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Domains of politics and modes of rule : Political structures of the neocolonial state in Africa
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 10.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 10.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageDomains of politics and modes of rule : Political structures of the neocolonial state in Africa
“A concise, dense and illuminating dissection of the workings of the post-independence African state that also charts a path towards imagining and working for a true politics of liberation.” — Ndongo Samba Sylla, Senior Researcher, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation.
This is a brief attempt to orient the study of the neocolonial state in Africa through an assessment of the manner in which it rules its people. It is argued that the state produces different modes of rule by deploying different politics over different parts of the population. In this manner, it can combine a genuinely democratic rule in the image of the West over some while subjecting the majority to colonial forms of domination. Imported political subjectivities from the West and its obsession with human rights discourse are reserved largely for a sphere of civil society in which the right to have rights is conferred upon citizens. In the domains of uncivil society and ‘traditional’ society, the right to rights is not observed by the state so different subjectivities, regularly including violence, govern the manner political problems and solutions are addressed both by the state and by people. In consequence, distinct political subjectivities prevail in the conceptualization of popular resistance in all three domains, and it becomes difficult to rally such different concerns and conceptions within an overall anti-neocolonial struggle.∴Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product page -
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(Arabic edition) الهندوتفا وعلاقتها بالصهيونية
هندوتفا
وارتباطها بالصهيونيةأمريت ويلسون
سلسلة محاضرات عن إسرائيل
المساهمة: لاهور ألباست، مؤسسة الدراسات الفلسطينية، الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية
المشرف: الدكتور فيريندر سينغ كالرا
المحرر: طارق محمود، الجامعة الأميركية في بيروتكتب هذا النص في كانون الأول/ديسمبر 2022، وهو مقتبس من محاضرة ألقيت بدعوة من مؤسسة الدراسات الفلسطينية. ومنذ ذلك الحين، تعمقت العلاقات بين إسرائيل والهند وتصاعدت الفظائع في كلا البلدين. في 5 إبريل 2023، اقتحمت قوات الاحتلال الإسرائيلي باحات المسجد الأقصى في القدس الشرقية المحتلة، واعتدت على المصلين بداخله. وفي الوقت نفسه، تواجه إسرائيل اضطرابات داخلية في الصراع بين مجموعة متنوعة، بما في ذلك أولئك الذين يعتقدون أن المستعمرة الاستيطانية الحالية هي دولة ديمقراطية ويريدون أن تبقى الأمور على ما هي عليه، وكذلك أولئك الذين يقفون على اليمين. والأهم من ذلك أن الحزب الحاكم في الهند، حزب بهاراتيا جاناتا، يدعم الخيار الأخير. يدور الكتاب حول هندوتفا، الأيديولوجية التي تحرك حكومة رئيس الوزراء ناريندرا مودي، حزب بهاراتيا جاناتا الذي يهيمن عليه الهندوس، والصهيونية، أيديولوجية دولة الفصل العنصري الإسرائيلية. وفي هذا العصر الذي يتسم بالفاشية الناشئة، تشكل هاتان الأيديولوجيتان المتشابهتان إلى حد لافت للنظر أهمية بالغة في تعزيز التحالفات الاقتصادية والعسكرية بين اثنتين من أكثر الدول اليمينية قمعية في العالم ـ وفي الوقت نفسه إضفاء الشرعية عليها في الساحات الثقافية. إن إسرائيل بلا شك دولة استعمارية استيطانية، لكنها أيضًا دولة فاشية، مثل الهند، ليس فقط بسبب “الأحزاب المتطرفة التي تشكل جزءًا من الحكومة” ولكن أيضًا “على حد تعبير مسؤوليها – نتنياهو ومروان بشارة”. نتنياهو هو “الأب الروحي للفاشية الإسرائيلية الحديثة”.
