Reading Groups
Sign up for Summer 2026 Reading Groups
Welcome! In Summer 2026, Metro DC DSA and its Political Education Working Group are excited to host 13 different reading groups on 13 different topics—and we’d love for you to join! Reading groups provide an opportunity to share learning and political education in a group setting, allowing members and supporters’ organizing and knowledge to develop alongside comrades.
Most (but not all) reading groups will be held in-person, and all groups have scheduled multiple in-person social meet ups and the option to meet online. Some groups are topic-driven and read a series of articles, while others are focused on a specific book. All meetings will be held in the evenings except where specified. No experience or knowledge is necessary before entering any group -and all readings and materials will be made available online or electronically for free! There are 3 groups that are monthly and ongoing and will keep convening far beyond this specific semester–these groups are still accepting new members. The others are now closed.
See below for descriptions and links to various syllabi/calendars for upcoming reading groups. You can sign up for groups at the link below:
Reading Groups Listed by Meeting Day/Time
- Sundays
- Capital Vol. 1 Reading Group
- Political Economy Reading Group: Cycles of Hegemony
- How Zohran Won: Electoral Strategy for the 21st Century Reading Group
- Mondays
- New Magazine Essays: Metro DC DSA Discussion Club
- Tuesdays
- Artificial Intelligence and Capitalism Reading Group: A Socialist Critique of AI
- Black Jacobins Reading Group
- Wednesdays
- Critical Theory Study Group: Adorno’s Minima Moralia
- Global Poetry Reading Group
- Labor and Organizing Articles Monthly Reading Group
- Thursdays
- Burnout Reading Group: The Experience of Political Defeat
- No Cop City, No Cop World Reading Group
- The Socialist Manifesto Reading Group
- Saturdays
- DSA TV Club: Policing, Race, and Superheroes in HBO’s Watchmen
Sundays
The Capital Vol. 1 Reading Group is a reading group that will read and discuss a key work to understand the capitalist society we live in: Capital Vol. 1, written by Karl Marx. Based in the DC area, the Reading Group will read the classic work that touches on labor, exploitation, the working day, surplus populations, and other issues that haunt capitalist society to this day. The groups will combine online meetings with in-person social meet ups throughout a regular reading schedule. Group members will have the choice between the new translation from Paul Reitter and Paul North or the ‘classic’ 1976 translation from Ben Fowkes. This group will last longer than others, going until September.
Political Economy Reading Group: Cycles of Hegemony
The Political Economy Reading Group will read and discuss Giovanni Arrighi’s famous works, The Long Twentieth Century and sections from Adam Smith in Beijing. Using the results of the French Annales School, Arrighi expands on one hypothesis Marx sketches in Capital Vol. 1 for the emergence of the Capitalist Mode of Production. He presents a relation between Market and State, where during certain periods of time, capitalist factions in one State come to lead not only their State, but the whole of the capitalist class across the growing world-market. This leadership, defined as “Hegemony”, goes through rises and falls and passes from one capitalist class faction to another, eventually landing in the hands of the ruling elite of the United States. We will ask, based on current events, what is happening to that Hegemony and what the future Hegemony will look like (and if a certain State will take the role many wish for it to take).
The group will meet weekly in an in-person setting on Sunday afternoons, and will hold in-person social events around the DMV.
How Zohran Won: Electoral Strategy for the 21st Century Reading Group
The How Zohran Won: Electoral Strategy for the 21st Century Reading Group will read a collection of essays, reports, and blog posts unpacking DSA’s electoral strategy. We will compare different chapters and organizations approaches to electoral politics and explore questions such as: Why do we engage in elections in the first place? How can we make strategic decisions about candidates we work with to advance our goals? What lessons can we learn from past electoral involvement both in our chapter and other chapters? This is a great group to join if you feel like there is never enough time during endorsement season to dive deep on these questions. The group will meet 4 times from June to August.
Mondays
New Magazine Essays: Metro DC DSA Discussion Club
The New Magazine Essays Discussion Club meets in person in DC to discuss new essays from some of the Left’s most thought-provoking magazines. This is not like the rest of the reading groups—it’s a ~monthly club that has held meetings already and will continue meeting after the semester. 📚 During each meeting, the Club will discuss 3 essays from the latest issue of a featured magazine (like n+1, The Drift, Parapraxis, and more) that produces thought-provoking radical work regularly. 👋 All are welcome, and there are no requirements to attend! We’ll provide digital copies of all readings. 🗓️ The group doesn’t have a fixed schedule, but we’ll try to meet about once a month. 📬 To join our email list, fill out Metro DC DSA’s reading group signup form.
