Anarchist Pedagogies Collective

Sharing and Supporting Anarchist Ideas and Experiences

(de)School Revolt 2023: Storytelling, Abolition, and Prefiguration

This year’s School Revolt was a bit more difficult than the last, as it presented people with the opportunity to tell their own stories. This is something that can be quite time-consuming and harder to organise. There’s a lot of work that goes into creating new worlds, even fictional ones. So we appreciate everyone who made an effort to build and create one!

We would like to present everyone with one of the submissions. It is a short story titled ‘And we could grow together‘ by Sonia Muñoz Llort.

We’d also like to share the other submissions that can help guide us in our creativity, giving us things to think about as we develop these new worlds in fiction, which are available on both YouTube or on PeerTube.

Hopefully, we’ll be able to do another storytelling event because there is such a need for it.

Smash the Class, Episode 6: Discussing the Contradictions within the School

In our sixth episode, Sonia and Nicole expand upon ideas that they had written in their article “The Revolutionary Power of Asking Questions.” They discuss the ways that the school systems—regardless of their positions as public, private, or anything in between— are inherently colonial and imperialist structures that maintain specific hierarchies.

It is imperative that we explore the ways that these structures operate and how they ensure that change doesn’t happen, even as they make the claims that they are spaces of change and learning. We need to better understand the ways that people who grow within them learn their ‘place’ in society, and we need to recognise the ways in which they coerce people to assimilate into society’s desires. We believe that there needs to be more open discussion about the ways that all people, particularly marginalised people, are done a disservice by schools while also understanding that reforming them will never be enough.

In exploring this, we outline the ways in which traditional structures within the school maintain the status quo and teach children the supposed ‘correct’ way of behaving. We also outline the contradictions that are inherent in what we, as a society, believe schools are for and what they are actually designed to do.

Enjoy! And if you’d like to help us explore other topics of anarchist education, please feel free to reach out to us on our email or any of the social media listed here.

Regarding Recent Events in Atlanta, GA: Stop Cop City and Defend Weelaunee Forest

The following post is taken directly from the call for solidarity with the movement in South Atlanta, Georgia. We are reposting it in full and stand in support with all the activists who are working towards stopping the development of Cop City and have been defending the forest in whatever ways they can. You can share and endorse the statement here.

Other updates have been submitted to and posted by the Atlanta Community Press Collective, including the statement about the loss of Tortuguita. Our hearts are with you all.


In solidarity with the movement to Stop Cop City and Defend Weelaunee Forest

We call on all people of good conscience to stand in solidarity with the movement to stop Cop City and defend the Weelaunee Forest in Atlanta.

On January 18, in the course of their latest militarized raid on the forest, police in Atlanta shot and killed a person. This is only the most recent of a series of violent police retaliations against the movement. The official narrative is that Cop City is necessary to make Atlanta “safe,” but this brutal killing reveals what they mean when they use that word.

Forests are the lungs of planet Earth. The destruction of forests affects all of us. So do the gentrification and police violence that the bulldozing of Weelaunee Forest would facilitate. What is happening in Atlanta is not a local issue.

Politicians who support Cop City have attempted to discredit forest defenders as “outside agitators.” This smear has a disgraceful history in the South, where authorities have used it against abolitionists, labor organizers, and the Civil Rights Movement, among others. The goal of those who spread this narrative is to discourage solidarity and isolate communities from each other while offering a pretext to bring in state and federal forces, who are the actual “outside agitators.” The consequence of that strategy is on full display in the tragedy of January 18.

Replacing a forest with a police training center will only create a more violently policed society, in which taxpayer resources enrich police and weapons companies rather than addressing social needs. Mass incarceration and police militarization have failed to bring down crime or improve conditions for poor and working-class communities.

In Atlanta and across the US, investment in police budgets comes at the expense of access to food, education, childcare, and healthcare, of affordable and stable housing, of parks and public spaces, of transit and the free movement of people, of economic stability for the many. Concentrating resources in the hands of police serves to defend the extreme accumulation of wealth and power by corporations and the very rich.

