Posted on July 15th, 2011 in AK Authors!, Recommended Reading, Reviews of AK Books, Uncategorized
From the author of our latest fiction offering, a humble analysis of why you should — and shouldn’t — read the book. I wish I could get every author we work with to write a piece like this. DD Johnston is just amazing, and I’m super-psyched about how well Peace, Love, and Petrol Bombs is doing already! Be sure to visit his blog at http://ddjohnston.wordpress.com/.
Some honest reflections on whether or not you should buy Peace, Love, and Petrol Bombs
By DD Johnston
Everybody knows that if more than ten per cent of the population likes a work of art then that work of art should be burned. Since there’s an eminent risk that you won’t like Peace, Love, and Petrol Bombs, and since I don’t want you to waste your limited disposable income, not to mention your precious leisure time, on a book you’re not going to like, it seems only fair that I describe as honestly as possible what you might be getting yourself into.
First up, the characters have jobs. Worse than that, some of them don’t have jobs. Either way, they’re not wizards or princesses or even symbologists. They spend their days doing fairly ordinary stuff (mainly cooking and selling beef burgers, but also reading books, sitting in pubs, going to university, having sex, having kids, etc), and so those readers who read primarily for escapism are advised to look elsewhere. I understand the appeal of escapist culture (my weakness is for televised football matches and romantic comedies about cheerleaders), and I wish you well.
A more grudging goodbye must be said to those who might be disappointed morally. The narrator, Wayne, is a youth of ambiguous moral fibre whose convictions and actions are more determined by circumstance than by principle (but then, what part of an individual could possibly transcend circumstance?) His friends, too, are not necessarily goodies, and since I know nothing about you, I can’t say that you’ll find them likeable. They do the sort of things that people do: they look after each other, drink with each other, and sometimes have extra-marital sex with each other (one reviewer said they had ‘cheap sex’, but in fact it’s totally unpaid for, which in Scotland is still the traditional way); but they also lie, steal, suffer from depression, fight, bully and fall out with each other. Oh, and they don’t all speak like educated North Americans. Given that they’re all European, this last point may seem redundant, but since even Robin Hood now speaks like an educated North American, I thought it wise to ward off any cultural misunderstanding. Finally, I should declare that they sometimes use ‘colourful language.’
The elephant in the room, of course, is that some of these characters behave in a manner that is politically objectionable to many readers, and sacrosanct to others. They organise collective action against their employer and some of them participate in anarchist demonstrations and riots. The author thinks that such political mobilisations are complex, sometimes admirable, and sometimes counter-productive. The people involved are not necessarily better or worse than any other group of people. Therefore, if you want to see ‘self-styled anarchists’ vilified, or placed on a pedestal, you will be disappointed.
You may also be disappointed for artistic reasons. This is a first novel. Not a J.D. Salinger or Joseph Heller first novel, but a regular, sometimes ungainly, vaguely foal-like first novel. It is also very ambitious (imagine a new-born foal attempting to break the world hacky-sack record). Although it’s a short book, it ranges over several years and takes us to five different countries. It’s stylistically uneven, I feel, and I think the strategy of varying Wayne’s proximity to the events he narrates has resulted in prose that is sometimes incongruous. There are almost certainly too many characters (any fool knows that a good book should have two major characters, two supporting characters, and three minor characters). The book is very definitely not an elegantly crafted linear narrative; it is episodic and skittish.
This is not necessarily a bad thing. The novel has been great at psychologically studying individuals and examining the nuclear family, but it’s wrong to assume that the same tactics will tell us about how structural forces produced millennial political awakenings in a fast food restaurant, say. However, I readily admit that if you are looking for literary craft of high order then you would do well to look elsewhere; I don’t know, reread Lolita or The Great Gatsby or something.
I think it was Somerset Maugham who said that ‘A novelist is stuck with his youth. We spend it without paying much attention to how it will work out as material; nevertheless, we must draw on whatever was there for the rest of our lives.’ What Somerset Maugham didn’t mention is that some of us impetuously raid the picnic hamper of experience, stuffing our faces with raw ingredients before we’ve worked out their value or how best to serve them. Like so many first time novelists, I crammed my book with drama, incident, and characters.
