Best of
Activism

2016

From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation


Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor - 2016
    The Black Lives Matter movement has awakened a new generation of activists.In this stirring and insightful analysis, activist and scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor surveys the historical and contemporary ravages of racism and persistence of structural inequality such as mass incarceration and Black unemployment. In this context, she argues that this new struggle against police violence holds the potential to reignite a broader push for Black liberation.

A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota


Sun Yung ShinAndrea Jenkins - 2016
    Essays that challenge, discomfort, disorient, galvanize, and inspire all of us to evolve now, for our shared future.

Rad Women Worldwide: Artists and Athletes, Pirates and Punks, and Other Revolutionaries Who Shaped History


Kate Schatz - 2016
    Featuring an array of diverse figures from Hatshepsut (the great female king who ruled Egypt peacefully for two decades) and Malala Yousafzi (the youngest person to win the Nobel Peace Prize) to Poly Styrene (legendary teenage punk and lead singer of X-Ray Spex) and Liv Arnesen and Ann Bancroft (polar explorers and the first women to cross Antarctica), this progressive and visually arresting book is a compelling addition to women's history.

Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love, and Liberation


Angel Kyodo Williams - 2016
    Bridging the world of spirit and activism, they urge a compassionate response to the systemic, state-sanctioned violence and oppression that has persisted against Black people since the slave era. With national attention focused on the recent killings of unarmed black citizens and the response of the Black-centered liberation groups such as Black Lives Matter, "Radical Dharma" demonstrates how social transformation and personal, spiritual liberation must be articulated and inextricably linked.Rev. angel Kyodo williams, Lama Rod Owens, and Jasmine Syedullah represent a new voice in American Buddhism. Offering their own histories and experiences as illustrations of the types of challenges facing dharma practitioners and teachers who are different from those of the past five decades, they ask how teachings that transcend color, class, and caste are hindered by discrimination and the dynamics of power, shame, and ignorance. Their illuminating argument goes beyond a demand for the equality and inclusion of diverse populations to advancing a new dharma that deconstructs rather than amplifies systems of suffering and prepares us to weigh the shortcomings not only of our own minds but also of our communities. They forge a path toward reconciliation and self-liberation that rests on radical honesty, a common ground where we can drop our need for perfection and propriety and speak as souls.In a society where profit rules, people's value is determined by the color of their skin, and many voices including queer voices are silenced, Radical Dharma recasts the concepts of engaged spirituality, social transformation, inclusiveness, and healing.

No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age


Jane F. McAlevey - 2016
    Today's progressives now work for professional organizations more comfortable with the inside game in Washington DC (and capitols throughout the West), where they are outmatched and outspent by corporate interests. Labor unions now focus on the narrowest possible understanding of the interests of their members, and membership continues to decline in lockstep with the narrowing of their goals. Meanwhile, promising movements like Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter lack sufficient power to accomplish meaningful change. Why do progressives in the United States keep losing on so many issues?In No Shortcuts, Jane McAlevey argues that progressives can win, but lack the organized power to enact significant change, to outlast their bosses in labor fights, and to hold elected leaders accountable. Drawing upon her experience as a scholar and longtime organizer in the student, environmental, and labor movements, McAlevey examines cases from labor unions and social movements to pinpoint the factors that helped them succeed - or fail - to accomplish their intended goals. McAlevey makes a compelling case that the great social movements of previous eras gained their power from mass organizing, a strategy today's progressives have mostly abandoned in favor of shallow mobilization or advocacy. She ultimately concludes that, in order to win, progressive movements need strong unions built from bottom-up organizing strategies that place the power for change in the hands of workers and ordinary people at the community level.Beyond the concrete examples in this book, McAlevey's arguments have direct implications for anyone involved in organizing for social change. Much more than cogent analysis, No Shortcuts explains exactly how progressives can go about rebuilding powerful movements at work, in our communities, and at the ballot box.

When We Rise: My Life in the Movement


Cleve Jones - 2016
    There were. Like thousands of other young people, Jones, nearly penniless, was drawn in the early 1970s to San Francisco, a city electrified by progressive politics and sexual freedom.Jones found community--in the hotel rooms and ramshackle apartments shared by other young adventurers, in the city's bathhouses and gay bars like The Stud, and in the burgeoning gay district, the Castro, where a New York transplant named Harvey Milk set up a camera shop, began shouting through his bullhorn, and soon became the nation's most outspoken gay elected official. With Milk's encouragement, Jones dove into politics and found his calling in "the movement." When Milk was killed by an assassin's bullet in 1978, Jones took up his mentor's progressive mantle--only to see the arrival of AIDS transform his life once again.By turns tender and uproarious--and written entirely in his own words--When We Rise is Jones' account of his remarkable life. He chronicles the heartbreak of losing countless friends to AIDS, which very nearly killed him, too; his co-founding of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation during the terrifying early years of the epidemic; his conception of the AIDS Memorial Quilt, the largest community art project in history; the bewitching story of 1970s San Francisco and the magnetic spell it cast for thousands of young gay people and other misfits; and the harrowing, sexy, and sometimes hilarious stories of Cleve's passionate relationships with friends and lovers during an era defined by both unprecedented freedom and possibility, and prejudice and violence alike.When We Rise is not only the story of a hero to the LQBTQ community, but the vibrantly voice memoir of a full and transformative American life--an activist whose work continues today.

Revolutionary Mothering: Love on the Front Lines


Alexis Pauline Gumbs - 2016
    The challenges faced by movements working for antiviolence, anti-imperialist, and queer liberation, as well as racial, economic, reproductive, gender, and food justice are the same challenges that marginalized mothers face every day. Motivated to create spaces for this discourse because of the authors’ passionate belief in the power of a radical conversation about mothering, they have become the go-to people for cutting-edge inspired work on this topic for an overlapping committed audience of activists, scholars, and writers. Revolutionary Mothering is a movement-shifting anthology committed to birthing new worlds, full of faith and hope for what we can raise up together. Contributors include alba onofrio, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Ariel Gore, Arielle Julia Brown, Autumn Brown, Cheryl Boyce-Taylor, China Martens, Christy NaMee Eriksen, Claire Barrera, Cynthia Dewi Oka, Esteli Juarez Boyd, Fabielle Georges, Fabiola Sandoval, Gabriela Sandoval, H. Bindy K. Kang, Irene Lara, June Jordan, Karen Su, Katie Kaput, Layne Russell, Lindsey Campbell, Lisa Factora-Borchers, Loretta J. Ross, Mai’a Williams, Malkia A. Cyril, Mamas of Color Rising, Micaela Cadena, Noemi Martinez, Norma A. Marrun, Panquetzani, Rachel Broadwater, Sumayyah Talibah, Tara CC Villaba, Terri Nilliasca, tk karakashian tunchez, Victoria Law, and Vivian Chin.

Executing Grace: How the Death Penalty Killed Jesus and Why It's Killing Us


Shane Claiborne - 2016
    But is the state’s taking of a life true—or even practical—punishment for convicted prisoners? In this thought-provoking work, Shane Claiborne explores the issue of the death penalty and the contrast between punitive justice and restorative justice, questioning our notions of fairness, revenge, and absolution.Using an historical lens to frame his argument, Claiborne draws on testimonials and examples from Scripture to show how the death penalty is not the ideal of justice that many believe. Not only is a life lost, so too, is the possibility of mercy and grace. In Executing Grace, he reminds us of the divine power of forgiveness, and evokes the fundamental truth of the Gospel—that no one, even a criminal, is beyond redemption.

The Third Reconstruction: Moral Mondays, Fusion Politics, and the Rise of a New Justice Movement


William J. Barber II - 2016
    William Barber led more than a hundred thousand people at rallies across North Carolina to protest cuts to voting rights and the social safety net, which the state’s conservative legislature had implemented. These protests, which came to be known as Moral Mondays, have blossomed into the largest social movement the South has seen since the civil rights era—and, since then, it has spread to states as diverse as Florida, Tennessee, Wisconsin, and Ohio. In The Third Reconstruction, Rev. Barber tells the story of how he helped lay the groundwork for the Moral Mondays movement and explores the unfulfilled promises of America’s multiethnic democracy. He draws on the lessons of history to offer a vision of a new Reconstruction, one in which a diverse coalition of citizens—black and white, religious and secular, Northern and Southern—fight side-by-side for racial and economic justice for all Americans. The Third Reconstruction is both a blueprint for activism at the state level and an inspiring call to action from the twenty-first century’s most effective grassroots organizer.

Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In


Bernie Sanders - 2016
    In the book, Sanders shares experiences from the campaign trail and outlines his ideas for continuing a political revolution to fight for a progressive economic, environmental, racial and social justice agenda that creates jobs, raises wages, protects the environment and provides health care for all.

