:: Call for Papers, Presentations, and Interventions ::

The State of Things: Towards a Political Economy of Artifice and Artefacts
April 29th to May 1st, 2009
Centre for Philosophy and Political Economy, University of Leicester

Keynote speakers:
Tiziana Terranova, University of Naples L’orientale
Natalie Jeremijenko, New York University
Nick Dyer-Witheford, University of Western Ontario

In a more wistful moment, Marx asked what commodities would say if they could speak. Surely, if he listened long enough, they would have announced the various traumas of their exploitatative and violent birthing to him. Eventually, one imagines, they would have described the nature of the various forms of labour necessary for their production as the apparitionally elementary components of the capitalist mode of production. So would the commodity’s autobiography be the same now, one wonders.

Today we live in a much different state of things: the artifice of artefacts is evident all around us. A parliament of communication technologies, from RFIDS to bluetooth devices, constantly exchange information and network all around and through us. Wireless networks of communication, control, and cooperation proliferate in mysterious ways, all speaking an infra-language of organization, inscribing new techniques of governance. But these networks have become all the more indiscernible by the open secret of their appearance.

FIFTH ESTATE #378 (Summer 2008) now out!

CONTENTS of FIFTH ESTATE #378:

* “Green Scare Continues” – H. Read
* “My Green Scare Arrest” – Marie Mason
* “RNC: Shut It Down!” – RNC Welcoming Committee
* “An Anarchist in Cuba: Socialism or Cell Phones” – Walker Lane
* “Shamanism, Anarchy, and the End of the World” – Dave Hanson
* “Tarot Cards and the Left” – Joshua Sperber
* “The End of Money” – Daniel Pinchbeck
* “An Arm of Jacks to Fight the Power” – Peter Lamborn Wilson
* “Counterfeiting Sovereignty” – Don LaCoss
* “Isn’t All Money Fake?” – E. B. Maple
* “Wealth and Poverty: In the Shadow of an Exclusive Club” – Val Salvo (reprint from
FE summer 1991)
* “Down and Out in Athens” (Excerpt from ‘Nike’) – Cara Hoffman
* “We Are All Slaves of Capital” (excerpt from ‘The Wandering of Humanity’) –
Jacques Camatte
* “Strike!” (poem) – Eugene V. Debs
* “The African Road to Anarchism?” – Jim Feast
* “Shoplifting and the Politics of Instant Gratification” – Cookie Orlando
* “Victorian Proto-Punk, Riot Grrls: The Literary Legacy of Helen and Olivia
Rossetti” – Cara Hoffman
* ”The ‘60s, 40 Years Later: No Chicago in Denver” – Bernard Marszalek
* “Organizing for Anarchism in Oreland” – interview with Andrew Flood
and much much more...

*Private Equity Sucks!*

*Take action against KKR - Thursday July 17*
*1pm, Trafalgar Square, under the lions*

http://www.privateequitysucks.com

*Join the Global Day of Action against one of the oldest and largest private equity firms in the world: KKR (Kohlberg, Kravitz and Roberts)*

Private equity companies have gained massive influence, power and obscene wealth because they’ve stayed invisible to public attention and scrutiny. It is time for that to change!

On Thursday 17 July 2008, thousands of trade unions, community organisations, environmentalists, workers and activists will be taking part in a global day of action against KKR - actions are planned in 100 cities in 25 countries. These actions will send a loud and clear message to private equity firms like KKR that we are sick and tired of a few people getting even richer and ruining our lives and the planet in the process.

In London on July 17, the Private Equity Creative Action Network (PECAN) will be bringing a creative and strong message to the executives of KKR, including the delivery a giant invoice that makes it clear that KKR has a long overdue debt to our community and world. To help make this action a success and to kick off a summer of actions against private equity, we are inviting people to participate and to get involved on the day (in particular we are looking for: video artists, anti-capitalist cheerleaders, independent media makers, musicians, DJ's, clowns and of course - activists).