(more…)
Posted on July 12th, 2011 in AK Distribution
Well hello there, folks! Hopefully by now you’ve all perused our list of the new AK Press titles of the past six months and started updating your reading lists. We like to keep you on your toes, so here’s another fun list for you: the top 10 bestselling new DISTRO titles in the first half of 2011. These are titles that have been released this year by other independent publishers, that we carry in our distribution catalog—and like everything else we carry, they are available to both individuals and wholesale customers. So whichever you are, if you haven’t picked them up yet, consider this your friendly reminder…
——
Fair Game: A Strategy Guide for Racial Justice Communications in the Obama Era
Praxis Media Productions
Praxis Project
A workbook-style guide from the good folks at The Praxis Project (some of the same folks who were involved in producing the AK Press book Talking the Walk)! This was debuted at the US Social Forum last year, and now updated and available for the first time to the general public, this guide is designed to help racial justice advocates navigate new political waters, explore proven strategies, and to consider what we must do over the long term to regain lost ground.
The Listener: Memory, Lies, Art, Power
David Lester
Arbeiter Ring Publishing
You followers of our blog already know that this one has been getting reviewed all over the place—and that we think it is good! You will too! It’s a graphic novel by David Lester (Mecca Normal guitarist and bestselling—for us!—author of The Gruesome Acts of Capitalism). A compelling tale of art, power, and murder (!) weaving weighty historical events together with modern-day art and life, all presented through eye-catching black-and-white drawings.
Art Gangs: Protest and Counterculture in New York City
Alan W. Moore
Autonomedia
An enlightening new contribution to the study of art history from a radical view. From the Art Workers Coalition through Art & Language, Colab and Group Material in the 1980s, in Soho and the Lower East Side, the collectives described in this book built the postmodern art world. This is the essential background story of today’s politicized international art world.
Post-Car Adventuring: The San Francisco Bay Area
Justin Eichenlaub & Kelly Gregory
Post-Car Press
This one got a nice write-up in the East Bay Express over the winter, and found its way onto many a bookstore counter in Oakland, Berkeley, and San Francisco. If you local bike enthusiasts haven’t gotten a copy yet, please do! But we encourage folks outside the area to pick it up, too—it’s tourist-friendly, and you’ll find it a unique approach to a travel guide for the more adventurous Bay Area visitor.
The Revolution Starts at Home
Ching-In Chen, Jai Dulani, & Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (eds)
South End Press
Nearly one in three women in the United States will experience intimate violence in her lifetime. And in order to effectively resist violence out there—in the prison system, on militarized borders, or other clear encounters with “the system”—we in activist communities must challenge how it is reproduced right where we live and work. Expanded from the popular zine by the same name, this essential book offers alternatives for survivor safety while building a revolution where no one is left behind. Authors and contributors are on tour now—keep an eye out, but definitely check out the book in the meantime!
Work: Capitalism. Economics. Resistance.
Crimethinc.
Crimethinc.
From the folks who brought us such recent classics as Days of War, Nights of Love, Recipes for Disaster, and Expect Resistance comes a new intervention into the world of work, and a larger analysis of capitalism: what it is, how it works, and how we might dismantle it. Not just an attempt to describe reality but also a tool with which to change it!
What Lies Beneath The Clock Tower: Being An Adventure Of Your Own Choosing
Margaret Killjoy
Combustion Books
From a new publisher of “dangerous fiction,” Combustion Books, comes a choose-your-own adventure book for grown-ups! This one is chock full of political struggle, drunkenness, gnomes, goblins, and clever steampunk sensibilities. Plus it comes highly recommended by Alan Moore (author of Watchmen) as well as BoingBoing, so you don’t even have to take our word for it!
Grammar Matters: The Social Significance of How We Use Language
Jila Ghomeshi
Arbeiter Ring Publishing
It is hard to find someone who doesn’t have a pet peeve about language. Self-appointed language police worry that new forms of popular media are contributing to sloppiness, imprecision, and a general disregard for the rules of grammar and speech. This book addresses the politics of language: what insistence on “proper” use of language reveals about power, authority, and various social prejudices.