Tuesdays
Artificial Intelligence and Capitalism Reading Group: A Socialist Critique of AI
The Artificial Intelligence and Capitalism Reading Group will explore how the newfound hype around “artificial intelligence” fits into the broader history of how capitalism justifies itself and subjects labor. The group will read Matteo Pasquinelli’s recent Eye of the Master: A Social History of Artificial Intelligence and discuss the relationship between “AI” and capitalism’s need to monitor, subject, and degrade workers’ labor. The group will meet online on Tuesday nights and will have an in-person social.
The Black Jacobins Reading Group will introduce readers to the seminal work of CLR James, and the Haitian Revolution, Black Jacobins: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo Revolution. Furthermore, the group will provide historical context for the Haitian Revolution and what lessons can be learned from this historic moment for radicals looking to change society. The group will meet online on Tuesday nights and will have regular socials in-person.
Wednesdays
Critical Theory Study Group: Adorno’s Minima Moralia
Known for other works like Dialectic of Enlightenment (co-authored with Max Horkheimer), German-Jewish critical theorist Theodor Adorno wrote Minima Moralia: Reflections from Damaged Life during the period from 1944 to 1947, when he was living in exile in the United States. Minima Moralia is a collection of 153 short aphorisms about how fascism and the “administered world” have pervaded modern life, from the realm of the everyday to that of high culture. In reading through this challenging but rewarding text, we will get to know Adorno a bit better as a thinker and see what relevance some of the questions he asked have in the present. How is it possible to philosophize in late capitalism? What is the value of negativity for leftist politics? Is slamming doors fascist?
Although we will be reading a somewhat difficult text, this group is open to everyone. Please feel free to join even if you have no experience with Adorno or Frankfurt School critical theory. This will be a collaborative learning experience where we all help each other along and learn from each other as much as from the text. The group will meet on Zoom on Wednesday evenings and will have regular socials in-person.
Global Poetry Reading Group
The Global Poetry Reading Group will read and discuss selections from around the world by anti-colonial, Leftist, and socialist poets. At times, poets will virtually join us to enlighten us about their works. Each month, we will explore a different region, group of people, or a specific poet. Participants can expect to read poems from the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico; Native Americans; Sudanese people; murdered Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer; and disabled people, among others. This Reading Group is ongoing and will continue to meet when summer reading groups end. Poems will be provided ahead of our monthly meetings. We will periodically meet in person to celebrate poetry and the hope of a better world.
Labor and Organizing Articles Monthly Reading Group
The Labor and Organizing Reading Group will meet in-person monthly to discuss new articles about labor campaigns, organizing strategy, and the state of working class organizing. The reading group is geared toward people active in their union, active in a labor campaign, or active in the DC labor movement. The reading group will read from magazines such as Long Haul, Labor Notes, and other publications doing movement-informed labor writing.
Thursdays
Burnout Reading Group: The Experience of Political Defeat
The Burnout Reading Group will explore how political setbacks register emotionally for those trying to create a better world and how it affects their view of political change going forward. The group will read Hannah Proctor’s recent book Burn Out: The Emotional Experience of Political Defeat and discuss its case studies of exiled French communards, Bolsheviks after the revolution, civil rights and feminist movement veterans, and much more. The group will connect advocates’ experience with burn out to the book’s history and theory. The group will meet online on Thursday nights and will have regular socials in-person.
No Cop City, No Cop World Reading Group
The No Cop City, No Cop World Reading Group will read and discuss the recent book by abolitionist advocates No Cop City, No Cop World. The book is a collection of essays from the Stop Cop City movement in Atlanta. The reading group will reflect on the strategy chosen by Atlanta residents to oppose a police training center and the counterreaction by the city’s power structure. We will consider the struggles and outcome in Atlanta and what it can teach us about the movement to abolish policing in DC. The group will host read-aloud sessions on Wednesday nights, meet online for discussion on Thursday nights, and host regular socials in-person.
The Socialist Manifesto Reading Group
The Socialist Manifesto Reading Group will read Bhaskar Sunkara’s recent book The Socialist Manifesto and discuss its contents over 10 meetings. The group will cover what constitutes a systemic change versus reform, how electoral strategies fit with the goal of systematic change, whether Democratic Socialism can be created through Revolution, why leftist and liberal governments come and go, what part will the labor movement play in the movement, who constitutes our side in this struggle, and more. The group will meet 10 times in-person around Northern Virginia.
Saturdays
DSA TV Club: Policing, Race, and Superheroes in HBO’s Watchmen
The DSA TV Club: Policing, Race, and Superheroes will watch episodes of HBO’s TV series Watchmen and read an accompanying article on it, then discuss the two. The show explores racial violence and the 1921 Tulsa Massacre along with policing while fitting into Alan Moore’s classic Watchmen. The group is sponsored by the Abolition Working Group. The group will meet in person on Saturday afternoons.
If you’re interested in what we’ve read previously or are looking for facilitation or community guideline resources for your own reading group, you can check out our resources page. If you have any questions about MDC DSA political education you can email us at politicaleducation@mdcdsa.org.