The ever-spectacular Modern Times bookstore in San Francisco has chosen AK Press as its “Indie Press of the Month” for January 2009. Besides demonstrating their good taste, this means they’ll be sponsoring two events on our behalf in the upcoming weeks. The first, we decided, will be a party—a chance for AK collective members, authors (past and future), allies, and pals to get together for the sheer fun of it. The second will be a screening of our new DVD, Shutdown: The Rise and Fall of Direct Action to Stop the War. Hope to see you at both!
Here are the details:
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Friday, January 16th: AK PRESS PARTY!
Modern Times Bookstore, 888 Valencia Street, San Francisco
7PM, Free
Join AK authors, editors, collective members, friends, and comrades in a celebration of AK Press Publishing! We’ll hear from Diana Block (Arm the Spirit), representatives from Critical Resistance (Abolition Now!), David Solnit (The Battle of the Story of the Battle of Seattle), Chris Duncan (My First Time), Brian Awehali (Tipping the Sacred Cow), Jeff Conant (Poetics of Resistance), Barry Pateman (editor of Chomsky on Anarchism and contributor to many, many books!), and many more. Refreshments provided … it’s a party after all!
On March 20, 2003—the day after the (most recent) Iraq war started—San Francisco was brought to a grinding halt by thousands of activists who occupied the streets to oppose the war. It was a mass uprising that forced the police to declare the financial district “shut down.” The planning and outreach coordinated by Direct Action to Stop the War (DASW), filled downtown San Francisco with approximately 15,000 people clogging traffic, stopping business as usual, communicating with passersby, and creating a pandemonium that lasted for several days. But neither DASW nor the mass resistance outlasted Iraq’s occupation.
Shutdown is an action-packed documentary chronicling how DASW successfully organized effort to shut down a major US city and how they failed to effectively maintain the organization to fight the war machine and end the occupation of Iraq.
Created by organizers involved with DASW, Shutdown combines detailed information on organizing for a mass action, critical interviews on organizing pitfalls, and the wisdom of hindsight. It is a must-see film for those engaged in the continuous struggle toward social justice.
*Join us (and the filmmakers!) for the first public screening of this new release from AK Press Video.*
Anarchists have been avid translators since the nineteenth century and our fondness for it is one of the reasons why our movement has always been so multicultural and international. French to Chinese, Italian to Yiddish, German to Turkish, Spanish to English . . . these are just some of the linguistic crossroads that anarchists have traveled.
Although there will never be a substitute for lived, practical experience with a language, changes in information technologies — the development of the internet, principally — have made translation a far less arduous process than it once was. Online dictionaries and databases, and the ease with which one can reach out to others across the globe, greatly reduce the cultural, grammatical, and lexical challenges that any good translator must face.
Not surprisingly, on the basis of the new technologies, anarchists have been innovators in the development of decentralized, participatory translation strategies. For those interested, below I will list four online resources that I have found valuable (although surely there are many others . . . and I encourage anyone who knows of any to post comments to this post).
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Radical Translator’s Email List — This list is a place for translators to ask questions about idiomatic expressions, grammatical problems, legal concerns, and even job opportunities. The list has a very low volume of activity and most discussions focus on the Spanish/English nexus. For more info, go here: http://www.negations.net/radical-translators-discussion-list/
Notas Rojas — The purpose of this list, according to its organizers, “is to work on collective translations of material from and about radical social movements as well as left theory, in order to contribute in our small way to the circulation of struggles and building relationships across the borders of languages and states. At the moment the list focuses primarily on translation from English into Spanish, but is open to other translation as well.” For more information, see: https://lists.riseup.net/www/info/notasrojas
Radical translators: resources & discussion — This php forum is a place for radical translators to discuss and help each with translation-related issues: to discuss ways to translate a difficult passage, share tips about helpful tools, post information about job opportunities, or anything else that could make translation easier and more enjoyable. The focus is on Spanish/English translation, but those working in other languages are welcome and encouraged to participate. See: http://www.negations.net/forum/
On December 6, an Athens cop shot and killed a young unarmed anarchist, Alexis Grigoropoulos. In a matter of hours, Athens exploded in a mass uprising of anarchists, students, migrant workers, and the unemployed. For over two weeks, in their anger and frustration, they attacked not just the police themselves but the oppressive institutions cops are armed to defend: banks, government buildings, multi-national corporate interests. Not since 1968 had Europe seen such militant and targeted mass direct action, and actions around the world echoed the heroic actions of our comrades in Greece. Not far from where I am writing, in San Francisco, solidarity actions were held and moving speeches given decrying police violence and the state capitalist hierarchies such violence is inevitably in service of, and vowing to “bring the fight home.”