Written in December 2022, this text is based on a lecture given earlier at the invitation of the Institute of Palestine Studies. Since then, the relationship between Israel and India has deepened further and atrocities have skyrocketed in both countries. On 5 April 2023, Israeli forces stormed Al Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem and attacked worshippers inside. At the same time, Israel is facing internal turmoil in a battle between a diverse group, including those who think the current settler colony is a democratic nation and want things to remain as they are, and those who stand even further to the right. Significantly, the BJP, India’s ruling party, supports the latter. This book is about Hindutva, the ideology which drives the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Zionism, the ideology of the Israeli apartheid state. In this era of rising fascism, these two remarkably similar ideologies are crucially important in cementing the economic and military alliance between two of the world’s most repressive right-wing states – while helping to legitimize them in cultural arenas. Israel is, of course, a settler colonial state, but it is also, like India, a fascist state, not only because of ‘the extremist parties that [are] part of the government’ but also because of ‘their enablers – Netanyahu and his chauvinistic Likud party which long strove for a Jewish state dominating both sides of the Jordan River.’ In the words of Marwan Bishara, Netanyahu is ‘the godfather of modern Israeli fascism.’
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(Bengali edition) হিন্দুত্ববাদ ও ইহুদী জাতীয়তাবাদ : একটি ক্রমবর্ধমান সম্পর্ক)
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 10.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 10.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product page(Bengali edition) হিন্দুত্ববাদ ও ইহুদী জাতীয়তাবাদ : একটি ক্রমবর্ধমান সম্পর্ক)
This is a Bengali translation of Hindutva and its relationship with Zionism, by Amrit Wilson: ISBN 978-1-990263-76-7. Written in December 2022, this text is based on a lecture given earlier at the invitation of the Institute of Palestine Studies. Since then, the relationship between Israel and India has deepened further and atrocities have skyrocketed in both countries. On 5 April 2023, Israeli forces stormed Al Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem and attacked worshippers inside. At the same time, Israel is facing internal turmoil in a battle between a diverse group, including those who think the current settler colony is a democratic nation and want things to remain as they are, and those who stand even further to the right. Significantly, the BJP, India’s ruling party, supports the latter. This book is about Hindutva, the ideology which drives the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Zionism, the ideology of the Israeli apartheid state. In this era of rising fascism, these two remarkably similar ideologies are crucially important in cementing the economic and military alliance between two of the world’s most repressive right-wing states – while helping to legitimize them in cultural arenas. Israel is, of course, a settler colonial state, but it is also, like India, a fascist state, not only because of ‘the extremist parties that [are] part of the government’ but also because of ‘their enablers – Netanyahu and his chauvinistic Likud party which long strove for a Jewish state dominating both sides of the Jordan River.’ In the words of Marwan Bishara, Netanyahu is ‘the godfather of modern Israeli fascism.’ This essay focuses primarily on Hindutva, discussing Zionism mainly to highlight its similarities, links and increasing alliances with Hindutva.
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Hindutva and its relationship with Zionism
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 11.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 11.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageHindutva and its relationship with Zionism
Written in December 2022, this text is based on a lecture given earlier at the invitation of the Institute of Palestine Studies. Since then, the relationship between Israel and India has deepened further and atrocities have skyrocketed in both countries. On 5 April 2023, Israeli forces stormed Al Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem and attacked worshippers inside. At the same time, Israel is facing internal turmoil in a battle between a diverse group, including those who think the current settler colony is a democratic nation and want things to remain as they are, and those who stand even further to the right. Significantly, the BJP, India’s ruling party, supports the latter. This book is about Hindutva, the ideology which drives the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Zionism, the ideology of the Israeli apartheid state. In this era of rising fascism, these two remarkably similar ideologies are crucially important in cementing the economic and military alliance between two of the world’s most repressive right-wing states – while helping to legitimize them in cultural arenas. Israel is, of course, a settler colonial state, but it is also, like India, a fascist state, not only because of ‘the extremist parties that [are] part of the government’ but also because of ‘their enablers – Netanyahu and his chauvinistic Likud party which long strove for a Jewish state dominating both sides of the Jordan River.’ In the words of Marwan Bishara, Netanyahu is ‘the godfather of modern Israeli fascism.’