The ABCs of Anarchy
Brian Heagney
An anarchist book suitable for children of all ages (as long as they like to color)! Every page includes questions relevant for children or adults. Whether you want to go through the alphabet with a little one, or have a thoughtful engaging discussion about life with your mother, this book is for you! Seriously, it’s great… check it out, you won’t be sorry.
How to Rock and Roll: A City Rider’s Repair Manual
Sam Tracy
Black Kettle Graphics
Here’s one from the vault (luckily, bike repair hasn’t changed too much over the years)! This book was believed to be out of print—but now, for a short time only, we have it back in stock. By the author of Bicycle! and Roadside Bicycle Repair! We’re down to our last 30 copies, so get yours now or forever wonder how great this book could have been.
Posted on July 10th, 2011 in AK News
We’ve just closed out the first half of 2011, and at a time like this I think it’s always nice to look back and give ourselves a pat on the back for all the good work. Not to mention—for you dedicated readers, and you bookstores stocking our books, it’s a good chance to look back and make sure you haven’t missed anything.
We would be remiss not to say a big THANK YOU to the Friends of AK Press for your continued support. We couldn’t do it without you! If you’re not already a Friend of AK Press and you like what you see here, please consider signing up. We’ve already got another great season of books in the works—beginning with Bifo’s After the Future, David Price’s Weaponizing Anthropology, Abel Paz’s Story of the Iron Column, our long-awaited Colin Ward Reader, and Captive Genders! Sign up now and you’ll get them all, and more…
——
AK PRESS NEW RELEASES—First Half of 2011:
Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance
Jason Hribal
In the most provocative book on animal rights since Peter Singer’s Animal Liberation, historian Jason Hribal argues persuasively that escapes and attacks by animals in captivity are deliberate, that the animals are acting with intent, and that they are asserting their own desires for freedom. Fear of the Animal Planet is a harrowing, and curiously uplifting, chronicle of resistance against the captivity and torture of animals.
“Yellow Kid” Weil: The Autobiography of America’s Master Swindler
J.R. “Yellow Kid” Weil, as told to W.T. Brannan
The latest addition to our popular Nabat Series! Bilked bankers, grifted gamblers, and swindled spinsters: welcome to the world of confidence men. You’ll marvel at the elaborate schemes developed by The Yellow Kid: fixed horse races, bad real-estate deals, and even a money-making machine! Dozens of schemes are laid out in full detail, told with wit and style—you won’t be able to put it down!
Oppose and Propose: Lessons from Movement for a New Society
Andrew Cornell
The second book in the Anarchist Interventions series, co-published with the Institute for Anarchist Studies!
Many ways of doing radical politics pioneered by Movement for a New Society in the 1970s and 1980s have become central to anti-authoritarian social movements: consensus decision making, spokescouncils, communal living, unlearning oppressive behavior, and co-operatively owned businesses. Andrew Cornell uses the story of the Movement for a New Society to raise crucial questions for activists today.
Property Is Theft!: A Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Reader
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon’s social and economic ideas have been a source of inspiration and debate since 1840. Mikhail Bakunin called Proudhon “the master of us all,” while for Peter Kropotkin he laid “the foundations of anarchism.” Property Is Theft! collects his most important works in one (giant!) volume, making many available in English for the first time. Extensively annotated and introduced by editor Iain McKay (author of An Anarchist FAQ)!
Marshall Law: The Life and Times of a Baltimore Black Panther
Marshall “Eddie” Conway & Dominque Stevenson
In 1970, the feds framed Eddie Conway for the murder of a Baltimore City Police officer. Forty years later, still incarcerated for a crime he didn’t commit, Eddie Conway continues to resist. Marshall Law is a poignant story of strength and struggle. From his childhood in inner-city Baltimore to his political awakening in the military, from the rise of the Black Panther Party to the sham trial, the realities of prison life, escape attempts, labor organizing on the inside, and beyond, Eddie’s autobiography is a reminder that we all share the responsibility of resistance, no matter where we are.
