The Death of Stuart Hall

I've just heard that Stuart Hall has died. I can't write an obituary. But what I can do is say how influential he has been and continues to be, throughout all of my academic, cultural and political thinking. He was the first thing I ever knew of 'cultural studies'. His work was the first I read. I still cite him and quote him in my ongoing work.

If you look at virtually anything I have ever published, Stuart Hall is there. My first book, of interviews  was organised by questions and problematics I'd formulated thanks to him. My first monograph, Post-Marxism Versus Cultural Studies, was literally, explicitly, organised by his work. My next one, Deconstructing Popular Culture, kicks off with epigraphs from Hall and runs with them. My first and my second books on Bruce Lee are permeated with his insights. My book on Rey Chow begins with a discussion of his work. My many criticisms of Zizek, my work on Rancière  my thinking about disciplinarity, and the relations between academic work and politics, even my thinking about 'martial arts studies', is all steeped in Stuart Hall's ideas. Everything.

So, I think we shouldn't simply threnodise Stuart Hall. Rather, we need to acknowledge how important he has been, and continues to be, by returning to the problematics he helped to articulate. None of it is finished yet.