This essay focuses primarily on Hindutva, discussing Zionism mainly to highlight its similarities, links and increasing alliances with Hindutva.Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product page -
Política e cultura no pensamento emancipatório africano
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 9.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 9.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pagePolítica e cultura no pensamento emancipatório africano
Description (2132 / 2500)
A atual ausência de uma visão emancipatória para a África está no centro dos nossos problemas políticos relacionados à opressão racial capitalista e colonial. Qualquer tentativa de repensar a emancipação política no continente africano deve ser capaz de localizar uma concepção universal de liberdade no interior das experiências culturais singulares que as pessoas vivem. Quando esteve baseada nas tradições populares, a política emancipatória exibiu tais traços dialéticos, independentemente da maneira específica na qual cada luta pela liberdade foi pensada em diferentes contextos históricos. No entanto, apenas alguns intelectuais militantes compreenderam a importância dessa dialética no pensamento.O presente volume esboça e discute dois pontos de vista particularmente importantes sobre o papel e a relevância da cultura popular na política emancipatória em África. Cada um deles resulta de formas distintas de exploração capitalista e colonialista: o primeiro viu a luz do dia em um contexto colonial, enquanto o segundo é diretamente confrontado pelo estado neocolonial. Todas as políticas emancipatórias são desenvolvidas em confronto com o poder estatal, e todas começam com um processo de discussão e debate através do qual um sujeito coletivo começa a se formar. No continente africano, a construção de tal sujeito político coletivo tem sido informada, de maneira fundamental, pelas culturas populares.
Os dois autores cujos ensaios estão aqui incluídos entenderam isso e colocaram a cultura popular no centro de suas políticas. O primeiro, Amílcar Cabral, aborda o papel central da cultura popular na luta pela independência da Guiné-Bissau nos anos 1970; o segundo, Ernest Wamba-dia-Wamba, aborda a centralidade da cultura popular africana para uma política emancipatória endereçada à atual República Democrática do Congo. Apesar das décadas que os separam, tanto Cabral como Wamba-dia-Wamba desenvolvem, no centro de sua política, uma dialética que ativa os universais da cultura no presente. É essa característica que confere às suas visões uma importância central para o pensamento emancipatório contemporâneo.
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Politics and Culture in African Emancipatory Thought
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 15.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 15.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pagePolitics and Culture in African Emancipatory Thought
The current absence of any emancipatory vision for Africa lies at the heart of our political problems of racial capitalist and colonial oppression. Any attempt to rethink political emancipation on the African continent must be able to locate a universal conception of freedom within singular cultural experiences where people live. Irrespective of the specific manner in which such struggles for freedom were thought within different historical contexts, emancipatory politics always exhibited such a dialectic when it was based within popular traditions. Yet only some militant intellectual leaders understood the importance of this dialectic in thought.
The present volume outlines and discusses two particularly important views concerning the role and importance of popular culture in emancipatory politics in Africa. Each is the product of distinct forms of colonial capitalist exploitation: the former saw the light of day within a colonial context while the latter is directly confronted by the neocolonial state. All emancipatory politics are developed in confrontation with state power, and all begin with a process of discussion and debate whereby a collective subject begins to be formed. The formation of such a collective political subject has been fundamentally informed by popular cultures on the African continent.
The two authors whose essays are included here understood this and posit popular culture at the centre of their politics. The first, Amílcar Cabral, addresses the central role of popular culture in the independence struggle of Guinea Bissau in the 1970s; the second, Ernest Wamba-dia-Wamba, addresses the centrality of African popular culture in an emancipatory politics for the current Democratic Republic of Congo. Despite the distance in time that separates them, both Cabral and Wamba-dia-Wamba develop a dialectics at the core of their politics which activates the universals of culture in the present. It is this that makes their views of central importance to emancipatory thought today.Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product page -
Politique et culture dans la pensée émancipatrice Africaine
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 9.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 9.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pagePolitique et culture dans la pensée émancipatrice Africaine
Au cœur de nos problèmes politiques issus d’un capitalisme racial et d’une oppression (néo)coloniale en Afrique aujourd’hui se trouve l’absence de toute vision émancipatrice véritable. Toute tentative de repenser une politique émancipatrice en Afrique doit pouvoir situer une vision universaliste de la liberté parmi les expériences culturelles singulières que les gens vivent. Les politiques émancipatrices quand elles existaient, bien que pensées dans les luttes pour la liberté ayant lieu dans des contextes historiques particuliers, mettaient toujours en vue une dialectique de ce genre quand elles étaient vraiment basées parmi les traditions populaires. Cependant, seulement une minorité de dirigeants intellectuels et militants comprenait l’importance d’une telle dialectique pour la pensée et l’action.