Sadly, the fight has, once again, come home. On New Years Day in Oakland, an unarmed butcher and father from Hayward, Oscar Grant, was shot in the back at point blank range by a transit cop after being pinned face-down on the ground. There can be absolutely no justification for this cold-blooded police murder. As was the case in the murder of Alexis, there are several witnesses who have come forward stating the officer was in no danger, some even with video recordings of the atrocity. Predictably, though, the cop who fired the shot, Johannes Mehserle, has not been arrested or even officially interrogated about the incident. This is no surprise; we know how the authorities will respond (or fail to), given their total disregard for the lives and humanity of working and poor people of color.
But how will we respond?
We are loudly indignant when police kill a militant in Athens, and applaud the just and outraged response of his comrades. We are furious when state violence kills oppressed people in Gaza, as is horrifically happening at this moment. But what do we do when a working class black man is murdered in cold blood by the cops in our own community? Do we value the lives and well being of Palestinians and Greeks and Oaxacans and adventurous middle-class white radicals more than those of working people we see every day in our own neighborhoods?
It has been five days and counting since Oscar was killed. What have we—supposed radicals and would-be revolutionaries—actually done?
Perhaps a better question is, how should we combat police violence in our own communities?
Below is a video of the killing (the woman who filmed it eventually comes onscreen to explain what you’re seeing…about halfway through). You can also check out the Indymedia story for more details.
AK Press denounces all current, past, and future massacres waged upon the Palestinian people at the hands of the U.S. supported Israeli state. We find the recent attacks on Gaza absolutely abhorrent and beyond any measure of justification. We support the Palestinian people in their struggle to live in peace and dignity, free from the physical, mental, and spiritual violence caused by occupation.
In dignity,
The AK Press Collective
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Please take a few minutes to read through the following links. We encourage you to post any relevant links/information in the comments section of our blog.
Jalan Journal is an independent journal written by a multiracial collective of activists who work toward the liberation of Asian peoples from the forces of racism, empire and neo-colonialism.
Asians are Pakistani, Iraqi, Afghani, Korean, Cambodian, Chinese, Palestinians and countless other faces. We are gender-bending men and women, queer and straight. We are fierce and loving. We are what the racists fear. Many of us are also here in the United States. This journal seeks to promote discussion and provide linkages, to remember the past so as to build for the future. We hope to discuss the struggles of Asian-American peoples in the United States from an anti-racist and democratic perspective in order to build solidarity among our communities and with working folks in Asia. We combat the historical and political roots of the model minority myth that has functioned to divide Asians from other working class people of color, both in the US and internationally. We also critically oppose the statist and oppressive versions of pan-Asian liberation found in Maoism, Bandungism and the Japanese empire of yesteryear. Today, a new vision is our only option, nourished by everyday struggles for freedom and democracy that Asian peoples wage in the family, at work, in their neighborhoods, and schools. From the relentless Intifadas of Palestinians pushing up against apartheid, to the jam-packed streets of the 2005 Hong Kong WTO protests exploding with fierce South Korean farmers, Filipino activists and Japanese anarchists, we are in action. A new society all around us is breaking out! (read more from our Mission statement)
Editorials:
* Asians Against White Supremacy: On the origins of anti-Asian racism and how we have fought back
* Stop Dividing the Korean nation: A vision of unity from below
Articles:
* Rebel Desis of the Hip Hop generation
* ¡Ya Basta! Reflections on Asian and Latino workers in the immigrant rights movement
* Retrieving an Asian American Anarchist Tradition
Book Review:
* Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution
[Editor’s Note: Kate Khatib joined AK Press about six months ago. We were really happy when she applied for the job—since we already knew her (some, by reputation; others, as a friend and comrade) to be a conscientious, diligent, and very hard-working part of the anarchist movement. Not surprisingly, she’s turned out to be a great asset to our collective, and we’re pleased to provide the following introduction for those of you who don’t know her.]
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My name is Kate, and, as of this past July, I’m a new member of the AK Press team, where I handle the marketing and publicity for our published titles … so if anybody out there is interested in reviewing an AK Press book, email me and we’ll set something up!