Angels with Dirty Faces: Three Stories of Crime, Prison, and Redemption


Walidah Imarisha - 2016
    . . . When I saw for the first time (but not the last) a mother sobbing and clutching her son when visiting hours were up, only to be physically pried off and escorted out by guards, I knew nothing about that made me safer. This is the heart of this country's prison system. And the prison system has become the heart of America."—Walidah Imarisha, from the Introduction.Angels with Dirty Faces is no romanticized tale of crime and punishment. The three lives in this creative nonfiction account are united by the presence of actual harm—sometimes horrific violence. Imarisha, dealing with the complexities of her own experience with sexual assault and accountability, brings us behind prison walls to visit her adopted brother Kakamia and his fellow inmate Jimmy “Mac” McElroy, a member of the brutal Irish gang the Westies. Together they explore the questions: People can do unimaginable damage to one another—and then what? What do we as a society do? What might redemption look like?Imarisha doesn’t flinch as she guides us through the difficulties and contradictions, eschewing theory for a much messier reality. The result is a nuanced and deeply personal analysis that allows readers to connect emotionally with the lives of people caught up within, and often destroyed by, our criminal justice system.“A highly personalized and intimate portrait by a courageous writer who goes beyond clichés and platitudes. This book is a bracing, clear-eyed exploration of one of the most important issues of our time: the growing incarceration rate in the US, and the consequences of this for citizens both inside and outside prison walls.” —T.J. English, New York Times best-selling author of Where the Bodies Were Buried and The Westies“Walidah Imarisha gives us an unvarnished take on prison abolition. Beyond slogans or strategy, we are left with people, in all our imperfections and possibilities. This is a bold, beautiful, and absolutely necessary book, told with urgency and passion. —Dan Berger, author of Captive Nation“Walidah Imarisha has written a brave book. It demonstrates both the universality and distinctiveness of three lives enmeshed through the US prison system. Imarisha pushes us to give up easy distinctions between innocence and guilt, good and evil, and to experience punishment and imprisonment as the messy, complex systems they are. And she reminds us that while there are no winners in this game, it is one replete with compassion, care, and resistance enough to permeate walls and cages.” —Rachel Herzing, co-founder of Critical Resistance.“Angels with Dirty Faces is a superbly written shocking, sensuous, sometimes sadistic and even scandalous binding of biographies struggling with the question: What does redemption actually mean? It is impossible for one to engage this work and not emerge on the other side profoundly affected.” Sundiata Acoli, Political Prisoner"Walidah Imarisha relates the experiences of crime, punishment, and victimization, not as abstractions, but as lived human tragedies. She shows us how they diminish and distort—but never define—the lives of those who suffer them. Writing with sorrow, and anger, and courageous hope, she forces us to reconsider what we mean by "justice," and by what endeavors its cause might be advanced, if never finally achieved. —Kristian Williams, author Our Enemies in Blue"I read Angels With Dirty Faces in one sitting, mesmerized by what Walidah Imarisha has accomplished. It is a daring dive into the real deal about why prisons don't work...written in such lyrical, fierce poetry it takes your breath away." —Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, editor of The Revolution Starts at Home"

Learning Good Consent: On Healthy Relationships and Survivor Support


Cindy Crabb - 2016
    Building ethical relationships is one of the most important things we can do, but sex, consent, abuse, and support can get complicated. This collection is an indispensable guide to both preventing sexual violence and helping its survivors to heal. Includes a foreword by Kiyomi Fujikawa and Jenna Peters-Golden.“Whether or not you think you need it, whether or not you’re a survivor, or dating a survivor, or even having sex, you would probably benefit from reading this book. And the people you choose to be intimate with will probably thank you for making their safety a priority.” —Nomy Lamm, Feminist Review “Learning Good Consent … offers powerful, complicated information (instead of shallow questions and uncomplicated answers). This book speaks to those who are unlearning silence as a safety/communication strategy.” —Jen Cross, make/shift“Essential reading.” —Colin Atrophy Hagendorf, author of Slice Harvester “What this book does is to stress consent: not ‘no means no,’ or even ‘yes means yes,’ but ‘Do you want me to stay here with you?’ ‘Are you here?’ ‘I thought I wanted this, but I’m not sure now.’ ‘Do you think we should take this farther?’ I’m moved that this book is here. It matters.” —Alison Piepmeier, author of Girl Zines: Making Media, Doing Feminism Cindy Crabb is an author of the influential, feminist, autobiographical ‘zine Doris, which has been anthologized into two books: The Encyclopedia of Doris: Stories, Essays and Interviews and Doris: An Anthology 1991–2001. Her essays and analyses of the impact of her writing have appeared in numerous books and magazines, including: The Riot Grrrl Collection; Stay Solid! A Radical Handbook for Youth; Girl Zines: Making Media, Doing Feminism; and We Don’t Need Another Wave: Dispatches from the Next Generation of Feminists.

Creating Freedom: Power, Control and the Fight for Our Future


Raoul Martinez - 2016
    It is foundational to our democracy, our way of life - our very conception of what it is to be human. But are we free in the way that we think we are?In Creating Freedom, Raoul Martinez compellingly dismantles the sacred myth of freedom, showing that our belief that our institutions are free, even our sense of ourselves as agents of free will, is all based on false understanding. From the lottery of our birth, to the coercive influence of our media, to the self-reinforcing, consent-manufacturing realities of power and money, this far-reaching manifesto fiercely demonstrates just how differently we would act if we accepted how the world really is.It shows that freedom is not something we are given; it is not even something we can easily take. But with empathy, imagination, and determination - it is something we can create.

This Is an Uprising: How Nonviolent Revolt Is Shaping the Twenty-First Century


Mark Engler - 2016
    When mass movements erupt onto our television screens, the media consistently portrays them as being spontaneous and unpredictable. Yet, in this book, Mark and Paul Engler look at the hidden art behind such outbursts of protest, examining core principles that have been used to spark and guide moments of transformative unrest. With incisive insights from contemporary activists, as well as fresh revelations about the work of groundbreaking figures such as Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Gene Sharp, and Frances Fox Piven, the Englers show how people with few resources and little conventional influence are engineering the upheavals that are reshaping contemporary politics. Nonviolence is usually seen simply as a philosophy or moral code. This Is an Uprising shows how it can instead be deployed as a method of political conflict, disruption, and escalation. It argues that if we are always taken by surprise by dramatic outbreaks of revolt, we pass up the chance to truly understand how social transformation happens.

Witness to the Revolution: Radicals, Resisters, Vets, Hippies, and the Year America Lost Its Mind and Found Its Soul


Clara Bingham - 2016
    From August 1969 to August 1970, the nation witnessed nine thousand protests and eighty-four acts of arson or bombings at schools across the country. It was the year of the My Lai massacre investigation, the Cambodia invasion, Woodstock, and the Moratorium to End the War. The American death toll in Vietnam was approaching fifty thousand, and the ascendant counterculture was challenging nearly every aspect of American society. Witness to the Revolution, Clara Bingham’s unique oral history of that tumultuous time, unveils anew that moment when America careened to the brink of a civil war at home, as it fought a long, futile war abroad.Woven together from one hundred original interviews, Witness to the Revolution provides a firsthand narrative of that period of upheaval in the words of those closest to the action—the activists, organizers, radicals, and resisters who manned the barricades of what Students for a Democratic Society leader Tom Hayden called “the Great Refusal.”We meet Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn of the Weather Underground; Daniel Ellsberg, the former Defense Department employee who released the Pentagon Papers; feminist theorist Robin Morgan; actor and activist Jane Fonda; and many others whose powerful personal stories capture the essence of an era. We witness how the killing of four students at Kent State turned a straitlaced social worker into a hippie, how the civil rights movement gave birth to the women’s movement, and how opposition to the war in Vietnam turned college students into prisoners, veterans into peace marchers, and intellectuals into bombers.With lessons that can be applied to our time, Witness to the Revolution is more than just a record of the death throes of the Age of Aquarius. Today, when America is once again enmeshed in racial turmoil, extended wars overseas, and distrust of the government, the insights contained in this book are more relevant than ever.

Skin, Tooth, and Bone: The Basis of Movement is Our People: A Disability Justice Primer


Sins Invalid - 2016
    Skin, Tooth, and Bone offers analysis, history and context for the growing Disability Justice Movement. The Second Edition includes the addition of a new section on Audism and Deafhood written and edited by members of the D/deaf community, and a Call to Action from Survivors of Environmental Injury, as well as disability justice timelines, an extensive glossary, and a resource list for learning more.

Follow the Moon Home: A Tale of One Idea, Twenty Kids, and a Hundred Sea Turtles


Philippe Cousteau - 2016
    Meet Viv, who has a new home and a new school by the sea and follow her as she finds her way in a new place and helps bring together a whole community to save the sea turtles of the South Carolina coast.• Explores various important themes like activism, philanthropy, volunteerism, and more• Features gorgeous watercolor illustrations that are colorful and engaging• Includes a "Letter to Young Activists" from the author as well as resources to learn more about sea turtles.• Meilo So is the esteemed illustrator of many books, including Water Sings Blue. Philippe Cousteau is an award-winning television host, producer, author, speaker, philanthropist, and social entrepreneur. Deborah Hopkinson is the author of many award-winning nonfiction books for young readersFans of Manfish and Water Sings Blue will also enjoy the inspiring storyline and stunning illustrations in Follow the Moon Home.• Great family and classroom read-aloud book• Books for kids ages 4-6 • Children's picture books for kindergarten through third grade

Secrets of a Successful Organizer


Alexandra Bradbury - 2016
    and you’re ready to do something about it.This book will show you how to fight back where you work and win. You’ll learn how to identify the key issues in your workplace, build campaigns to tackle them, anticipate management’s tricks and traps, and inspire your co-workers to stand together despite their fears. It’s a step-by-step guide to building power on the job.