Ce petit livre trace le contour et discute de deux points de vue très importants sur le rôle de la culture populaire dans la politique émancipatrice en Afrique. Chacun d’entre eux émane de formes d’exploitation capitalistes coloniales distinctes : le premier a vu le jour dans un contexte colonial classique tandis que le second est directement issu d’un contexte étatique néocolonial. Toute politique émancipatrice est développée vis-à-vis le pouvoir d’état et toutes commencent avec un processus de discussion ou est formé un sujet collectif. Un tel sujet politique doit être fondamentalement informé par et conçu en relation avec les cultures populaires.
Les deux auteurs ci-inclus ont compris ce principe et mettent la culture populaire au centre de leur pensées politiques. Le premier, Amílcar Cabral se réfère au rôle principal de la culture dans la lutte contre le colonialisme au Guinée Bissau dans les années 1970 ; le second, Ernest Wamba-dia-Wamba insiste sur le rôle central de la culture populaire pour une politique émancipatrice dans la République Démocratique du Congo aujourd’hui. Malgré la distance temporelle qui les sépare, tous les deux développent au centre de leurs politiques distinctes, une pensée dialectique qui déclenche des pensées universalistes depuis la culture populaire dans le présent. C’est pour cela que leurs points de vue sont d’une importance capitale pour la pensée de la politique émancipatrice en Afrique aujourd’hui.
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ہندوتواہ اور صیہونیت کے ساتھ اس کا تعلق(Urdu edition)
ہندوتواہ
اور صیہونیت کے ساتھ اس کا تعلقاَمرت وِلسن
اسرائیل پر لیکچرز کا سلسلہ
معاون: لاہورہ آلباسٹ ، ادارہ برائے مطالعہ فلسطین ، یو ایس اے
ثالث: ڈاکٹر وریندر سنگھ کالرا
ایڈیٹر: طارق محمود ، امریکن یونیورسٹی بیروتدسمبر 2022 میں لکھا گیا، یہ متن انسٹی ٹیوٹ آف فلسطین سٹڈیز کی دعوت پر دیے گئے ایک لیکچر پر مبنی ہے۔ اس کے بعد سے اسرائیل اور بھارت کے تعلقات مزید گہرے ہوئے ہیں اور دونوں ممالک میں مظالم آسمان کو چھونے لگے ہیں۔ 5 اپریل 2023 کو اسرائیلی فورسز نے مقبوضہ مشرقی یروشلم میں مسجد اقصیٰ کے احاطے پر دھاوا بول دیا اور اندر نمازیوں پر حملہ کیا۔ ایک ہی وقت میں، اسرائیل کو ایک متنوع گروہ کے درمیان لڑائی میں اندرونی انتشار کا سامنا ہے، جن میں وہ لوگ بھی شامل ہیں جو یہ سمجھتے ہیں کہ موجودہ آباد کار کالونی ایک جمہوری قوم ہے اور چاہتے ہیں کہ چیزیں جوں کی توں رہیں، اور وہ بھی جو دائیں طرف کھڑے ہیں۔ اہم بات یہ ہے کہ بھارت کی حکمران جماعت بی جے پی مؤخر الذکر کی حمایت کرتی ہے۔ یہ کتاب ہندوتوا کے بارے میں ہے، وہ نظریہ جو وزیر اعظم نریندر مودی کی ہندو بالادستی بھارتیہ جنتا پارٹی (بی جے پی) حکومت کو چلاتا ہے، اور صیہونیت، اسرائیلی نسل پرست ریاست کا نظریہ۔ ابھرتے ہوئے فاشزم کے اس دور میں، یہ دونوں نمایاں طور پر ملتے جلتے نظریے دنیا کی دو سب سے زیادہ جابرانہ دائیں بازو کی ریاستوں کے درمیان اقتصادی اور فوجی اتحاد کو مضبوط بنانے میں انتہائی اہم ہیں – جبکہ ثقافتی میدانوں میں انہیں قانونی حیثیت دینے میں مدد فراہم کرتے ہیں۔ اسرائیل بلاشبہ ایک آبادکار نوآبادیاتی ریاست ہے، لیکن یہ بھارت کی طرح ایک فاشسٹ ریاست بھی ہے، نہ صرف ‘انتہا پسند جماعتوں جو کہ حکومت کا حصہ ہیں’ کی وجہ سے بلکہ ‘ان کے اہل کاروں – نیتن یاہو اور مروان بشارا کے الفاظ میں، نیتن یاہو ‘جدید اسرائیلی فاشزم کا گاڈ فادر’ ہے۔
Written in December 2022, this text is based on a lecture given earlier at the invitation of the Institute of Palestine Studies. Since then, the relationship between Israel and India has deepened further and atrocities have skyrocketed in both countries. On 5 April 2023, Israeli forces stormed Al Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem and attacked worshippers inside. At the same time, Israel is facing internal turmoil in a battle between a diverse group, including those who think the current settler colony is a democratic nation and want things to remain as they are, and those who stand even further to the right. Significantly, the BJP, India’s ruling party, supports the latter. This book is about Hindutva, the ideology which drives