We begin with the Chinese Revolution in 1930, after the nationalist party led by Chiang Kai Shek turned on the mass movement, slaughtered militant workers and peasants, and declared war on Communists. After the war, the struggle between the armies of Chiang Kai Shek and the Communists resumed, ending with Chiang's fleeing to Taiwan and the final victory of the Communist army in 1949.

This reading group will undertake a close reading (over 10 weeks) of Costas Lapavitsas and Makoto Itoh’s book Political Economy of Money and Finance. The book attempts to offer a systematic theoretical examination of money and finance by re-examining the classical foundations of political economy and the creator of money and assessing all of the important theoretical schools since then, including Marxist, Keynesian, post-Keynesian and monetarist thinkers.

In Styron's novel and in the response from 10 African-American writers, numerous questions concerning race, class, the rendering of historical presentation, claims on sectors of our shared history, etc. are raised. We will discuss as many of these questions as possible including having a careful read of James Baldwin’s essay concerning the work and subsequent controversy.