Making Political Theory Accessible

One of the challenges of any Crash Course is how to make the erudite accessible. Want to learn about genetics? Dr. Sammy will explain it through kittens. Trying to understand plant taxonomy? Let Alexis Nikole tell you about collectible plush plants.

But when it came to Crash Course Political Theory, that roadblock met us around practically every corner. Take a concept like dialectical materialism, Karl Marx’s bread and butter. It’s heady stuff! Entire textbooks have been written about it! There’s probably a roomful of philosophy grad students out there right now, unpacking it. And we’ve got about two minutes to make it make sense. 

Turns out, explaining dialectical materialism requires the dialectic… and materials. (Not to be confused with dialectical materialism. You’ll have to watch the episode for that explainer!) 

The editorial team is all about the dialectic: talking about different ideas until they synthesize into new ones. And the production team thinks about the literal materials we’ll use to illustrate those ideas. Which, in this case, was 17 coffee mugs. 

We figured that before our host, Ellie Anderson, delved into these incredibly robust philosophical ideas, she was gonna need some caffeine. Which becomes a recurring bit throughout the series — and gives viewers time to catch their breath, too. And because the amount of caffeine is equivalent to the nebulousness of the topic, dialectical materialism required A LOT of coffee.