What do cops do with their increased budgets and their carte blanche from politicians? They kill people, every single day. They incarcerate and traumatize schoolchildren, parents, loved ones who are simply struggling to survive. We must not settle for a society organized recklessly upon the values of violence, racism, greed, and careless indifference to life.

The struggle that is playing out in Atlanta is a contest for the future. As the catastrophic effects of climate change hammer our communities with hurricanes, heat waves, and forest fires, the stakes of this contest are clearer than ever. It will determine whether those who come after us inherit an inhabitable Earth or a police state nightmare. It is up to us to create a peaceful society that does not treat human life as expendable.

The forest defenders are trying to create a better world for all of us. We owe it to the people of Atlanta and to future generations everywhere to support them.

Here are some ways to support the defense of the forest in Atlanta:

  • Donate to the Atlanta Solidarity Fund to support legal costs for arrested protestors and ongoing legal action.
  • Organize political solidarity bail funds, forest defense funds, and forest defense committees where you live.
  • Participate in or organize local solidarity actions.

Smash the Class, Episode 5: Discussing the Intersections Between Pedagogy and Therapy

In the fifth episode of Smash the Class, we were joined by Renya of Come Together Counseling. They’re an anarchist in Pennsylvania who conducts practice as a therapist and often talks about how their work in therapy intersects with anarchism.

During the time that we were talking with Renya, we discussed a whole range of topics. We originally wanted to do something together because we kept noticing a lot of the overlaps between therapy  and pedagogy. As a result, much of this conversation surrounds the intersections between the two, their relationship to anarchism, and how our learning spaces need to incorporate both. We also discuss our passive acceptance of authority figures, how we can work to overcome bureaucracy and its obstacles, and how our spaces can respond to the needs of the people in them.

Two videos that were the impetus for this were Renya’s videos on Internal vs External Motivation and Embodying Anarchist Principles as a Therapist. We also referenced a piece titled “How Can We Prefigure Society When We Only Seem to React.

Hope you enjoy it!

Attention! New (de)School Event for 2023!

UPDATE: PARTICIPATION CALL EXTENDED  – 12 FEBRUARY 2023

Last year, we had a wonderful month of amazing events during the first ever School Revolt. We were genuinely really pleased with all the participation and for getting to know so many enriching educational projects.

However, we want to try something a little different this time. Instead of focusing on events (though there will be some of them!), we wanted to provide a space where people can create a range of stories told in a variety of ways for people of all ages.

In order to build the worlds that we want to see, we need to have time to explore the many different ways that it could be configured. Storytelling is one of the best ways to learn how things work while also giving us space to imagine what new realities we might create.

So for School Revolt 2023, the theme is Storytelling, Abolition, and Prefiguration. Everything this year will take place between February and April.

We invite everyone to share your stories of resistance, mutual care, radical love, community building, or any other topic you are burning to share. These stories can take many forms, including zines, books, poems, music, film, or any other medium you can think of. Together we will gather these stories and publish them for all to enjoy and learn from, with complete free access to anyone everywhere. You can take on this challenge on your own, or you can organise yourselves into collectives that share in the work. Any form of horizontal, non-hierarchical, and free form of self-organisation is highly encouraged.

There is no formal requirement to participate. Anyone is welcome regardless of academic degree, official title, expertise, geographic location, or language.

There is a zero tolerance policy for any forms of bigotry. Proposals and stories that veer too close to the possibility of being discriminatory in any form will first receive an email requesting clarification. Any projects that promote harm towards marginalised, oppressed and vulnerable communities will be rejected outright.

To apply, simply fill out the form below. Deadline for applications is 12 February 2023. People can sign up to create a story, provide a workshop to help others in their creation, or do both!

Participants are welcome to use whatever devices and any software that are needed to make their stories a reality. Should you require any kind of assistance or accommodations (including technical support or requests for workshop tutorials), you can indicate your needs in the registration form and we will do our best to make it happen.

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to send us an email at anarchapednet@riseup.net or contact us through any of our social media.

We are looking forward to seeing what ideas you come up with!

Love and Solidarity,

APC

Link to registration form: https://forms.gle/83e14WzA3v1ahoor

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