By way of history, I was born in Florida, moved to a teensy coal-mining town in upstate Pennsylvania, spent the better part of my pre-teen and teen years in a teensy town in Kentucky, and fled to the big city – Philadelphia, in this case – as soon as I could. I’m always surprised when I hear that campus activism was “dead” until the new SDS started kicking again … I just don’t think anybody was paying attention. We had a great radical community in Philadelphia that was a pretty unique blend of students, community activists, and other assorted folks, and we organized around the Gulf War, around the Mumia struggle, and around community rights issues pretty much constantly. But the focus was largely infrastructural – building better communities, developing the kinds of social, political, and material networks that helped to ease the burden of day-to-day life in a depressed world. It was also very local in a lot of ways, and that’s really what led me to develop an interest in anarchism, which I see as being very much about the importance of building strong local communities that are linked with a larger distributed network of like-minded projects and places.
In 2000, disgusted with the U.S. after the RNC in Philly that summer, I headed to Amsterdam where I spent three years going to grad school and working in autonomous and squatted social centers, running an infocafe on the weekends where we gave out free breakfast and lunch and offered squatting advisory services, and programming a series of political avant-garde films at the former home of the Netherlands Film Academy, which is now a reclaimed autonomous space, Overtoom 301, that houses a cinema, performance spaces, living spaces, and a rockin’ vegan cafe.
I headed back to the States in 2003, to take up a doctoral position at Johns Hopkins (I’m still writing my dissertation on American Surrealism), and ended up helping to found Red Emma’s Bookstore Coffeehouse, a collectively-owned and operated radical bookstore and fair-trade cafe in Baltimore that’s been at the center of my life and of my political development for the past six years.
I’m incredibly thrilled to be a part of the AK team these days – AK was an important part of my political development in the mid-90s as a West Philly anarchist and surrealist. I remember the first time AK’s massive print catalog found its way into the Philadelphia Radical Surrealist Front (a West Philly group house with an awesome porch and a nifty purple flag out in front): what a revelation! There were sections on anarchist AND on surrealism! And later, when we started Red Emma’s, AK was a huge inspiration for us – it was proof that a collective business can exist, can function, and can thrive, and that workplaces don’t have to be exploitative cesspools in order to survive. And, in true movement form, the folks at AK were incredibly supportive of us when we were starting out, offering advice, a helping hand, and general moral support, in addition to a massive catalog of books with which we could fill our shelves! I hope that AK will continue to encourage a network of solidarity between autonomous, anti-authoritarian, and anarchist places and projects in the years to come – I know I’ll continue to make that a priority in my work with the collective.
Otherwise, I continue to work on Red Emma’s (I’m based in Baltimore) and its sister project 2640 (4,000 glorious square feet of an old church that we run as a radical events & arts venue), and I organize the Mid-Atlantic Radical Bookfair and a variety of other events, including the upcoming City From Below conference, scheduled for March 27-29. I also frequently work with the Chicago Surrealist Group and the Charles H. Kerr Company, the nation’s oldest, continuously-running labor press, distributed by AK Press! I write articles, rants, manifestos, and other cogitations on the contemporary relevance of surrealist praxis and on the Benjaminian approach to dialectical materialism when I have time, and I’m a contributing editor to Steampunk Magazine, a fantastic journal that’s working hard to put the punk back into steampunk.
This fall AK Press’s UK branch released Volume One of An Anarchist FAQ. Below, Iain McKay’s Introduction provides the history and logic of the internet phenomenon cum published set. We’re proud to provide this one-of-a-kind resource for new and old comrades alike. Many excellent works provide entry points for those curious about anarchism (Berkman’s What is Anarchism?; Meltzer’s Anarchism: Arguments for and Against; Goldman’s Anarchism and Other Essays; and Guérin’s Anarchism: From Theory to Practice, to name a few) and An AFAQwill undoubtedly find its place alongside these great books. And just as we return to the classic works for new insight, so too will we come back time and time again to An Anarchist FAQ for a reasoned and informed discussion on anarchist thought, theory, and practice.
It is now ten years since “An Anarchist FAQ” (AFAQ) was officially released. A lot has happened over that time, unfortunately finishing it has not been one of them!
Over that decade, AFAQ has changed considerably. It was initially conceived as a energy-saving device to stop anarchists having to continually make the same points against claims that “anarcho”-capitalism was a form of anarchism. As would be expected, the quality of the initial versions and sections were pretty mixed. Most of it was extremely good (even if we do say so ourselves!) and has required little change over the decade (mostly we have built upon and expanded the original material). A few bits were less good and have been researched more and rewritten. We have also, of course, made mistakes and corrected them when we have been informed about them or have discovered them ourselves. In general, though, our initial work has stood up well and while we were occasionally wrong on a few details, the general thrust of even these areas has been proven correct. Overall, our aim to produce an FAQ which reflected the majority of anarchist thought, both currently and historically from an international perspective, has been a success as shown by the number of mirrors, links and translations AFAQ has seen (being published by AK Press confirms this).