Zapatista Spring: Anatomy of a Rebel Water Project & the Lessons of International Solidarity
Ramor Ryan
Eight volunteers converge to help campesinos build a water system in Chiapas—a strategy to bolster the Zapatista insurgency by helping locals to assert their autonomy. These outsiders come to question the movement they’ve traveled so far to support—and each other—when forced into a world so unlike the poetic communiqués of Subcomandante Marcos; a world of endemic rural poverty, parochialism, and shifting loyalties to the movement. From the author of Clandestines!
The Right to Be Lazy: Essays by Paul Lafargue
Paul Lafargue
At once a masterpiece of critical theory and rip-roaring radical humor, this is one of the most spirited attacks on the notion of the “work ethic” ever to be published! This collection also includes four of Paul Lafargue’s lesser-known critiques, as well as a biographical sketch by Wobbly organizer Fred Thompson,and a new introduction by editor Bernard Marszalek. Released in collaboration with Kerr Company to celebrate their 125th anniversary year, and including a tribute to Kerr by labor journalist Kari Lydersen.
Revolt and Crisis in Greece: Between a Present Yet to Pass and a Future Still to Come
Edited by Antonis Vradis & Dimitris Dalakoglou
How does a revolt come about and what does it leave behind? This timely new volume traces Greece’s long moment of transition from the revolt of 2008 to the economic crisis that followed. In its twenty chapters, authors from around the world—including those on the ground in Greece—analyze how December became possible, exploring its legacies, the position of the social antagonist movement in face of the economic crisis and the arrival of the IMF, and the potentialities that have opened up in face of the crisis.
I Mix What I Like!: A Mixtape Manifesto
Jared A. Ball
In a moment of increasing corporate control in the music industry, where three major labels call the shots on which artists are heard and seen, Jared Ball analyzes the colonization and control of popular music and posits the homemade hip-hop mixtape as an emancipatory tool for community resistance. Blending together elements from internal colonialism theory, cultural studies, political science, and his own experience on the mic, Jared suggests that the low-tech hip-hop mixtape may be one of the best weapons we have against Empire.
Peace, Love & Petrol Bombs: A Novel
D.D. Johnston
Wayne Foster is fed up. How long can you work in a dead-end job as a full-time burger-flipper in a small town in Scotland before you start to wonder what comes next? Add a likeable geek with a love of Karl Marx, an angry French anarchist, and a country schoolteacher’s daughter in search of excitement, and soon you’ll have a rebellion on your hands. Rife with dry wit and disaffected humor, Peace, Love & Petrol Bombs is the modern working-class novel, and the perfect antidote to “serious” political fiction.
Posted on July 5th, 2011 in AK Authors!, Reviews of AK Books, Uncategorized
In the June 2011 issue of Reason Magazine (Free Minds and Free Markets!) Thaddeus Russell had a lot to say about Jason Hribal’s Fear of the Animal Planet. His article, Ventriloquists for the Powerless, starts off with a bang.
“Jason Hribal’s Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance will be ignored, dismissed, and mocked. Published by the tiny and idiosyncratic AK Press and written by an obscure semi-academic, it proposes an argument that will make anyone other than the fiercest PETA activists smirk. Yet it should be required reading for all social scientists and political activists, because it perfectly demonstrates a central and enduring problem of modern left-wing political discourse: the tendency to speak on behalf of those who have not spoken.”
Here are a few gems that Russell uses to defend his point…
“Few historians mention that a majority of the ex-slaves who were interviewed held positive views of their days on the plantation (including those who were interviewed by African Americans) or, more important, that more than 99 percent of American slaves left not a single record of their thoughts.”
“to claim a status for all slaves as “victimized” or “oppressed” is to homogenize the attitudes, behaviors, and cultures of millions of people and to make them one’s sock puppet.”Preview
And here is Jason’s response, which ran on Counterpunch.org on June 27th. Make sure to check out the original post here.