Unspeakable


Chris Hedges - 2016
    He is an intellectual bomb thrower, who continues to confront American empire in the most incisive, challenging ways. The kinds of insights he provides into the deeply troubled state of our democracy cannot be found anywhere else. Like many of our most important thinkers, he has been relegated to the margins because of ideas deemed too radical—or true—for public consumption. Whether it is covering the dissolution of former Soviet states or embedding in the Middle East to understand the post-9/11 world, he has been a singular voice pushing against mainstream media disinformation and the amnesia of establishment received wisdom. He is an intellectual heir to American radical heroes such as Thomas Paine and Noam Chomsky, and is dedicated to reigniting a shared commitment to radical equality and honesty.Hedges here speaks up about the most pressing issues that currently face our nation. He tackles the rise of a fascist right in support of Donald Trump, which advocates xenophobia and violence in a push for American totalitarianism. He rails against the posturing of inclusivity from establishment elites on both sides of the aisle, who post-Occupy-Wall-Street continue to advocate for policies that make America uninhabitable for all but the ultra-rich and, as lackeys for corporate interests, continue to expand income inequality in all directions. He tears into the contemporary glamorization of the military and the unchecked, unchallenged hawkishness that defines contemporary American foreign policy. Moreover, he shows his support for contemporary revolts against this twisted order—such as Black Lives Matter—that represent Americans refusing to take the destruction of their country lying down. And that’s just the start.He possesses a clear understanding of the challenges that lie before us, and has proven to be ahead of the curve time and again. All of which is to say, Chris Hedges is unafraid to say what is necessary and true—and has always been. If we are to combat the intellectual and moral decay that have come to grip American life, we must listen to him and the urgent message he brings in this book.

The Black Panthers: Portraits from an Unfinished Revolution


Bryan Shih - 2016
    But beyond the labels of "extremist" and "violent" that have marked the party, and beyond charismatic leaders like Huey Newton, Bobby Seale, and Eldridge Cleaver, were the ordinary men and women who made up the Panther rank and file. In The Black Panthers, photojournalist Bryan Shih and historian Yohuru Williams offer a reappraisal of the party's history and legacy. Through stunning portraits and interviews with surviving Panthers, as well as illuminating essays by leading scholars, The Black Panthers reveals party members' grit and battle scars--and the undying love for the people that kept them going.

Of Poetry and Protest: From Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin


Philip Cushway - 2016
    Smith, as well as the work of other luminaries such as Elizabeth Alexander, Ishmael Reed, and Sonia Sanchez. Included are poems such as “No Wound of Exit” by Patricia Smith, “We Are Not Responsible” by Harryette Mullen, and “Poem for My Father” by Quincy Troupe. Each is accompanied by a photograph of the poet along with a first-person biography. The anthology also contains personal essays on race such as “The Talk” by Jeannine Amber and works by Harry Belafonte, Amiri Baraka, and The Reverend Dr. William Barber II, architect of the Moral Mondays movement, as well as images and iconic political posters of the Black Lives Matter movement, Malcolm X, and the Black Panther Party. Taken together, Of Poetry and Protest gives voice to the current conversation about race in America while also providing historical and cultural context. It serves as an excellent introduction to African American poetry and is a must-have for every reader committed to social justice and racial harmony.

Queering Sexual Violence: Radical Voices from Within the Anti-Violence Movement


Jennifer Patterson - 2016
    Queering Sexual Violence: Radical Voices from Within the Anti-Violence Movement locates them at the center of the anti-violence movement and creates a space for their voices to be heard. Moving beyond dominant narratives and the traditional “violence against women” framework, the book is multi-gendered, multi-racial and multi-layered. This thirty-seven piece collection disrupts the mainstream conversations about sexual violence and connects them to disability justice, sex worker rights, healing justice, racial justice, gender self-determination, queer & trans liberation and prison industrial complex abolition through reflections, personal narrative, and strategies for resistance and healing. Where systems, institutions, families, communities and partners have failed them, this collection lifts them up, honors a multitude of lived experiences and shares the radical work that is being done outside mainstream anti-violence and the non-profit industrial complex.

Democracy Now!: Twenty Years Covering the Movements Changing America


Amy Goodman - 2016
    Today it is the largest public media collaboration in the US. This important book looks back over the past twenty years of Democracy Now! and the powerful movements and charismatic leaders who are re-shaping our world. Goodman takes us along as she goes to where the silence is, bringing out voices from the streets of Ferguson to Staten Island, Wall Street, and South Carolina to East Timor—and other places where people are rising up to demand justice. Giving voice to those who have been forgotten, forsaken, and beaten down by the powerful, Democracy Now! pays tribute to those progressive heroes—the whistleblowers, the organizers, the protestors—who have brought about remarkable, often invisible change over the last couple of decades in seismic ways. This is “an impassioned book aiming to fuel informed participation, outrage, and dissent” (Kirkus Reviews).

A Radical Faith: The Assassination of Sister Maura


Eileen Markey - 2016
    But as Congress held hearings, the State Department, CIA, and FBI traded memos, and supporters held emotional memorial services, the women themselves became symbols, shorn of context and background: hapless victims.In A Radical Faith, journalist Eileen Markey sets the record straight, exploring the full and complex life of one of these women, Sister Maura Clarke. Raised in a tight-knit Irish Catholic community in Queens, New York during WWII, by the 1970s she was organizing and marching against the dictatorship in Nicaragua and willing to take great risks for a movement to transform El Salvador.Drawing on interviews with Maura’s family and those she worked with, Maura’s letters, and declassified government documents, Markey weaves an intimate portrait of Maura’s spiritual and political journey during a shockingly violent era. Working in poor communities transformed Maura from an obedient and rule-bound young woman into a provocative critic of authority who pushed the boundaries of what it meant to be faithful to religious conviction and her own heart—even if it meant challenging the CIA-backed regimes that terrorized the poor of Latin America. Maura’s life is a microcosm of the larger evolution of postwar Catholicism: from a inward-looking, protective institution in the 1950s, through the dramatic reassessments of Vatican II to a community of Christians grappling with liberation theology and what it meant to serve God in the world and beside the poor in the 1970s. As Pope Francis challenges and fascinates the world with outspoken calls for justice, A Radical Faith provides an up-close account of what a faith that does justice looks like.

Style of Attack Report


Metropolarity - 2016
    This Style of Attack Report contains select work from Metropolarity's four founding members, who contribute theory, practice, and experience of home grown speculative visioning for both historical documentation as well as personal and collective survival. The collection serves as a model and a record of how Black, brown, queer, low-resource, working, ill and in-recovery people can project themselves into the future, conjuring resources, technology, and magic that aid us in the present. Also this sci-fi is FIRE cuz the crew don't play.

Blessed is the Flame: An Introduction to Concentration Camp Resistance and Anarcho-Nihilism


Serafinski - 2016
    Within each of these stories we can find a simmering spirit of anarcho-nihilism, a tendency that challenges us to translate our feelings of hopelessness into wild and joyous forms of attack.Because even if we don't stand a chance, we refuse to be led to the slaughter like sheep."

To Live Freely in This World: Sex Worker Activism in Africa


Chi Adanna Mgbako - 2016
    To Live Freely in This World is the first book to tell the story of the brave activists at the beating heart of the sex workers’ rights movement in Africa—the newest and most vibrant face of the global sex workers’ rights struggle. African sex worker activists are proving that communities facing human rights abuses are not bereft of agency. They’re challenging politicians, religious fundamentalists, and anti-prostitution advocates; confronting the multiple stigmas that affect the diverse members of their communities; engaging in intersectional movement building with similarly marginalized groups; and participating in the larger global sex workers’ rights struggle in order to determine their social and political fate. By locating this counter-narrative in Africa, To Live Freely in This World challenges disempowering and one-dimensional depictions of “degraded Third World prostitutes” and helps fill what has been a gaping hole in feminist scholarship regarding sex work in the African context. Based on original fieldwork in seven African countries, including Botswana, Kenya, Mauritius, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda, Chi Adanna Mgbako draws on extensive interviews with over 160 African female and male (cisgender and transgender) sex worker activists, and weaves their voices and experiences into a fascinating, richly-detailed, and powerful examination of the history and continuing activism of this young movement.