the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Zionism, the ideology of the Israeli apartheid state. In this era of rising fascism, these two remarkably similar ideologies are crucially important in cementing the economic and military alliance between two of the world’s most repressive right-wing states – while helping to legitimize them in cultural arenas. Israel is, of course, a settler colonial state, but it is also, like India, a fascist state, not only because of ‘the extremist parties that [are] part of the government’ but also because of ‘their enablers – Netanyahu and his chauvinistic Likud party which long strove for a Jewish state dominating both sides of the Jordan River.’ In the words of Marwan Bishara, Netanyahu is ‘the godfather of modern Israeli fascism.’
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Aufbruch in Jackson [German edition of Jackson Rising: Black self-management and solidarity economy]
German translation of Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, MississippiHow black activists are building liberation practically from below: Departure in Jackson documents the history of one of the most exciting revolutionary experiments in the USA Present.
Since the 1970s, black liberation movements in majority-black Mississippi have taken change into their own hands. The Deep South should become the center of their independence – “Free the Land!” In the 2010s, the election of Chokwe Lumumba as mayor in the capital Jackson took an important step towards implementing the vision of assembly democracy, solidarity economy and an end to racial inequality. Lumumba dies unexpectedly in 2014, but his son Antar and the Cooperation Jackson continue to move forward.
We learn about the pitfalls of radical local politics and struggles for housing and land, democratic economic models and ecology, internationalist solidarity and the parallels to the Rojava Revolution and the Zapatistas, about encouraging experiences in which different concerns go hand in hand.
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From Citizen to Refugee: Uganda Asians Come to Britain
In his introduction to this new edition of From Citizen to Refugee: Uganda Asians Come to Britain, Mahmood Mamdani reminds us that long before 1972, most Ugandan ‘Asians’ had already been disenfranchised by law, both Ugandan and British. Despite a global industry that insists otherwise, Uganda Asians are a poor fit as victims: there was no large-scale loss of life during the expulsion, nor were there massacres of Asians, only of ‘indigenous’ peoples. Asians in Uganda, as in East or Southern Africa, he argues, were immigrants, not settlers: immigrants are prepared to be a part of the political community, whereas settlers ‘create their own political community, a colony, more precisely, settler colonialism.’ Mamdani insists that there is no single Asian legacy. there are several and they are contradictory. The Asian question in Uganda remains, but it is no longer the original Asian question. But it does allow us to think more broadly. Just as US law recognizes African Americans as Americans of African descent, so too must those of Asian origin in Africa consider themselves, and be considered, Asian Africans. It is in his bittersweet and touching book on the Asian expulsion from Uganda that one can trace the beginnings of author and intellectual Mahmood Mamdani’s world-view.. … In From Citizen to Refugee: Uganda Asians Come to Britain Mamdani offers portraits of people reduced to a vegetative existence in refugee camps, feeling the burden of not being fluent in English and struggling with the uncomfortably cold weather. Not surprisingly, these few months played a pivotal role in shaping Mamdani’s theoretical and political leanings, and it is here that one can locate his preoccupation with the formation of racial, ethnic and class identities during the colonial era and his overarching concern with issues of citizenship.