A Lesson from Thaddeus Russell
Understanding Class and Species
By JASON HRIBAL
“I will have a degree,” the Harvard graduate student sneered, “and you will be serving my kids fries at a drive-through on our way to a skiing trip.” “Maybe,” Will replied, “but at least I won’t be unoriginal.”
— Good Will Hunting (1997)
There are numerous social contracts that exist in today’s society. According to the historian Thaddeus Russell in his recent review in Reason Magazine (May 2011), I broke two with the publication of my book Fear of the Animal Planet. The first of those contracts has to do with class. The second has to do with species and class. Both are interesting points and needing of consideration.
To the first point, Russell wastes no time in reaching it. By the second sentence, he calls me “an obscure semi-academic” and my publisher “tiny and idiosyncratic.” Russell carries on through the rest of the review with a general tone of derision. No attempt is made to hide his distaste of the ideas that I use. While some might be put off by such curtness, I find it refreshing and instructive. For the issue at hand is made very clear to me, this is about socioeconomic class and the ways in which it manifests itself. In other words, Russell is teaching me a lesson in class relations. It has not been my first time.
My initiation into the working class was given in the summer before the start of 5th grade. I had been sent to a camp by my then step-mother. It was run by a large Evangelical church. I was not member of the church and my experience in theological matters consisted of one-year spent at Christian Life Elementary School in Rockford, IL. Nevertheless I would do my best to fit in at the camp and the other attendees were, at least on the surface, friendly enough. The days were spent intermixed with playful activities and bible study. Near the end of our stay, an exam was given. It was comprehensive, serious, and tested our knowledge of the New Testament. The head pastor’s son would go on to score the highest mark and he received numerous accolades for doing so on our final night together. This seemed to everyone as expected. He should have won.
The unexpected came the following morning. With the parents arriving to pick up their children for the return homeward, the truth was told to me privately. I had tied for the top mark on the exam. The church elders, however, had apparently felt it necessary to conceal this fact. They believed that I neither deserved recognition nor the award. The reasons behinds their judgment were not supplied. But I was old enough to figure it out on my own. I was not a pastor’s son.
The next lesson happened in high school. I attended Dakota High School in rural NW Illinois. The student body was quite limited in number, comprised mainly of kids from small farms and villages. On the outskirts of the district, there was Lake Summerset. This private, gated community contained a comparable wealth and it stood out. Its members carried themselves differently—with a certain level of arrogance and aloofness. In my high school, this disparity in wealth meant a disparity in treatment ranging from noticeable to stark. Encouragement, attention, and advanced coursework were lavished on the few. These students needed to be prepared for college. As for the rest of us, we were left scrambling for crumbs. We simply did not merit such consideration. This arrangement seemed normal to people. Wealth bought privileges.
College came after and it had its own particular set of teachings. They are the three C’s of liberalism: conformity, cynicism, and conservatism. To start, we were never taught directly about class. There was talk about the cultural politics of race, ethnicity, and gender. But we appeared to live in a classless society. There was the ubiquitous middle class but it turned out to be more of an ideology than anything else: a potent cocktail of individualism and objectivity. I came to identify more with those of wealth. If you looked the part, weren’t you one of them? I thought that selfishness could be rationalized. Isn’t it reasonable to look out for yourself?
Then there was cynicism. I gained a very real sense that people were powerless to the forces around them. Effort didn’t make that much of a difference. Sure there were the great social movements of our time. But those had more to do with progress and civilization than agency. Weren’t civil rights and women’s rights inevitable? It certainly looked that way. The past did not have much of a connection to the present. History seemed to proceed without struggle. I stopped caring.
Finally, there was conservatism. When Sir Thomas More wrote his monograph Utopia (1515), he would not take a side on what the idea of utopia actually meant. It could be either the Greek eutopia (the good place) or outopia (no place). Why the uncertainty? “More,” Lewis Mumford explained, “was a punster, in an age when the keenest minds delighted to play tricks with language, and when it was not always wise to speak too plainly.” The situation has not changed and, in the modern university, carefulness has become something both required and cumulative in its effects. I learned that idealism and romanticism were bad and should be reacted against. Realism and skepticism, however, were good and could be used as a cover for lack of engagement. “Words” should be put into quotes. The passive voice should be used. Language and ideas should be postmodern and kept purposely complex and obtuse. Knowledge itself seemed to be evolving ever more specialized and closed off.