[ JUST RELEASED >>> INTERVENTIONS Number One ]]]

http://uppingtheanti.org/node/3070

ROUNDTABLE ON G8 RESISTANCE
Perspectives for the Next Phase of
Global Anti-Capitalist Uprisings

Moderated by Kriss Sol (Amsterdam);
with Hanne Jobst (Germany), Sabu & Go
(Japan), Miranda (Italy), and Jaggi
Singh (Montreal)

The G8 is more than a place where neoliberal
trade agreements are authored. It is also a
space where the legitimacy of global governance
is reproduced. In 2005, 300,000 people took to
the streets in Edinburgh to ask the G8 for a
solution to poverty. By 2007, antagonism and
dissent prevailed once again. We are entering
a period that could mark the resurgence of positive
dynamics from the earlier phase of global
uprisings. But have we learned from the past?
Can we build our interventions on new and more
stable ground?

SEIZED
Critical Art Ensemble
Institute for Applied Autonomy

June 7 to July 19, 2008
Opening Reception: Saturday, June 7, 8–11pm
Admission is FREE

Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center
341 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo, NY 14202

Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center is pleased to announce the exhibition SEIZED by Critical Art Ensemble (CAE) and the Institute for Applied Autonomy (IAA). The exhibition premieres Saturday, June 7, 2008 from 8–11pm and the opening reception is free and open to the public. The exhibition will remain on view through July 18, 2008. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Friday, 11am to 6pm and Saturday, 1–4pm.

Following the four year long ordeal of CAE founding member and University at Buffalo Art Professor Steve Kurtz—accused by the Justice Department of “bio-terrorism” and later indicted on charges of mail fraud for procuring harmless bacterial cultures for use in an educational art project—SEIZED presents the artworks behind this case which has attracted worldwide attention and propelled an international arts community to rally to Kurtz’s support and on behalf of freedom of expression.

Will you join us in the middle of a whirlwind?

In the Middle of a Whirlwind:
2008 Convention Protests, Movement and Movements
A one-off online journal of theory, art, activism and organizing out now!

Coordinated by: Team Colors Collective

Published by: The Journal of Aesthetics & Protest Press

In the Middle of a Whirlwind (Whirlwinds) inquires into current organizing efforts in the United States, and through that process, assembles a strategic analysis of current political composition as a tool for building political power.

Whirlwinds’ strategic context is this summer’s RNC and DNC protests; through these documents and the discussions that erupt from them we hope to directly impact the anti-Convention organizing. In a larger sense, and in the long-term, Whirlwinds is intended to provide a set of useful documents for contemporary radical organizing. Each essay and interview addresses the issues of movement, working class power and composition, and/or gives strategic insight into organizing, and the strengths and weaknesses of current movement/s in the U.S.

Seeking Autonomous POC to Make Something New
Are you interested in founding an organization of people of color united around anti-authoritarian politics?

Over time, many collectives self-identified with APOC (Anarchist People Of Color) have come and gone. New autonomous people of color are getting involved. Interest in seeing something more consistent is a common refrain. What could be needed is an organization that helps strengthen and build collectives, supports activists and puts out a coherent vision for the present and future as autonomous people of color.

“Forging a Black Liberation Agenda for the 21st Century”
Black Radical Congress, June 20-22, 2008, St. Louis, Missouri

With the launch of the Black Radical Congress (BRC) in 1998, a current of optimism rippled through the social justice movement. In the tradition of other black political gatherings such as the National Negro Congress, the National Black Political Convention and other more recent ones, the BRC set out on a mammoth challenge to build unity within the Black Liberation Movement (BLM) and consensus around the Freedom Agenda.

New Radical Subjectivities: Re-thinking Agency for the 21st Century
The University of Nottingham, UK
Friday, September 19th, 2008

Keynote Speaker – Professor Peter Hallward (Middlesex University)

This one day conference for postgraduate students and early career
researchers explores recent articulations of subjectivity and
political agency in critical theory and cultural studies. The
continued ascent of neo-liberalism and economic globalisation, along
with postmodern and poststructuralist theorising around subjectivity,
potentially sets a dangerously de-politicised subject against the
expanding forces and inequalities of contemporary capitalism.

http://housingstruggles.wordpress.com/

Delhi Solidarity Group, 26 April 2008

CALL TO JOIN NATIONAL LEVEL ACTION

Join hands to raise our collective voice against Displacement & Un-Democratic, Unjust, Anti-People & Pro-Corporate Land Acquisition (Amendment) Act, 2007 and Resettlement and Rehabilitation Bill, 2007

Join Dharna at Jantar Mantar, Delhi 28th to 30 April, 2008

Dear Friends,