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Settler Colonialism
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 10.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 10.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageSettler Colonialism
Settler Colonialism examines the genesis in the USA of the first full-fledged settler state in the world, which went beyond its predecessors in 1492 Iberia and British-colonized Ireland with an economy based on land sales and enslaved African labor, an implementation of the fiscal-military state. Both the liberal and the rightwing versions of the national narrative misrepresent the process of European colonization of North America. Both narratives serve the critical function of preserving the “official story” of a mostly benign and benevolent USA as an anticolonial movement that overthrew British colonialism. The pre-US independence settlers were colonial settlers just as they were in Africa and India or like the Spanish in Central and South America. The nation of immigrants myth erases the fact that the United States was founded as a settler state from its inception and spent the next hundred years at war against the Native Nations in conquering the continent. Buried beneath the tons of propaganda—from the landing of the English “pilgrims” (Protestant Christian evangelicals) to James Fenimore Cooper’s phenomenally popular The Last of the Mohicans claiming settlers’ “natural rights” not only to the Indigenous peoples’ territories but also to the territories claimed by other European powers—is the fact that the founding of the United States created a division of the Anglo empire, with the US becoming a parallel empire to Great Britain, ultimately overcoming it. From day one, as was specified in the Northwest Ordinance, which preceded the US Constitution, the new “republic for empire,” as Thomas Jefferson called the new United States, envisioned the future shape of what is now the forty-eight states of the continental US. The founders drew up rough maps, specifying the first territory to conquer as the “Northwest Territory.” That territory was the Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes region, which was already populated with Indigenous villages and farming communities thousands of years old. Even before independence, mostly Scots Irish settlers had seized Indigenous farmlands and hunting grounds in the Appalachians and are revered historically as first settlers and rebels, who in the mid-twentieth century began claiming indigeneity. Self-indigenizing by various groups of settlers is a recurrent theme in story of settler colonialism, white supremacy, and the history of erasure and exclusion about which I have written elsewhere.
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Slave King: Rebels against empire: A Novel
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 26.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 26.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageSlave King: Rebels against empire: A Novel
In thirty chapters, the narrative develops the incredible story of how a boy (Younis/Eunus/Euno) captured as a slave in Afamia, Syria challenges the Roman Empire in Sicily, circa 140-132 BCE. The chapters dramatize the circumstance of his capture, his experiences as a tutor, the growth of his prophetic and magical abilities, events that fomented the uprising (cruelties, rapes, crucifixions), the role of female characters, connections to other historical events (e.g., the destruction of Carthage), as well as scenes of an exorcism, an ancient marriage ceremony, a play performed outside a besieged city, and several battles against the Roman legions. An epilogue by an imagined contemporary narrator, who explains why she wrote the novel, ends the work. In the chapters and epilogue, while using ancient sources to some extent (sparse and biased as they are), the work departs from them to resolve contradictions, fill in gaps, and present an alternative narrative of historical and cultural issues. It’s intended to remedy the neglect of this story in both ancient and modern sources, reverse the demonization explicit and implicit in them, and remedy the imbalance in the dominant constructs. It promotes the event as significant, certainly just as important as (if not more than) the Spartacus rebellion seven decades afterwards, or others that are commonly recounted. A significant aspect of this revolt comes from the fact that Younis was able to forge a coalition of slaves, farmers and herders that defeated Roman armies and established an independent entity on more egalitarian principles. The novel also touches on a range of topics, such as prophecy, magic, languages, the construct of Western civilization, representation of regional cultures, customs, and mythologies. An idealized statue of this rebel stands today in Enna, Sicily, along with an inscription that seems designed to appeal to tourists, yet Younis’ rebellion contradicts the dominant notions promoted in Italy and throughout the West, especially the identification with imperial Rome. This novel is intended to remedy his legacy. A fictionalised account of a slave rebellion in Roman Sicilia more than sixty years before Spartacus, it tells the story of the slave Younis from Afamia (now in Syria), a mystic and seer who led a great uprising sustained much longer than Spartacus’.