Watershed Discipleship


Ched Myers - 2016
    Watershed Discipleship is a ""triple entendre"" that recognizes we are in a watershed historical moment of crisis, focuses on our intrinsically bioregional locus as followers of Jesus, and urges us to become disciples of our watersheds. Bibliographic framing essays by Myers trace his journey into a bioregionalist Christian faith and practice and offer reflections on incarnational theology, hermeneutics, and ecclesiology. The essays feature more than a dozen activists, educators, and practitioners under the age of forty, whose work and witness attest to a growing movement of resistance and reimagination across North America. This anthology overviews the bioregional paradigm and its theological and political significance for local sustainability, restorative justice, and spiritual renewal. Contributors reread both biblical texts and churchly practices (such as mission, baptism, and liturgy) through the lens of ""re-place-ment."" Herein is a comprehensive and engaged call for a ""Transition church"" that can help turn our history around toward environmental resiliency and social justice, by passionate advocates on the front lines of watershed discipleship. CONTRIBUTORS: Sasha Adkins, Jay Beck, Tevyn East, Erinn Fahey, Katarina Friesen, Matt Humphrey, Vickie Machado, Jonathan McRay, Sarah Nolan, Reyna Ortega, Dave Pritchett, Erynn Smith, Sarah Thompson, Lydia Wylie-Kellermann "". . . let diverse young peace and justice activists and visionaries instruct you. Their fresh biblical exegesis, interlaced with the experience of coming home to their bioregions and its waters of life, will inspire you from front to back in this remarkable volume"" --Larry Rasmussen, Union Theological Seminary ""Myers brings a much-needed prophetic voice to the church with his call to watershed discipleship. The way he frames the issues--along with hopeful actions--and then engages an array of younger voices makes this anthology poignant. The book helps the church rediscover that the bioregional lens is critical to practicing the good news of the gospel. This material will be required reading in the collegiate courses I teach and with congregations seeking a new paradigm for living out their faith."" --Luke Gascho, Executive Director, Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center, Goshen College; Leader, Mennonite Creation Care Network ""This book is important not just because it offers some shred of hope for the future of the church, but because it shows Christians who are relevant allies in the struggle for the planet."" --Laurel Dykstra, Salal + Cedar Watershed Discipleship Community, Coast Salish Territory ""Ched Myers and the team of young authors he has assembled offer in this volume a Spirit-inspired, theologically grounded call to action that is filled with passionate hope."" --Cynthia Moe-Lobeda, Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary and the Graduate Theological Union Ched Myers is an author and activist theologian who has worked in social change movements for forty years. He and his partner, Elaine Enns, who helped edit this volume, co-direct Bartimaeus Cooperative Ministries (www.bcm-net.org) in the Ventura River watershed, traditional Chumash teritory in southern California. Their publications can be found at www.ChedMyers.org.

Charleston Syllabus: Readings on Race, Racism, and Racial Violence


Chad Williams - 2016
    The Twitter hashtag #charlestonsyllabus quickly emerged as the central resource for help in learning how the tragedy fit into the tumultuous history of race relations - not only in the United States but globally. This reader collects some of the best writings to be recommended and debated using the Charleston Syllabus hashtag. Featuring a variety of texts such as songs and poems, historical documents, op-eds, and excerpts from books and journals, Charleston Syllabus is a tool for understanding the roots of American systemic racism, white privilege, the uses and abuses of the Confederate flag and its ideals, the black church as a foundation for civil rights activity, and much more.

The Activist's Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for a Modern Revolution


William Martin - 2016
    Looking for answers to today’s wrenching challenges, William Martin turns to the Tao Te Ching and finds that while Taoism is known for its quiet, enigmatic wisdom, the Tao can also have the cleansing force of a rushing river.Through his interpretation of this ancient Chinese text, Martin elucidates revolutionary messages condemning power-seeking and greed. He emphasizes that humans have a “natural virtue” that can help them heal the planet; shows how Taoism’s simplicity can be subversive and its flexibility a potent force; and reassures that “when injustice is the rule, justice always lies in wait.”Provocative and stirring, Martin’s Tao flows within and through those who ride the waves of anger and frustration and gently guides them to true freedom.“We have learned the secret of transformation: Injustice feeds our determination. Hate increases our love. Wounds bring forth our healing, and fear uncovers our courage and serenity.”— from The Activist’s Tao Te Ching

Queer & Trans Artists of Color Vol 2


Nia King - 2016
    Building on the groundbreaking first volume, Queer and Trans Artists of Color: Stories of Some of Our Lives, NIA KING is back with a second archive of interviews from her podcast We Want the Airwaves. She maintains her signature frankness as an interviewer while seeking advice on surviving capitalism from creative folks who often find their labor devalued. In this collection of interviews, Nia discusses biphobia in gay men's communities with JUBA KALAMKA, helping border-crossers find water in the desert with MICHA CARDENAS, trying to preserve Indigenous languages through painting with GRACE ROSARIO PERKINS, revolutionary monster stories with ELENA ROSE, using textiles to protest police violence with INDIRA ALLEGRA, trying to respectfully reclaim one's own culture with AMIR RABIYAH, taking on punk racism with MIMI THI NGUYEN, the imminent trans women of color world takeover with LEXI ADSIT, queer life in WWII Japanese American incarceration camps with TINA TAKEMOTO, hip-hop and Black Nationalism with AJUAN MANCE, making music in exile with MARTIN SORRONDEGUY, issue-based versus identity-based organizing with TRISH SALAH, ten years of curating and touring with the QTPOC arts organization Mangos With Chili with CHERRY GALETTE, raising awareness about gentrification through games with MATTIE BRICE, self-publishing versus working with a small press with VIVEK SHREYA, and the colonial nature of journalism school with KILEY MAY. The conversation continues. Bear witness to QTPOC brilliance.

No Tea, No Shade: New Writings in Black Queer Studies


E. Patrick Johnson - 2016
    Building on the foundations laid by the earlier volume, this collection's contributors speak new truths about the black queer experience while exemplifying the codification of black queer studies as a rigorous and important field of study. Topics include "raw" sex, pornography, the carceral state, gentrification, gender nonconformity, social media, the relationship between black feminist studies and black trans studies, the black queer experience throughout the black diaspora, and queer music, film, dance, and theater. The contributors both disprove naysayers who believed black queer studies to be a passing trend and respond to critiques of the field's early U.S. bias. Deferring to the past while pointing to the future, No Tea, No Shade pushes black queer studies in new and exciting directions.Contributors. Jafari S. Allen, Marlon M. Bailey, Zachary Shane Kalish Blair, La Marr Jurelle Bruce, Cathy J. Cohen, Jennifer DeClue, Treva Ellison, Lyndon K. Gill, Kai M. Green, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Kwame Holmes, E. Patrick Johnson, Shaka McGlotten, Amber Jamilla Musser, Alison Reed, Ramón H. Rivera-Servera, Tanya Saunders, C. Riley Snorton, Kaila Story, Omise'eke Natasha Tinsley, Julia Roxanne Wallace, Kortney Ziegler

Milo's Museum


Zetta Elliott - 2016
    The docent leads them on a tour and afterward Milo has time to look around on her own. But something doesn't feel right, and Milo gradually realizes that the people from her community are missing from the museum. When her aunt urges her to find a solution, Milo takes matters into her own hands and opens her own museum!

Cultural Studies 1983: A Theoretical History


Stuart Hall - 2016
    The eight foundational lectures Hall delivered at the University of Illinois in 1983 introduced North American audiences to a thinker and discipline that would shift the course of critical scholarship. Unavailable until now, these lectures present Hall's original engagements with the theoretical positions that contributed to the formation of Cultural Studies. Throughout this personally guided tour of Cultural Studies' intellectual genealogy, Hall discusses the work of Richard Hoggart, Raymond Williams, and E. P. Thompson; the influence of structuralism; the limitations and possibilities of Marxist theory; and the importance of Althusser and Gramsci. Throughout these theoretical reflections, Hall insists that Cultural Studies aims to provide the means for political change.

Safe Is Not Enough: Better Schools for LGBTQ Students


Michael Sadowski - 2016
    Using examples from classrooms, schools, and districts across the country, Michael Sadowski identifies emerging practices such as creating an LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum; fostering a whole-school climate that is supportive of LGBTQ students; providing adults who can act as mentors and role models; and initiating effective family and community outreach programs.   While progress on LGBTQ issues in schools remains slow, in many parts of the country schools have begun making strides toward becoming safer, more welcoming places for LGBTQ students. Schools typically achieve this by revising antibullying policies and establishing GSAs (gay-straight student alliances). But it takes more than a deficit-based approach for schools to become places where LGBTQ students can fulfill their potential. In Safe Is Not Enough, Michael Sadowski highlights how educators can make their schools more supportive of LGBTQ students’ positive development and academic success.

Rise of the Lioness: Restoring a Habitat and its Pride on the Liuwa Plains


Bradley Hague - 2016
    Witness Lady's fight for survival in this evocative narrative on the decline, fall, and rebirth of the Liuwa Plains. Follow Lady as she grapples with a landscape altered by human hands and discover how both Lady and humankind restore balance to the environment. More than a story about one brave lion, The Lioness offers a great introduction to life science by looking at the workings of an ecosystem, the methods of scientists and environmentalists, and explaining the interconnection between the plant, animal, and human systems.

