Published by Chuck on 31 May 2007
Beer, Plumbers, and Anarchists – Two new books
The following new books may be of interest:
Tom Goyens’s forthcoming Beer and Revolution: The German Anarchist Movement in New York City, 1880-1914 will be attractive to anyone with an interest in anarchism, New York’s radical history, and/or oppositional culture generally (University of Illinois Press, September 2007). The publisher writes:
Understanding an infamous political movement’s grounding in festivity and defiance, Beer and Revolution examines the rollicking life and times of German immigrant anarchists in New York City from 1880 to 1914. Offering a new approach to an often misunderstood political movement, Tom Goyens puts a human face on anarchism and reveals a dedication less to bombs than to beer halls and saloons where political meetings, public lectures, discussion circles, fundraising events, and theater groups were held. Goyens brings to life the fascinating relationship between social space and politics by examining how the intersection of political ideals, entertainment, and social activism embodied anarchism not as an abstract idea, but as a chosen lifestyle for thousands of women and men. He shows how anarchist social gatherings were themselves events of defiance and resistance that aimed at establishing anarchism as an alternative lifestyle through the combination of German working-class conviviality and a dedication to the principle that coercive authority was not only unnecessary, but actually damaging to full and free human development as well. Goyens also explores the broader circumstances in both the United States and Germany that served as catalysts for the emergence of anarchism in urban America and how anarchist activism was hampered by police surveillance, ethnic insularity, and a widening gulf between the anarchists’ message and the majority of American workers.
Those interested in the state’s impact on oppositional culture, or oppositional culture’s impact on the the state (of Massachusetts), may want to check out Christine Bold’s Writers, Plumbers, and Anarchists: The WPA Writer’s Project in Massachusetts (University of Massachusetts Press, 2006). The publisher writes:
The Works Progress Administration (1935–1943) housed America’s largest arts funding program ever, part of the New Deal’s foray into nationwide work relief. In Massachusetts its acronym could well have stood for “Writers, Plumbers, and Anarchists,” in tribute to the state’s distinctive contribution to the writers’ wing of the program. Beginning in 1935, the Massachusetts writers’ project took a huge range of white- and blue-collar workers off the breadlines and put them to work as government writers. This motley group produced approximately two dozen state, regional, and community guides, which included stories that ran the gamut from the quirky to the disturbing. WPA writers in the state were routinely accused of being “plumbers” and, after publication of the state guide, the project was accused of supporting anarchists and other subversives.
The Massachusetts writers’ project was often mired in dramas and scandals. The most notorious concerned the censorship of guidebook copy on the case of Sacco and Vanzetti, the true story of which remained hidden for almost seventy years. Struggles also broke out over the representation of people of color, as the guides shifted the state’s image away from an ethnically homogeneous “cradle of the nation” to a much more culturally diverse and politically volatile society.
Making excellent use of the extensive surviving records, Christine Bold offers a unique glimpse into what New Deal pieties meant in practice for the “worker-writers” in its employ. As the first book to pursue the WPA writers’ project in a single state, this work probes the Massachusetts experience to discover the consequences of New Deal patronage for writers-in-the-making, for community image-making, and for minority groups attempting to achieve cultural citizenship in America.
The Works Progress Administration (1935–1943) housed America’s largest arts funding program ever, part of the New Deal’s foray into nationwide work relief. In Massachusetts its acronym could well have stood for “Writers, Plumbers, and Anarchists,” in tribute to the state’s distinctive contribution to the writers’ wing of the program. Beginning in 1935, the Massachusetts writers’ project took a huge range of white- and blue-collar workers off the breadlines and put them to work as government writers. This motley group produced approximately two dozen state, regional, and community guides, which included stories that ran the gamut from the quirky to the disturbing. WPA writers in the state were routinely accused of being “plumbers” and, after publication of the state guide, the project was accused of supporting anarchists and other subversives.
* * * The brain and skull of Giovanni Passannante, an Italian anarchist, are finally buried more than a century after he tried to kill King Umberto I, although the interment occurs under a cloak of secrecy. [
This book explores a key moment in the history of social discontent in New York City: the 1920 bombing of Wall and Broad streets, which killed 40 people and injured hundreds more. Though no one was ever charged with the crime, Paul Avrich and many other historians believe that Mario Buda, a local anarchist of Italian extraction, bore responsibility. (This incident is the source of the title of Mike Davis’s new and interesting book,
The following article offers insight why they made this fateful choice, describes their decisive first encounter with the President of Catalonia, and details the activity of the Central Committee of Anti-Fascist Militias, the institutional framework for their cooperation with the other anti-fascists tendencies. It is one of few accounts of anarchist activity during the early period of the war written by a direct participant.
Arif Dirlik’in başlangaçtaki niyeti bir nükleer fizik uzmanı olmaktı. Mersin’de 1940 yılında (annesine göre 1941) doğan Dirlik mühendislik üzerine lisans öğrenimi gördükten sonra, bilim konusunda eğitim görmek üzere Rochester Üniversitesi’ne yazıldı. Kente geldikten kısa bir süre sonra bilim konusundan tümüyle çekilerek, tarih üzerine yoğunlaşmaya başladı. Sözkonusu geçişi yadırgamayan bir grup tarihçi aydından destek gören Dirlik, Çin tarihi üzerinde çalışmaya başladı. Çin’deki Marksist tarih yazımının kökenlerini incelediği makalesini kaleme aldı. Bu yazı, Çin siyasi düşüncesi, daha özelde Çin’deki radikal hareketlerde toplumsal devrim düşüncesi üzerinde gelişecek geniş bir araştırma sürecinin ilk adımıydı. Dirlik’in 1980′li yılların başında Çinli anarşistlere gösterdiği ilgi de kaynağını bu makaleden alıyordu. Yazdığı pek çok kitap ve makaleye ek olarak Dirlik, 1971 yılından bu yana Duke Üniversitesi Tarih Bölümü’nde ders vermektedir. Biri sinema öğrenimi gören, diğeri rock müzisyeni olmak isteyen iki oğlu var. Dirlik’e yapıtı üzerindeki ana etkilerin ne olduğunu sorduğumda, bir anlık duraksamadan sonra, Marx, Mao ve Dostoyevski’nin adlarını verdi.
Janet Biehl heeft altijd tegen de stroom in geroeid. Ze is geboren in 1953 in Cincinnati, Ohio, en sloot zich niet aan bij de radicale bewegingen van de zestiger jaren, zoals vele van haar leeftijdsgenoten. Ze beschrijft zichzelf daarentegen in deze periode als ‘rather straight’.