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A Mutiny of Morning: Reclaiming the Black Body from Heart of Darkness
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 15.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 15.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageA Mutiny of Morning: Reclaiming the Black Body from Heart of Darkness
Nikesha Breeze has taken pages from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, taken his words, and forced them to leave his colonized mind. She has made the words her own in poetic form. She illuminates the invisible Black voices inside, a radical, surgical, and unapologetic Black appropriation, at the same time as a careful birthing and spiritual road map. The resulting poems are sizzling purifications, violent restorations of integrity, pain, wound, bewilderment, rage, and, sometimes, luminous generosity. This is a work of Reclamation. The author, Nikesha Breeze, has slowly, page by page, reclaimed the text of the book Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. This racist turn-of-the-19th-century book was pivotal in the continued dehumanization of Black people and in particular of African people, as it painted an image of bestiality on the Congo people and the continent. It is laced with racist imagery and language. The author has reappropriated the book, page by page, making “BlackOut” poetry for each page, isolating methodically the words to create new poems of power and black voice within the text —stealing the language and reappropriating the power.
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MATHARE: An Urban Bastion of Anti-Oppression Struggle in Kenya.
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 15.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 15.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageMATHARE: An Urban Bastion of Anti-Oppression Struggle in Kenya.
History is written by the victors of any war. But what happens when the victors forget to write down their history or omit the cog of the struggle? This is the untold story of Mathare Slum that has never been told to the world: of the role it played in anti-colonial struggle and the planning ground for the Mau Mau struggle which culminated with the fall of the British Colonial Empire in Kenya in the midnight of December 12th 1963. Mathare has also played a critical role in anti-oppression struggle against the four regimes that we’ve had since independence and continues to do so up to date. This history has not been documented and has only been done piecemeal. This has overtime eroded the rich history of Mathare and led to a distorted history of once a planning ground and a bulwark of Kenya Land and Freedom Army (KFLA). The current generation are not cognizant with the critical role Mathare played in the independence of our country. Presently, Mathare is majorly known for all the negative reasons and its proximity to Mathari Mental Hospital has contorted its image to the outside world. My story tries to re-tell the history of Mathare from an informed insider perspective by threading the struggles from the colonial era to the present day and the role it has played in agitating for social justice. My story brings to view the past history of this informal settlement in the heart of Nairobi, the present struggle and the promising future through community organizing.
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Mental Health and Human Rights in Palestine
From: USD $ 5.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageMental Health and Human Rights in Palestine
This is a biography of the life of Dr Eyad El Sarraj, Gaza’s pioneering psychiatrist and founder of the Gaza Community Mental Healthcare Programme, written by his son, Wasseem El Sarraj. It is also a history of Palestine with a focus on Gaza. Eyad’s life was intimately intertwined with Palestine’s struggles so his choices and reactions reflected many of the major historical moments of the last 70 years. The book is an effort to provide a perspective on how the forces around him impacted his life, and how he took control of what he could achieve in an intractable situation. The book is interspersed with Wasseem’s own reflections as a mixed-race Palestinian, and as someone who has lived under occupation in Gaza.
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Bongoman and the Golden Boots
USD $ 16.25Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman and the Golden Boots
Bongoman stumbles upon a pair of magical football boots that have the ability to transform the wearer into a football wizard. His legendary love for football induces him to try out the boots, with spectacular results. With his new incredible ability, he suddenly becomes a maestro on the pitch. His brilliant dribbling and scoring tactics attracts international attention and several international premier football teams start seeking him with handsome offers for his services. Bongoman comes to face with the ugly face of game fixing and dirty practices, leading to threats to his life and family. After a series of unsettling incidents, including the kidnap of his nephew, Bongoman decides to play for his local team, but the malpractices run deeper than he had imagined and the mandarins controlling the game he so loves will give him no peace. He has no place in the game if he does not do as they say, but he cannot give up his strong principles for money or fame. Bongoman is in a quandary. Does he abandon his passion for good? Should he take the fall? That is out of the question! His only option is to take the criminals controlling football in the country out of the equation.