Since the official release, AFAQ has changed. When we released it back in 1996, we had already decided to make it a FAQ about anarchism rather than an FAQ on why anarchism is anti-capitalist. However, the first versions still bore the marks of its origins. We realised that this limited it somewhat and we have slowly revised the AFAQ so that it has become a resource about anarchism (indeed, if it were to be started again the section on “anarcho”-capitalism would be placed into an appendix, where it belongs). This means that the aim of AFAQ has changed. I would say that it has two related goals:
1. To present the case for anarchism, to convince people they should become anarchists.
2. To be a resource for existing anarchists, to use to bolster their activism and activities by presenting facts and arguments to allow them to defend anarchism against those opposed to it (Marxists, capitalists, etc.).
[Editor’s Note: Charles Weigl is a long-standing member of the AK collective. We post this brief, autobiographical statement from him in order to share some of the reasons why we’re glad he’s here, and to help readers of this blog learn more about those who enable AK to function from day-to-day. We plan to publish biographies of other collective members in the near future.]
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My exciting career in anarchism started in the New York punk scene in the late 1970s. I spent long hours in the library researching all the “anarchy” stuff I kept hearing about in lyrics and liner notes. Along with Marx, who a high school teacher turned me on to, anarchism helped my teenaged self make sense of the world in which I grew up: a rapidly decaying working-class area on the north shore of Staten Island. Third generation born in the same neighborhood, I was raised more or less in the shadow of the Rheingold brewery where my grandfather worked for forty years. By the time I came along, the neighborhood was sinking fast. The shipyards had mostly closed by the time I was born, the brewery some years later—both departing for sunnier, non-union climes. Anarchism gave me a framework for understanding the resulting ravages.
My work history is all over the place—truck driver, furniture mover, bartender, cabbie, office drone, professor, editor, freight elevator operator—but anarchism has been a constant part of my life, since I first learned about it. AK is the third anarchist “job” I’ve had, in the sense of being lucky enough to find a way to develop and spread anarchist ideas while earning a little to help pay the rent.
In the mid-eighties, I taught at Tolstoy College, an anarchist academic unit at the State University of New York/Buffalo. Yes, that’s right: anarchists receiving salaries from a state university (courtesy of a student strike fifteen years earlier that demanded, among other things, that SUNY fund an anarchist college). Unfortunately, I was the last instructor hired and Tolstoy College folded soon thereafter. From 1987 to 1990, I was part of the Left Bank Books collective in Seattle…which is still going strong.
My political activity is about as varied as my work history. It started with opposing draft registration in the 1970s. Since then, I’ve worked on everything from Central American solidarity issues, to housing struggles, to the successful unionization of graduate student employees at SUNY.
I’ve been part of AK Press for almost six years, first as a volunteer, then as full-time collective member. Soon after I moved to the Bay Area, I showed up at the famous (to me at least) AK warehouse to volunteer and was put to work editing manuscripts and transcribing lectures. More than half a decade later, I can honestly say that being at AK has involved some of the hardest and most fulfilling work I’ve ever done. It ain’t easy keeping the presses rolling, but it’s been wonderful being part of such a vitally important project. Anarchists have always been big on publishing propaganda, but one difference between today and, say, 1917 or 1936 is the huge potential for communication in various forms. If we don’t want to make the same mistakes we’ve historically made, if we want to deepen and expand the existing anti-authoritarian elements within the broader left and help move it in a more revolutionary direction, we need to get historical, theoretical, and practical information into as many hands as possible. At no other time in history has it been possible to let so many people know what anarchism means, to strengthen and sharpen the discussion among people who already accept that label, and to help the wider “movement” avoid the authoritarian and electoral traps that have crippled it in the past.
I hope to continue my association with AK Press well into my (rapidly approaching) old age.
The publishers describe the book as follows: “From Peter Kropotkin to Pierre Clastres, passing through Marcel Mauss or Radcliffe-Brown, an enigmatic link has connected anarchism and anthropology. Today, a species of “anarchist anthropology” is emerging within efforts to defend non-hegemonic anthropologies. This book assembles contributions from diverse anthropologists touching on disparate topics in which libertarian thought has had an influence. Authors include Brian Morris, Abel Al Jende, Harold Barclay, Félix Talego, David Graeber, Gavin Grindon, Jesús Sepúlveda, Karen Goaman, and John Zerzan. Each one, from distinct angles and analyzing different objects of study, underscores the value of a dialogue between a current of thought and a social movement, on the one hand, and a scientific discipline on the other.