American Prophets: Seven Religious Radicals and Their Struggle for Social and Political Justice


Albert J. Raboteau - 2016
    J. Muste, Dorothy Day, Howard Thurman, Thomas Merton, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Fannie Lou Hamer inspired individuals who succeeded in conveying their vision to the broader public through writing, speaking, demonstrating, and organizing. Raboteau traces how their paths crossed and their lives intertwined, creating a network of committed activists who significantly changed the attitudes of several generations of Americans about contentious political issues such as war, racism, and poverty. Raboteau examines the influences that shaped their ideas and the surprising connections that linked them together. He discusses their theological and ethical positions, and describes the rhetorical and strategic methods these exemplars of modern prophecy used to persuade their fellow citizens to share their commitment to social change.A momentous scholarly achievement as well as a moving testimony to the human spirit, American Prophets represents a major contribution to the history of religion in American politics. This book is essential reading for anyone who is concerned about social justice, or who wants to know what prophetic thought and action can mean in today's world."

Tibet on Fire: Self-Immolations Against Chinese Rule


Tsering Woeser - 2016
    Most have died from their injuries. Author Tsering Woeser is a prominent voice of the Tibetan movement, and one of the few Tibetan authors to write in Chinese. Her stirring acts of resistance have led to her house arrest, where she remains under close surveillance to this day. Tibet On Fire is her account of the oppression Tibetans face and the ideals driving those who resist, both the self-immolators and other Tibetans like herself.With a cover image designed by Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei, Tibet on Fire is angry and cogent: a clarion call for the world to take action.

Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting


Shannon Vallor - 2016
    How can our future be protected in such challenging anduncertain conditions? How can we possibly improve the chances that the human family will not only live, but live well, into the 21st century and beyond?This book locates a key to that future in the distant past: specifically, in the philosophical traditions of virtue ethics developed by classical thinkers from Aristotle and Confucius to the Buddha. Each developed a way of seeking the good life that equips human beings with the moral andintellectual character to flourish even in the most unpredictable, complex and unstable situations--precisely where we find ourselves today.Through an examination of the many risks and opportunities presented by rapidly changing technosocial conditions, Vallor makes the case that if we are to have any real hope of securing a future worth wanting, then we will need more than just better technologies. We will also need better humans.Technology and the Virtues develops a practical framework for seeking that goal by means of the deliberate cultivation of technomoral virtues: specific skills and strengths of character, adapted to the unique challenges of 21st century life, that offer the human family our best chance of learning tolive wisely and well with emerging technologies.

Poetry of Resistance: Voices for Social Justice


Francisco X. Alarcón - 2016
    Moved by the students’ actions, that same day Francisco X. Alarcón responded by writing a poem in Spanish and English titled “Para Los Nueve del Capitolio/ For the Capitol Nine,” which he dedicated to the students. The students replied to the poem with a collective online message. To share with the world what was taking place, Alarcón then created a Facebook page called “Poets Responding to SB 1070” and posted the poem, launching a powerful and dynamic forum for social justice. Since then, more than three thousand original contributions by poets and artists from around the globe have been posted to the page. Poetry of Resistance offers a selection of these works, addressing a wide variety of themes, including racial profiling, xenophobia, cultural misunderstanding, violence against refugees, shared identity, and much more. Contributors include distinguished poets such as Francisco Aragón, Devreaux Baker, Sarah Browning, Lorna Dee Cervantes, Susan Deer Cloud, Sharon Dubiago, Martín Espada, Genny Lim, Pam Uschuk, and Alma Luz Villanueva. Bringing together more than eighty writers, the anthology powerfully articulates the need for change and the primacy of basic human rights. Each poem shows the heartfelt dedication these writers and artists have to justice in a world that has become larger than borders. Poetry of Resistance is a poetic call for tolerance, reflection, reconciliation, and healing.

Len, A Lawyer in History: A Graphic Biography of Radical Attorney Leonard Weinglass


Michael Steven Smith - 2016
    “The typical call I get is one that starts by saying, ‘You’re the fifth attorney we’ve called,’” he once said. “Then I get interested.” Those calls came from the likes of the SDS, the Chicago Seven, Daniel Ellsberg, Abbie Hoffman, and Mumia Abu-Jamal, among many others.In a field dominated by egomaniacs, Weinglass was known for his humility, his common touch, his ability to work collectively, his kindness, and his attention to detail. This long-overdue biography captures the vibrant life and inspiring legacy of an American iconoclast.Praise for Len, A Lawyer in History“For decades Seth Tobocman has been working within the comics vernacular to create a unique language, and with Len he’s at the top of his game…brilliantly applying himself not only with pencil and ink on paper, but as an active participant in the same political struggles that Len Weinglass valiantly dedicated his life to solving.” —Peter Kuper, author of Ruins“Tobocman has conjoined past and present to create singular, beautiful, volatile images of struggle.… At the center of this explosion—as example and harbinger, but most of all as an incendiary intimate portrait—stands Len himself. Our coalitions will forever be enriched by his presence, and by the demands his legacy bequeaths.” —AK Thompson, author of Black Bloc, White Riot“I met Len Weinglass in 1964.… He was learned, funny, and the best damned trial lawyer I ever saw in a courtroom.… The chapters on Newark, Chicago, and the Pentagon Papers case will help a new generation understand the substance behind all the blurry labels about the time.” —Tom Hayden, author of The Port Huron Statement “The book is dramatic in its reach and speechless in its words. It’s not just about Len, but who we were as people during his journey. Remarkable.” —Stanley L. Cohen, attorney and political activist“Len said: ‘I would classify myself as radical American. I want to spend my time defending people who have committed their time to progressive social change.’ This exemplifies how, along with Michael Ratner, William Kunstler, and other US lawyers around the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, he was an incredibly important role model for radical human rights lawyers in Europe such as myself.” —Wolfgang Kaleck, Secretary General, European Center for Constitutional and Human RightsPAUL BUHLE is the editor of a dozen comic art books along with many scholarly works, including the authorized biography of C.L.R. James.MICHAEL STEVEN SMITH is executor of Leonard Weinglass’s estate and co-editor of Imagine: Living in a Socialist USA.SETH TOBOCMAN is an author/illustrator and one of the founding editors of World War 3 Illustrated.

3 Conversations


Charlotte Shane - 2016
    Introduction by Haley Mlotek.

Walls Come Tumbling Down: The Music and Politics of Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge


Daniel Rachel - 2016
    The following sixteen years saw politics and pop music come together as never before to challenge racism, gender inequality and social and class divisions. For the first time in UK history, musicians became instigators of social change and their political persuasion as important as the songs they sang.Through the voices of campaigners, musicians, artists and politicians, Daniel Rachel charts this extraordinary and pivotal period between 1976 and 1992, following the rise and fall of three key movements of the time: Rock Against Racism, 2 Tone and Red Wedge, revealing how they both shaped, and were shaped by, the music of a generation.Consisting of new and exclusive in-depth conversations with over 100 contributors, including Pauline Black, Billy Bragg, Jerry Dammers, Phill Jupitus, Neil Kinnock, Linton Kwesi-Johnson, Tom Robinson, Clare Short, Tracey Thorn and many more, Walls Come Tumbling Down is a fascinating, polyphonic and authoritative account of those crucial sixteen years in Britain's history, from the acclaimed writer of Isle of Noises.Walls Come Tumbling Down also features more than 150 images – many rare or previously unpublished – from some of the greatest names in photography, including Adrian Boot, Chalkie Davies, Jill Furmanovsky, Syd Shelton, Pennie Smith, Steve Rapport and Virginia Turbett.

Rightlessness: Testimony and Redress in U.S. Prison Camps Since World War II


A. Naomi Paik - 2016
    Naomi Paik grapples with the history of U.S. prison camps that have confined people outside the boundaries of legal and civil rights. Removed from the social and political communities that would guarantee fundamental legal protections, these detainees are effectively rightless, stripped of the right even to have rights. Rightless people thus expose an essential paradox: while the United States purports to champion inalienable rights at home and internationally, it has built its global power in part by creating a regime of imprisonment that places certain populations perceived as threats beyond rights. The United States' status as the guardian of rights coincides with, indeed depends on, its creation of rightlessness.Yet rightless people are not silent. Drawing from an expansive testimonial archive of legal proceedings, truth commission records, poetry, and experimental video, Paik shows how rightless people use their imprisonment to protest U.S. state violence. She examines demands for redress by Japanese Americans interned during World War II, testimonies of HIV-positive Haitian refugees detained at Guantanamo in the early 1990s, and appeals by Guantanamo's enemy combatants from the War on Terror. In doing so, she reveals a powerful ongoing contest over the nature and meaning of the law, over civil liberties and global human rights, and over the power of the state in people's lives.

My Night in the Planetarium


Innosanto Nagara - 2016
    The true story of a child, a play, and the art of resistance.From the author and illustrator of A is for Activist and Counting on Community. This time, Innosanto Nagara tells a true story from his childhood in Indonesia. It is a child’s view of a particular place and time—but it is also an introduction to Indonesia, a story about colonialism, and a message about the power of creativity.-from http://www.aisforactivist.com/works/m...