This takes us to Russell and the latest lesson. Why would he so rudely dismiss anyone as “an obscure semi-academic”? The answer is that the university remains a rigidly class-based institution—not only in what it teaches but also in how it operates. Russell himself has written about being a C student from the high schools in Berkeley and Oakland, who magically went on to attend two private schools: Antioch College and Columbia University. The first was best known for its rich hippy kids and the second continues to be known for just being rich. Only it was not magic that got him there; it was money.
The recent New York Times article, “Top Colleges, Largely for the Elite,” continues with this well-trotted theme: undergraduate admissions at leading colleges and the gross inequalities that exist therein. For today, it is not enough that the children of wealth to attend the best funded primary and secondary schools with the smallest classes, most advance courses, and most diverse curriculum. Such students now get their own private college admissions counselors. They get $90 per hour tutors and test preparation workshops. They load up with extracurricular activities: Spacecamp, Earthwatch, Habitat for Humanity. The key is to impress the admissions boards and why not? It’s the golden ticket and the costs can be socialized. The top 100 research universities regularly give as much or more financial aid to families making over $100,000 a year than to those making less than $40,000. But the problem of inequality extends far beyond there, for it gets worse the further up the ladder of education you go.
The American Historical Association released a related study in 2005 examining the quantitative trends in graduate schools for the social sciences and humanities. It found that, over the past 40 years, PhDs from these fields are “growing less diverse and more likely to draw from a narrow range of elite institutions.” Moreover, previous attendance at highly-selective, private liberal-arts schools—such as Williams, Bryn Mawr, Oberlin, Pomona, etc—plays a disproportionate role in the selection process for doctoral programs. In other words, not only do an ever growing number of PhDs come from the most exclusive universities, but these same students first attended the most exclusive colleges. The AHA’s concluding advice on the matter: “the beginnings of an academic career can play an important role in the way it ends.” About as political of a statement the organization could muster.
But the AHA was right. The funnel of education narrows and compresses. Along the way, privilege becomes more important and potent, and merit comes to matter less and less. The anthropologist Franz Boas warned that “academic teachers are apt to consider themselves a privileged class in whose hands the development of university teaching and the advance of science rests.” Boas, who obtained his position at Columbia through his family’s connections, understood this well. He would join the Committee of Social Investigation at Greenwich House in order to help fund research for those outside of the university. But that was 100 years ago. Today, you get people like Professor X.
Remember Professor X? He wrote that popular, anonymous piece, “In the Basement of the Ivory Tower,” for the Atlantic a few years ago. It argued without apology that some people should not attend college, for they are ill prepared for the intellectual rigors and it does not ultimately serve their interests. Who are these people? For Professor X, this meant adult education, nontraditional education, and education for returning students—in other words, education for the working class. It is a very good thing that he was never my teacher or I would have never finished my undergraduate degree. I was working class. I attended a junior college while working a second and third shift job. I bounced around various state schools. I was dyslexic and struggled mightily with my writing. Professor X would have given me an F and been done with it. I didn’t belong in college.
Russell believes the same thing. He got his PhD from Columbia. I got my PhD from Toledo. He is significant. I am obscure. He is a professor. I am a semi-academic who teaches part-time ESL to immigrants. He has a literary agent and published his latest book through the Free Press. I had to often choose between grocery money for the month or coming up with the funds for the research of my book, and it would be published by Counterpunch and AK Press. Russell had to stoop low to review my book and he wants everyone to know it.
The class divide is apparent. And it is beyond arrogance, self-entitlement, and exclusion. This divide is manufactured and corrupting. Professor X and Russell have come to outwardly speak for it. Many people quietly believe in it. Society is taught it. If you are poor, your only chance to make it and achieve your dreams is to get that rare scholarship to Amherst College. This is eugenics—the belief that class determines intelligence.