Revolution by the Book will periodically post excerpts from new (and older) AK Press books. This one comes from Part III, Chapter I of Durruti in the Spanish Revolution, by Abel Paz (translated by Chuck Morse). The chapter covers the opening moments of the Spanish Revolution in Barcelona, July 19, 1936. Enjoy!
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Barcelona in Flames
The fascists put their military machine in gear just before five in the morning. The leaders knew what they wanted, but the soldiers had been deceived into thinking that they were defending a Republic in peril.
The Montesa Calvary regiments took Tarragona Street toward the Plaza de España. The Santiago regiment left its barracks on Lepanto Street and followed Industria Street on their way to the “Cinc d’Ors.” The Seventh Light Artillery from Sant Andreu divided into two columns; one circumvallated the city and the other cut across it, both heading for the Plaza de Cataluña. The Mountain Artillery from the Docks took Icaria Avenue; its objective was Palacio Plaza and control of the port. The Badajoz Infantry Regiment left its barracks in Pedralbes behind and advanced along the Diagonal to occupy the center of the capital. The Sappers Battalion companies left their barracks on Cortes Street, which they followed on their march toward the Plaza de España. There they would link up with the Montesa regiments and seize the Paralelo, establishing a direct route to the port. The divided loyalties among the officers of the Alcántara Infantry Regiment mostly neutralized it, but Colonel Jacobo Roldán managed to send out a company to attack Radio Barcelona’s transmitter on Caspe Street.
Who will fight these forces? Who will fight these soldiers led by men who confidently assured themselves that “the rabble will run like pussies as soon as they hear the cannons’ thunder?”
The rabble? Assault Guards were already breaking ranks: they were fraternizing with the CNT and FAI workers and, together, they all formed an urban guerrilla force that would determine the outcome of the battle. They were joined by POUM groups (who were as unarmed as the CNT), UGT militants, and, later, the Esquerra Republicana’s boldest activists, whom the Generalitat had armed generously. The ideological differences that existed among the members of this human conglomerate melted as they faced a common danger and threw themselves against the military apparatus that was declaring war on everything in its path. (more…)
this means they’ll be sponsoring two events on our behalf in the upcoming weeks. The first, we decided, will be a party—a chance for AK collective members, authors (past and future), allies, and pals to get together for the sheer fun of it. The second will be a screening of our new DVD, Shutdown: The Rise and Fall of Direct Action to Stop the War. Hope to see you at both!
Anarchists have been avid translators since the nineteenth century and our fondness for it is one of the reasons why our movement has always been so multicultural and international. French to Chinese, Italian to Yiddish, German to Turkish, Spanish to English . . . these are just some of the linguistic crossroads that anarchists have traveled.
On December 6, an Athens cop shot and killed a young unarmed anarchist, Alexis Grigoropoulos. In a matter of hours, Athens exploded in a mass uprising of anarchists, students, migrant workers, and the unemployed. For over two weeks, in their anger and frustration, they attacked not just the police themselves but the oppressive institutions cops are armed to defend: banks, government buildings, multi-national corporate interests. Not since 1968 had Europe seen such militant and targeted mass direct action, and actions around the world echoed the heroic actions of our comrades in Greece. Not far from where I am writing, in San Francisco, solidarity actions were held and moving speeches given decrying police violence and the state capitalist hierarchies such violence is inevitably in service of, and vowing to “bring the fight home.”
Sadly, the fight has, once again, come home. On New Years Day in Oakland, an unarmed butcher and father from Hayward, Oscar Grant, was shot in the back at point blank range by a transit cop after being pinned face-down on the ground. There can be absolutely no justification for this cold-blooded police murder. As was the case in the murder of Alexis, there are several witnesses who have come forward stating the officer was in no danger, some even with video recordings of the atrocity. Predictably, though, the cop who fired the shot, Johannes Mehserle, has not been arrested or even officially interrogated about the incident. This is no surprise; we know how the authorities will respond (or fail to), given their total disregard for the lives and humanity of working and poor people of color.
My exciting career in anarchism started in the New York punk scene in the late 1970s. I spent long hours in the library researching all the “anarchy” stuff I kept hearing about in lyrics and liner notes. Along with Marx, who a high school teacher turned me on to, anarchism helped my teenaged self make sense of the world in which I grew up: a rapidly decaying working-class area on the north shore of Staten Island. Third generation born in the same neighborhood, I was raised more or less in the shadow of the Rheingold brewery where my grandfather worked for forty years. By the time I came along, the neighborhood was sinking fast. The shipyards had mostly closed by the time I was born, the brewery some years later—both departing for sunnier, non-union climes. Anarchism gave me a framework for understanding the resulting ravages.