Sacred Trickery and the Way of Kindness: The Radical Wisdom of Jodo


Alejandro Jodorowsky - 2016
    In this book, we get an intimate look into the inner workings of the cult figure of Jodo. What is revealed is a man who has evolved since his groundbreaking films of the 1970s, El Topo and The Holy Mountain, a man who has grown from a sacred trickster, a shaman of psychomagic, into a brilliant spiritual maverick of the 21st century. We get to see Jodo’s own reflections on the rich tapestry of his remarkable life, including the initiatory failure of the Dune film project, which combined the talents of a multitude of creative greats, including Moebius, Salvador Dali, Orson Welles, Mick Jagger, and H. R. Giger. We learn about Jodo’s years with Marcel Marceau and with great masters such as Ejo Takata, whose Zen training featured strenuous physical and mental ordeals; the sorceress Pachita, who performed psychic surgery on Jodo; and the mysterious Carlos Castaneda, whose sacred trickery reveals how intentions matter more than notions of “true” and “false.” Discussing the Way of Kindness that he now follows, Jodo reveals how intentionally practicing small acts of generosity and goodness can have a profound effect on your spirit, infusing life with a wealth of happiness. From sacred trickery to the path of kindness, Jodo’s radical wisdom discerns the timeless within the immediate and gauges the everyday by the measure of eternity.

Motivational Methods for Vegan Advocacy: A Clinical Psychology Perspective


Casey T. Taft - 2016
    Many fall within different "camps," claiming that their particular approach is more "effective" despite a lack of any meaningful or peer-reviewed scientific study. Often, claims of effectiveness are not grounded in any particular theory of behavioral change and may actually run counter to the clinical and scientific literatures about how change occurs for other behaviors. Motivational Methods for Vegan Advocacy applies principles and methods from the field of clinical psychology to enhance the potential impact of the animal advocacy efforts of individuals and groups. This work is based on the premise that animal advocates are the change-makers and will help determine whether this movement succeeds or fails. Fortunately, there are tried and tested models and strategies that have been shown to help create true, internal, long-standing behavioral change for a range of problem behaviors that include unnecessary violence. Taft discusses these methods and illustrates how they can best be applied in preventing the needless harm inflicted upon animals.

Toward an Urban Ecology: SCAPE / Landscape Architecture


Kate Orff - 2016
       In purely practical terms, SCAPE has already generated numerous tools and techniques that designers, policy makers, and communities can use to address some of the most pressing issues of our time, including the loss of biodiversity, the loss of social cohesion, and ecological degradation conceptualize. Toward an Urban Ecology features numerous projects and select research from SCAPE, and conveys a range of strategies to engender a more resilient and inclusive built environment.

A Life In Trans Activism


A. Revathi - 2016
    Revathi’s memoir The Truth about Me became a sensation in India when it was published in 2011. The pathbreaking autobiography told the story of Revathi’s childhood uneasiness with her male body, her exile to a house of hijras (the South Asian term for trans people) in Delhi, and her eventual transition. Now in her second book, Revathi: A Life in Trans Activism, Revathi opens up once again, telling the story of her life as an activist. In the Thiruchengode temple, with the hills of the Ardhanareeshwara as her backdrop, Revathi begins a conversation about what it means to live on the margins of society. She shares stories about her life working for the NGO, Sangama, which helps transgender people, and her remarkable journey there from office assistant to director. She describes her research into the lives of those who make the transition from female to male identity; her efforts to provide a voice to those who do not fit the gender binary; and her travels around the world to discuss the community’s experience. Revathi also sheds light on her decision to quit Sangama and continue her struggle as an independent activist—including her collaboration with a theater group performing a play based on her autobiography. As told to Nandini Murali, Revathi: A Life in Trans Activism provides insight  into one of the least talked about subjects in our society—from the point of view of a person most qualified to talk about it. This is a rare and searingly honest account of Revathi’s life—on both sides of the gender binary.

Unruly Equality: U.S. Anarchism in the Twentieth Century


Andrew Cornell - 2016
    Far from fading away, anarchists dealt with major events such as the rise of Communism, the New Deal, atomic warfare, the black freedom struggle, and a succession of artistic avant-gardes stretching from 1915 to 1975.Unruly Equality traces U.S. anarchism as it evolved from the creed of poor immigrants militantly opposed to capitalism early in the twentieth century to one that today sees resurgent appeal among middle-class youth and foregrounds political activism around ecology, feminism, and opposition to cultural alienation.

Say Her Name: Resisting Police Brutality Against Black Women


Kimberlé Crenshaw - 2016
    In addition to stories of Black women who have been killed by police and who have experienced gender-specific forms of police violence, Say Her Name provides some analytical frames for understanding their experiences and broadens dominant conceptions of who experiences state violence and what it looks like. Say Her Name responds to increasing calls for attention to police violence against Black women by offering a resource to help ensure that Black women’s stories are integrated into demands for justice, policy responses to police violence, and media representations of victims and survivors of police brutality.

Outspoken: A Decade of Transgender Activism and Trans Feminism


Julia Serano - 2016
    It is a personal history of where transgender activism has recently been, and a passionate insightful analysis of where it should head in the future. This collection compiles forty-eight of her previously unpublished and difficult to find trans-themed writings, including her early slam poems and spoken word, essays and manifestos written contemporaneously with her acclaimed books Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity and Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive, plus her recent work addressing differences within transgender communities and activism. These pieces are augmented with thoughtful introductions and interludes that contextualize the issues at hand and previous periods in transgender activism. Combining elements of memoir, historical account, gender theory, and activist philosophy, this book is a must for anyone who has appreciated Serano's previous books and/or has an interest in transgender identities, experiences, perspectives, and progress.

Being a Scholar in the Digital Era: Transforming Scholarly Practice for the Public Good


Jessie Daniels - 2016
    It is the first to consider how new technologies can connect academics, journalists, and activists in ways that foster transformation on issues of social justice. Discussing digital innovations in higher education as well as what these changes mean in an age of austerity, this book provides both a vision of what scholars can be in the digital era and a road map to how they can enliven the public good.

On Their Own Terms: Animal Liberation for the 21st Century


Lee Hall - 2016
    On Their Own Terms: Animal Liberation for the 21st Century uncovers our personal connections with the current emissions and extinction crises. It explores the human potential to fit our own habitat, while allowing nonhuman communities to thrive in theirs. Explore the hits and misses of animal and environmental advocacy. Learn the ethic underlying the burgeoning vegan movement. And consider some personal goal-setting exercises. This book is a call to community action, and your workshop for social change.

Vulnerability in Resistance


Judith Butler - 2016
    Focusing on political movements and cultural practices in different global locations, including Turkey, Palestine, France, and the former Yugoslavia, the contributors to Vulnerability in Resistance articulate an understanding of the role of vulnerability in practices of resistance. They consider how vulnerability is constructed, invoked, and mobilized within neoliberal discourse, the politics of war, resistance to authoritarian and securitarian power, in LGBTQI struggles, and in the resistance to occupation and colonial violence. The essays offer a feminist account of political agency by exploring occupy movements and street politics, informal groups at checkpoints and barricades, practices of self-defense, hunger strikes, transgressive enactments of solidarity and mourning, infrastructural mobilizations, and aesthetic and erotic interventions into public space that mobilize memory and expose forms of power. Pointing to possible strategies for a feminist politics of transversal engagements and suggesting a politics of bodily resistance that does not disavow forms of vulnerability, the contributors develop a new conception of embodiment and sociality within fields of contemporary power.Contributors: Meltem Ahiska, Athena Athanasiou, Sarah Bracke, Judith Butler, Elsa Dorlin, Basak Ertür, Zeynep Gambetti, Rema Hammami, Marianne Hirsch, Elena Loizidou, Leticia Sabsay, Nükhet Sirman, Elena Tzelepis

Public Sphere and Experience: Analysis of the Bourgeois and Proletarian Public


Alexander Kluge - 2016
    But is this a single authoritative and universal space in which various positions compete for recognition, or does it consist of multiple local spaces spread over diverse collectivities? In Kluge and Negt’s groundbreaking book they examine the material conditions of experience in an arena that had previously figured only as an abstract term: the media of mass and consumer culture.With a new, up-to-date introduction from Alexander Kluge.

Powered by Girl: A Field Guide for Working with Youth Activists


Lyn Mikel Brown - 2016
    Here we learn about the intergenerational support behind thirteen-year-old Julia Bluhm when she got Seventeen to go Photoshop free; nineteen-year-old Celeste Montano, who pressed Google to diversify their Doodles; and sixteen-year-old Yas Necati, who campaigns for better sex education. And we learn what experienced adult activists say about how to scaffold girls' social-change work. Brown argues that adults shouldn't encourage girls to "lean in." Rather, girls should be supported in creating their own movements--disrupting the narrative, developing their own ideas--on their own terms.