(more…)
Posted on July 4th, 2011 in AK Distribution, Happenings
In observance of that national holiday we love to hate: AK Press is offering you not one, not two, but THREE ways to take advantage of our annual “Fuck the Fourth” sale!
1) For those of you who aren’t near our Oakland or Baltimore warehouses, our online sale runs through the end of the day TODAY! Place your order by tonight and get 25% off everything in our catalog: books, DVDs, CDs, t-shirts, pamphlets, and anything else you can find on our website.
2) Those of you in the Bay Area, come out to the “Fuck the Fourth” sale at the AK Press warehouse in Oakland, this Friday, July 8 from 4–10PM! Take 25% off anything in the warehouse, PLUS pick through loads of awesome sale books and t-shirts priced as low as $1–$5. There’ll also be vegan refreshments (of both solid and liquid varieties), and you never know what other fun we might have up our sleeves…
3) Now that we are a bi-coastal operation, we’re letting folks in Baltimore in on the fun as well! On Thursday, July 7 from 6–9PM we’ll be hosting a special “Fuck the Fourth” version of our monthly Radical Publishing Happy Hour, co-hosted by our office-mates, the Baltimore Indypendent Reader. All books in the warehouse will be 25% off, plus enjoy special summery cocktails and refreshments.
Wherever you are, we hope you’ll take advantage of the sale, and help us spread the word!
Posted on July 4th, 2011 in Events, Uncategorized
The AK Press warehouse in California has its big “Fuck the Fourth” sale this week, and we thought we’d let all you East Coasters in on the fun as well!
Join us for a special edition of our monthly Radical Publishing Happy Hour. Check out the new books just out from AK Press this month, and get a 25% discount on any and all books we have in stock! Plus get to know the Baltimore Indyreader, our favorite local independent newspaper…, and help both projects raise the funds we need to keep our Baltimore office open!
We are also extending the invitation to folks who are coming to town for the Eastern Conference on Workplace Democracy to come hang out with two of Baltimore’s collective media projects.
Being as this is an extra-special July edition of our Happy Hour, there will be plenty of summery cocktails and special refreshments on hand–but we guarantee it will be free of American flags, fireworks (okay, we probably would if we could…) and patriotic sentiment. Come one, come all!
*The AK Press/Indyreader warehouse is located a short walk from the Woodberry light rail stop!*
Posted on July 4th, 2011 in AK Authors!, Events
Catch Jason Hribal on the air talking about his book Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance, on the Enviroshow program of Valley Free Radio , WXOJ-LP in Amherst, MA.
July 19th, 7pm EST
Posted on July 4th, 2011 in AK Authors!, Events
Catch Jason Hribal on the air talking about his book Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance, on Indymedia on Air, KPFK 90.7FM in Los Angeles.
July 11th from 8:30-9pm PST.
Posted on July 3rd, 2011 in Uncategorized
We received this call for participation and conference announcement from our comrades in Tennessee; it sounds amazing, and we’re proud to support the efforts of the OUTstanding Organizing Committee, and we hope you will too. Read on for more info, and be sure to visit the OUTstanding website at http://outstandingseminar.wordpress.com/.
OUTstanding: A Seminar Exploring LGBTIQ Diversity at the University of Tennessee: October 22, 2011
Open Call for Proposals! Deadline is August 22nd, 2011. Submit to outstandingutk@gmail.com, or visit the “Call for Proposals” for more information.
LGBTIQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer and questioning) issues are visible in a way never before experienced at the University of Tennessee. This focus on LGBTIQ issues nationally and locally coincides with the university’s “VOL Vision 2015” initiatives to nurture diversity.
For these issues, time is truly of the essence, on the University of Tennessee campus, in Knoxville and beyond. Devastating circumstances persist in our communities including a national epidemic of gay teen suicides and bullying, anti-gay sentiment surrounding the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and the fight for marriage equality. These struggles directly connect to local incidents and issues, such as a house fire of a lesbian couple in Lenore, TN, safety and wholeness of LGBTIQ students on campus, and the omnipresent conservatism of our region. The struggle for LGBTIQ equality also spans borders and continents, as local and global legislators continue to push and promote discriminatory, unjust, and utterly devastating bills. In Tennessee, the “Don’t Say Gay” bill is debated in our state legislature and Uganda’s “Kill the Gays” bill is fiercely fought on an international level.
