07:24

  And I think that this is in those conditions when we're constantly assailed by these chains of urgencies it's no wonder that we don't have the capacity to absorb ourselves either in the production of the new or in the absorption of the new either. And that's where I'd like to sort of end it. All right. Somewhat good.