Matricentric Feminism: Theory, Activism, Practice


Andrea O'Reilly - 2016
    Indeed, mothers are oppressed under patriarchy as women and as mothers. Consequently, mothers need a feminism of their own, one that positions mothers’ concerns as the starting point for a theory and politic of empowerment. O’Reilly terms this new mode of feminism matricentic feminism and the book explores how it is represented and experienced in theory, activism, and practice. The chapter on maternal theory examines the central theoretical concepts of maternal scholarship while the chapter on activism considers the twenty-first century motherhood movement. Feminist mothering is likewise examined as the specific practice of matricentric feminism and this chapter discusses various theories and strategies on and for maternal empowerment. Matricentric feminism is also examined in relation to the larger field of academic feminism; here O’Reilly persuasively shows how matricentric feminism has been marginalized in academic feminism and considers the reasons for such exclusion and how such may be challenged and changed.

Idealist's Survival Kit, The: 75 Simple Ways to Prevent Burnout


Alessandra Pigni - 2016
    Gathered from Alessandra Pigni’s interaction with humanitarian professionals and backed up by cutting–edge research, these concrete tools offer new perspectives and inspiration to anyone whose work is focused on helping others.

No More Heroes: Grassroots Challenges to the Savior Mentality


Jordan Flaherty - 2016
    No More Heroes celebrates grassroots challenges to these saviors and highlights movements focused on real, systemic change from the Arab Spring to Black Lives Matter.Praise for No More Heroes “In this marvelous, enormously instructive book, Jordan Flaherty explores how we too often allow the struggle for change to be undermined by would-be saviors—and how today’s grassroots social movements, led by communities on the frontlines of crisis, are charting a far more powerful path forward.” —Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything“Part memoir, part history, part political critique, No More Heroes exposes the savior complex for what it really is: imperialism camouflaged as a rescue operation. A perfect gift for the age of Trump.” —Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams“In No More Heroes, Jordan Flaherty upends the world. You might think you understand the issues of sex workers, disaster victims, and the poor, but through this series of personal stories from the front lines of these fights, No More Heroes demonstrates that our best intended assumptions are often wrong. Read this book before your misguided good intentions do more harm to your pet causes than good.” —Lolis Eric Elie, Writer, HBO’s Treme“From left -wing vanguards, Teach-For-America, and charitable foundations, to the power of military interventions, Jordan Flaherty shows how rhetorics of commercial culture and corporate media re-appear as ‘moral’ arguments to justify domination. This is an original interrogation of destructive control masquerading as ‘help.’” —Sarah Schulman, author of Conflict Is Not Abuse“Jordan Flaherty is one of America’s most committed journalists writing from below and to the left. His work lifts up voices rarely heard in media as he focuses on the tireless, courageous work of marginalized communities building collective power. At a time when many movements are increasingly aligned with the dangerous neoliberal notion of individual saviors, Jordan reminds us there are no masters in the path to love and liberation.” —Harsha Walia, author of Undoing Border Imperialism“Compelling and accessible, this book may be challenging for folks with privilege—especially cisgendered straight white men—to read as it demands they ask searing questions that may indict them and their behavior, but Flaherty shows clearly that is exactly what privileged people have to do, because oppressed people stare these realities in the face every day—and when we blink, we die.” —Walidah Imarisha, author of Angels with Dirty Faces“Jordan Flaherty...has learned through personal experience and from listening to those who are marginalized just how dangerous it can be for would-be superheroes (even those with the best intentions) to take up the cause of justice, absent a real grounding in the solidarity and accountability necessary to bring true liberation. This is a unique and compelling contribution to movement literature, written with a humility that is as powerful as it is genuine.” —Tim Wise, author of White Like Me“No More Heroes gives us all another opportunity to do what it will actually take to create liberation in our lifetimes: trust them most impacted, come together across forms of oppression, and most importantly throw away the scarcity-based, fragile individuality that privilege teaches us to defend. Let it go, and embrace the humbling, collective work of getting free.” —Alexis Pauline Gumbs, author of Spill

Twenty Years with the Jewish Labor Bund: A Memoir of Interwar Poland


Bernard Goldstein - 2016
    As such, the book offers a corrective view in the form of social history, one that commands attention and demands respect for the vitality and activism of the generation of Polish Jews so brutally annihilated by the barbarism of the Nazis.In Warsaw, a city with over 300,000 Jews (one third of the population), Bernstein was the Jewish Labor Bund’s “enforcer,” organizer, and head of their militia—the one who carried out daily, on-the-street organization of unions; the fighting off of Communists, Polish anti-Semitic hooligans, and antagonistic police; marshaling and protecting demonstrations; and even settling family disputes, some of them arising from the new secular, socialist culture being fostered by the Bund.Goldstein’s is a portrait of tough Jews willing to do battle—worldly, modern individuals dedicated to their folk culture and the survival of their people. It delivers an unparalleled street-level view of vibrant Jewish life in Poland between the wars: of Jewish masses entering modern life, of Jewish workers fighting for their rights, of optimism, of greater assertiveness and self-confidence, of armed combat, and even of scenes depicting the seamy, semi-criminal elements. It provides a representation of life in Poland before the great catastrophe of World War II, a life of flowering literary activity, secular political journalism, successful political struggle, immersion in modern politics, fights for worker rights and benefits, a strong social-democratic labor movement, creation of a secular school system in Yiddish, and a youth movement that later provided the heroic fighters for the courageous Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Making It Right: Building Peace, Settling Conflict


Marilee Peters - 2016
    It’s often called restorative justice. It’s a way to think about the deeper reasons behind crimes, and suggests that by building more caring communities, it’s possible to change our societies—and ourselves.Making It Right relates true stories of young people who are working in innovative ways to further peaceful resolution of conflict and to heal past wounds. The book begins with individual injustices, such as bullying, and works up to collective ones, like wars. Each chapter begins with a dramatic fictional account, making the topic engaging and relevant for kids.Restorative justice isn’t going to change the world overnight, nor will it end all crime or prevent all wars. But it’s a powerful way to get teens thinking about how they can participate in building a more peaceful society.

Outside the XY: Queer Black and Brown Masculinity


Morgan Mann Willis - 2016
    Read these passionate, complex autobiographical glimpses into the many layers of identity as the authors offer olive branches to old and new lovers.This anthology is designed to be uplifting, as it considers and explores our masculine identities as non cis-gendered males, or those traditionally born with the "XY" chromosome. It is a radical act of self-love and affirmation. Outside the XY is a labor of love.

Women Against Marcos: Stories of Filipino and Filipino American Women Who Fought a Dictator


Mila De Guzman - 2016
    The author includes short recollections of her own journey towards activism and letters from the underground from her sister Violeta, who helped inspire her to join the U.S. movement against the dictatorship.

Changing the World from the Inside Out: Jewish Wisdom for a Lifetime of Making a Difference


David Jaffe - 2016
    

A Pound of Flesh: Monetary Sanctions as Punishment for the Poor


Alexes Harris - 2016
    Court-ordered monetary sanctions that compel criminal defendants to pay fines, fees, surcharges, and restitution further inhibit their ability to reenter society. In A Pound of Flesh, sociologist Alexes Harris analyzes the rise of monetary sanctions in the criminal justice system and shows how they permanently penalize and marginalize the poor. She exposes the damaging effects of a little-understood component of criminal sentencing and shows how it further perpetuates racial and economic inequality.Harris draws from extensive sentencing data, legal documents, observations of court hearings, and interviews with defendants, judges, prosecutors, and other court officials. She documents how low-income defendants are affected by monetary sanctions, which include fees for public defenders and a variety of processing charges. Until these debts are paid in full, individuals remain under judicial supervision, subject to court summons, warrants, and jail stays. As a result of interest and surcharges that accumulate on unpaid financial penalties, these monetary sanctions often become insurmountable legal debts which many offenders carry for the remainder of their lives. Harris finds that such fiscal sentences, which are imposed disproportionately on low-income minorities, help create a permanent economic underclass and deepen social stratification.A Pound of Flesh delves into the court practices of five counties in Washington State to illustrate the ways in which subjective sentencing shapes the practice of monetary sanctions. Judges and court clerks hold a considerable degree of discretion in the sentencing and monitoring of monetary sanctions and rely on individual values—such as personal responsibility, meritocracy, and paternalism—to determine how much and when offenders should pay. Harris shows that monetary sanctions are imposed at different rates across jurisdictions, with little or no state government oversight. Local officials’ reliance on their own values and beliefs can also push offenders further into debt—for example, when judges charge defendants who lack the means to pay their fines with contempt of court and penalize them with additional fines or jail time.A Pound of Flesh provides a timely examination of how monetary sanctions permanently bind poor offenders to the judicial system. Harris concludes that in letting monetary sanctions go unchecked, we have created a two-tiered legal system that imposes additional burdens on already-marginalized groups.

The Pig in Thin Air: An Identification


Alex Lockwood - 2016
    Part of Lantern's {bio}graphies series.