On US campuses, the environment for LGBTIQ students, faculty and staff continues to be a struggle. A 2010 report issued by the Q Research Institute for Higher Education consisting of over 5,000 participants from all 50 states found that a “chilly” and unsafe environment persists for LGBTIQ students, faculty and staff in higher education institutions.
The OUTstanding Planning Committee are an interdisciplinary group of students, staff and faculty from across the university who have banded together to explore the visibility of diversity and LGBTIQ cultural issues in order to create campus-wide discussion, education, exploration and celebration of intersectional diversity of the community on campus and in general society. To do this, we have attempted to create a space where individuals and groups from UT, Knoxville, and the surrounding region, along with nationally recognized speakers and participants, can explore, celebrate, and facilitate discussions and networking surrounding these important issues. Feedback from the campus community has been sought through the use of focus groups attended by students, faculty and staff, with the intent of providing the most intellectually enriching and accessible experience to a broad set of attendees. The seminar themes and issues will be in the form of keynote addresses, presentations, workshops, panels, scholar forums, and inspiring entertainment from LGBTIQ artists. Presenters and participants alike will come from diverse backgrounds and bring creative and intersecting opinions, views, and issues to the table. Such issues for discussion include but are not limited to gender expression, class issues, race issues and ethnic LGBTIQ diversity, religion and community, disability within the community, campus environment, local history, and a special focus on how to foster continuing celebration and advocation of LGBTIQ rights and more.
The OUTstanding seminar has support and encouragement from the Commission for Blacks, LGBT Commission, Dean of Students, Student Affairs, the Feminist Action Collective, the Masters of Science in Social Work Organization, and several faculty and student organizations from multiple departments across campus. The support of groups, organizations, businesses, and individuals is growing every day.
One of the main goals of the seminar will be to encourage ongoing advocacy and engagement of students, faculty, and staff in LGBTIQ cultural issues. Attendees will gain insight and understanding of the LGBTIQ culture as stereotypes are broken down and the effects of discrimination are made clear. LGBTIQ attendees will have an opportunity to see the support available as well as become more knowledgeable about the history of struggles within their own culture. This seminar will explain terminology associated with the gender queer community and attendees will gain confidence in communicating about LGBTIQ issues. We strive to bring awareness to the difficulties in maneuvering social constructs of gender and breaking down stereotypes and displaying individuality and diversity under the LGBTIQ umbrella. Ultimately, we hope OUTstanding contributes quality, meaningful, and exceptional work towards a compassionate future for The University of Tennessee and other campuses, Knoxville and other communities, and the nation and beyond.
Posted on July 1st, 2011 in Current Events
From our comrades at Critical Resistance:
On July 1st, prisoners in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, California will begin an indefinite hunger strike to protest the tortuous, inhumane and cruel conditions of their imprisonment. The hunger strike is spreading, with prisoners in the SHU at Corcoran State Prison joining the strike in solidarity with those at Pelican Bay.
The hunger strikers need your support to make sure their voices are heard!
When Georgia prisoners in prisons across the state went on a work strike in December 2010, mainstream media barely covered it.
We need to make sure that as many people as possible know about the Pelican Bay hunger strike!
Click here to read their demands!
Please spread the word far and wide to your friends, families, and networks, all over the US and internationally. You can refer people to the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity blog, a place for updates on organizing efforts inside and outside the prison; a location for research, history and analysis relevant to the strike; and a hub for ways people can be in solidarity.
How you can help now:
1. Pass the blog on to everyone you know!
2. Check out the facebook page and share with your friends!
3. Write letters to people you know in prison and their family members to make sure they know about the hunger strike!
4. Attend solidarity demonstrations, events, and actions! Solidarity actions and events are happening throughout the US and Canada during the strike. Find out when and where they are taking place.
5. Organize a solidarity event, demonstration, or action! Don’t see an action or event near you? Organize one! Go here for more info.
