About the lecture

In this lecture, we turn to two twentieth-century thinkers who worked in the Marxist tradition to explore the concepts of hegemony, ideology and religion – Louis Althusser (1918-90) and Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937), focusing in particular on: (i) the life and times of both Althusser and Gramsci, including the importance in both men's lives of the Catholic church; (ii) the concept of repressive state apparatuses (RSAs) and ideological state apparatuses (ISAs); (iii) Gramsci's view that ideology was not a passive reflection of state power, but an active force in its own right; (iv) Gramsci's writings on hegemony, and his view that the dominant class relied on aligning itself with "the general interests of the subordinate groups" in order to stay in power; and (v) the relation to all of this to religion.

About the lecturer

Dr Paul-François Tremlett is a Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies at The Open University. He is interested in theory and method in Religious Studies, and, as well as ethnographic research in the Philippines, has conducted research in Hong Kong and London on the Occupy movement.