Breaking Through Power: It's Easier Than We Think


Ralph Nader - 2016
    Written just before Donald Trump’s Electoral College victory, Nader’s latest book reads with even greater urgency now."--Yes MagazineIn Breaking Through Power, Ralph Nader draws from a lifetime waging--and often winning--David vs. Goliath battles against big corporations and the United States government. In this succinct, Tom Paine-style wake-up call, the iconic consumer advocate highlights the success stories of fellow Americans who organize change and work together to derail the many ways in which wealth manipulates politics, labor, media, the environment, and the quality of national life today. Nader makes an inspired case about how the nation can--and must--be democratically managed by communities guided by the United States Constitution, not by the dictates of big businesses and the wealthy few. This is classic Ralph Nader, a crystallization of the core political beliefs and commitments that have driven his lifetime of advocacy for greater democracy."Ralph Nader is the grand progressive of our time. We overlook his words at our own peril! This book is required reading."--Cornel West"Ralph Nader's Breaking Through Power is a brilliant analysis of corporate power and the popular mechanisms that can be used to wrest back our democracy. No one has been fighting corporate domination longer, or understands it better, than Nader, who will go down in history not only as a prophet but an example of what it means to live the moral life. We disregard his wisdom and his courage at our peril."--Chris Hedges, Pulitzer-Prize winner and author of Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt"Nader goes beyond delineating the problem and provides a critical prescription to battle the toxicity of unjust power--one that every individual can, and must, embrace."--Nomi Prins, author, All the Presidents' Bankers"People are recognizing that our founding, fundamental values of fairness, justice, and opportunity for all--the very values that define our America--are being shoved aside to create an un-America of plutocracy and autocracy. Ralph Nader's new book Breaking Through Power provides progressive boat-rockers with inspiration and a plan for reclaiming America from the greedy Plutocrats and Fat Cats who think democracy is for sale to the highest bidder."--Jim Hightower"I read Ralph Nader for the same reasons that I read Tom Paine. He knows what he thinks, says what he means, and his courage is a lesson for us all."--Lewis Lapham"Nader insists on speaking up for the little people and backs his arguments and decent sentiments with hard facts."--Publishers WeeklyAbout Ralph Nader: Named by The Atlantic as one of the hundred most influential figures in American history, and by Time and Life magazines as one of the most influential Americans of the twentieth century, Ralph Nader has helped us drive safer cars, eat healthier food, breathe better air, drink cleaner water, and work in safer environments for more than four decades. Nader's recent books include Animal Envy, Unstoppable, The Good Fight, and the bestseller, Seventeen Traditions. Nader writes a syndicated column, has his own radio show, and gives lectures and interviews year round.

The A-To-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals


Erlene Grise-Owens - 2016
    From A (awareness) to Z (ZZZZ--Sleep), the editors and contributors use a simple A-to-Z framework to outline strategies to help you build a self-care plan with specific goals and ways to reach them realistically. Questions for reflection and additional resource lists help you to dig deeper in your self-care journey. Just as the ABCs are essential building blocks for a young child's learning, you can use the ABCs in The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals to build your way to a happy, healthy, ethical life as a helping professional. Includes a self-care planning form to help you set goals and formulate strategies. The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals...offers a broad range of concrete suggestions for improving individual self-care that should provide guidance and support to fit a broad range of practitioner needs. The book also includes material in several chapters that notes the important role organizations must take in stress and burnout reduction and support of self-care. SUE STEINER, Ph.D., MSW, Professor, School of Social Work at California State University, Chico, Co-author, Self-Care in Social Work: A Guide for Practitioners, Supervisors, and Administrators...a caring and useful resource for helping professionals concerned about burnout, stress, staff turnover, and wellness.... By focusing on insights and reflections and providing resources and strategies, The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook is a practical guide and an empowering book. DR. BARBARA W. SHANK, Ph.D., MSW, Dean and Professor, School of Social Work, University of St. Thomas, St. Catherine University, Chair, Board of Directors, Council on Social Work EducationAs the leader of a large nonprofit organization, the health and well-being of my colleagues is always top of mind for me. The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals is just what an organization like ours needed to promote self-care in a way that makes sense for all of us! JENNIFER HANCOCK, LCSW, President & CEO, Volunteers of America-Mid-StatesSometimes there is a book that speaks to what you also have tried to put into words that feels truly hand-in-glove. I see The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals as precisely this book. SARAKAY SMULLENS, MSW, LCSW, author of Burnout and Self-Care in Social Work: A Guidebook for Students and Those in Mental Health and Related ProfessionsGrise-Owens, Miller, & Eaves' The A-to-Z Self-Care Handbook for Social Workers and Other Helping Professionals is a much-needed handbook to inspire and guide self-care practice. Its insights are far-ranging, original, practical, and flexible. The short chapter format, focused topics, and fresh tone are both accessible and sure to motivate. Even those who have given a great deal of thought and attention to self-care will find new, exciting, and practicable guidance in its pages. LISA D. BUTLER, Ph.D., Associate Professor, University at Buffalo, School of Social Work, Primary Developer, UBSSW Self-Care Starter Kit

Votes of Confidence: A Young Person's Guide to American Elections


Jeff Fleischer - 2016
    Following an interesting and hotly contested election year in 2016, Votes of Confidence offers young readers an essential guide to the past, present, and future of American elections.

The Hammer Blow: How 10 Women Disarmed a Warplane


Andrea Needham - 2016
    They were arrested, charged with £2.4m of criminal damage, and sent to prison to await trial. A week later, Angie Zelter joined them, accused of conspiracy. After six months in prison, all four were acquitted by a Liverpool jury in a court case that effectively put Britain’s arms trade on trial.The disarmament could not have happened without the support of the other six members of the Seeds of Hope Ploughshares group – Lyn Bliss, Clare Fearnley, Emily Johns, Jen Parker, Ricarda Steinbrecher and Rowan Tilly – who were absolutely integral to the whole action from the very start.

I'm Supposed to Relate to This?


Valérie Robin Clayman - 2016
    The time has come for trans people to become the “bearer of the look” and not simply the “object of the gaze”. With illustrations by Kat Verhoeven (TOWERKIND, 2015) and an interior graphic design by Auni Milne of Sumack Loft, "I'm Supposed to Relate to This?" transforms the often static rendering of academic texts into one of creative flow that allows readers the opportunity to engage with the experiences of the author. "I'm Supposed to Relate to This?" also features a foreword by trans educator, activist, and Youtuber Chase Ross (uppercaseCHASE1).

Ideas for Action: Relevant Theory for Radical Change


Cynthia Kaufman - 2016
    Exploring a wide range of political traditions - including Marxism, anarchism, anti-imperialism, postmodernism, feminism, critical race theory and environmentalism - Cynthia Kaufman acknowledges the strengths and weaknesses of a variety of political movements and the ideologies inspired by or generated through them. Fully updated to confront pressing issues of today.

Leadership in the Age of Rage: How to Lift Up a World That's Falling Down


Umair Haque - 2016
    Observing that an Age of Rage is erupting across a troubled world, Umair suggests that the art of leadership need urgent, sweeping reinvention. Yesterday's approaches to leadership have failed to create leaders who can spark authentic, lasting prosperity. Thus, leaders have never been trusted less--yet the world has never needed direction moreCaught in the paradox, as middle classes implode, people around the globe are fleeing into the arms of extremists who offer them protection. Not just from their problems--but from the very leaders who have failed them. Reimagining leadership as the art of expanding human potential, not just power and control, Umair explains the challenges tomorrow's leaders must rise to and the skills that they need if they are to win the the trust, respect, and admiration that today's leaders have lost. Illustrating his insights with examples from across the globe, he lays down a manifesto for those who truly want to lead a troubled world to a brighter tomorrow.

Ideology and Power in Pre-Code Comic Books: Struggles for Cultural Space, Audience, and Meaning


Jan Philipzig - 2016
    It traces the medium’s cultural roots, its rise to popularity, and its persistent struggles for meanings, cultural space, and an audience. Characters, genres, stereotypes, myths, and many other narrative elements are discussed as encodings of ideology, thereby exposing underlying assumptions of class, race, nationalism, sexism, and ageism. Some pre-Code comic books point to themselves as textual constructs, demystifying the fictional sphere by foregrounding their intertextual relationships, as well as their own production or reception. This study pioneers the systematic analysis of comic-book reflexivity. It investigates within a matrix of historical factors the commercial, social, and cultural functions of reflexive devices - an enterprise that reveals deep cultural ambivalences toward the medium and its assumed effects on readers. Combining a solid theoretical frame with in-depth research, the book provides an insightful and entertaining examination of the most popular and influential comic books of the Golden Age.

Summary of The New Jim Crow: by Michelle Alexander | Includes Analysis


Instaread Summaries - 2016
    America’s current racial caste system builds upon the legacy of both chattel slavery that existed in the United States prior to the Civil War and on the system of Jim Crow laws that designated African Americans to second-class citizenship in many parts of the American South prior to the civil rights movement.This racial caste system is perpetuated across the country by members of both political parties. It has resulted in a large number of African American men who cannot vote, serve on juries, or find employment and housing. Discrimination against convicts is legally accepted and widespread…   PLEASE NOTE: This is key takeaways and analysis of the book and NOT the original book.   Inside this Instaread Summary of The New Jim Crow  ·      Overview of the book·      Important People·      Key Takeaways·      Analysis of Key Takeaways  About the Author With Instaread, you can get the key takeaways, summary and analysis of a book in 15 minutes. We read every chapter, identify the key takeaways and analyze them for your convenience.