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Bongoman and the Magic Potion
USD $ 15.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman and the Magic Potion
Bongoman’s old friend, ‘Prof’, invents a potion that gives that gives someone superhuman strength when ingested, but his assistant, seeking personal benefit, steals a few vials for sale to some shadowy underworld boss. After the gang boss kidnaps the professor’s assistant to get hold of the magic potion’s formula, the professor seeks Bongoman’s assistance to get back his assistant from the crook’s clutches. One of the gang boss’s minions has taken the stolen magic potion and now possesses prodigious strength, wreaking havoc in the neighborhood and imposing a siege on the population. Bongoman must employ all his wits to outsmart his new nemesis. Bongoman finds himself in a full-scale war with an organized criminal gang. He must fight for the soul of his cherished neighborhood. The helpless police also appeal for his assistance in taking down the gang of cutthroats threatening the peace and turning Eastlands into a battleground. This is going to be a bare-knuckle brawl where no prisoners will be taken.
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Bongoman and the Pirates
USD $ 13.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman and the Pirates
Bongoman wins the lottery and believes this is the answer to all his financial woes. He plans to get into the transport industry by purchasing a ‘matatu’ (passenger van). He seeks a vehicle dealer to assist him import a van but a few days later, Bongoman learns that the ship importing his vehicle has been hijacked by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Kenya. With nowhere to turn to for help, Bongoman decides to take matters into his hands. He must travel to Somalia and get back his vehicle! As he embarks on his mission, he unearths the allies of the hijackers who lay a trap for him. He finds himself stranded in the middle of the Indian Ocean where he has to battle sharks, thirst and exposure. He overcomes these obstacles but falls into the hands of the hijackers, who consequently imprison him. Bongoman worms his way into the hearts of his captors after preparing a delicious meal for them and even accept his offer to join them as cook and soldier. The pirate boss orders him to accompany them to hijack another ship and after the attack goes awry, Bongoman miraculously manages to escape capture by an international anti-piracy force. Will Bongoman get back his vehicle? Will his transport business become a reality?
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Bongoman and the Warlords
USD $ 14.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman and the Warlords
Bongoman lands a job as a reporter and his first assignment for the News Daily is to cover the ongoing war in Somalia between the Transitional Government of Somalia and militant groups in the war-torn country. Bongoman boards a plane to Jowar but due to bad weather the plane is forced to land in Mogadishu, the last place Bongoman wanted to find himself in. The lawless nature of the battle-scarred city catches up with him soon enough. He finds himself at the wrong end of a gun at every turn. He meets an old friend who has a penchant for attracting trouble. To his shock, he learns that she’s running guns for one of the main warlords in the city. He tries to extricate himself from her company but the situation escalates and they both end up in the hands of a regional warlord, who sees in them handsome ransom rewards. An old friend helps Bongoman and his companions escape from their dingy dungeon but they have to contend with a terrorist armed with an RPG. Bongoman has been shot at, blown up, kidnapped and buried in a landslide. It’s time to go back home… but will it be that easy?
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Bongoman Strikes Gold
USD $ 14.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman Strikes Gold
Bongoman bumps into his perpetually broke friend, Rastafasta, driving a flashy car. Rastafasta discloses the secret to his new-found wealth; he is involved in the gold trade. There is a thriving gold business in the mines of Ikolomani, a bustling little town about 350 km from the city. Bongoman embarks on an epic journey to this Eldorado, with dreams of making big money. Halfway through the journey, the bus breaks down and impatient to get to his destination, he disembarks and continues the journey on foot. He jogs through hills and valleys, hour after hour and finally, thirsty and exhausted he finds himself in a dingy bar where he ingests a potent alcoholic brew unknowingly. Shaken but unfazed he continues his journey which is cut short after a gang of robbers posing as passengers hijack the passenger van he is travelling in. After a decisive reckoning with Bongoman, the robbers find themselves behind bars as Bongoman walks away with a hefty bounty derived from their capture. This windfall quickly evaporates after the crafty van driver spikes his drink. He finally arrives at the gold mines of Ikolomani and to his utter dismay, finds that all is not a bed of roses…
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Bongoman vs Mother-In-Law
USD $ 13.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageBongoman vs Mother-In-Law
Bongoman’s ill-tempered mother-in-law arrives for a visit. Bongoman is far from thrilled as he doesn’t see eye-to-eye with the old lady. She never has a kind word for him, calling him a good-for-nothing bum. The tranquillity of the Bongoman household is turned upside down as the old lady imposes her uncompromising will, harassing Bongoman at every given opportunity, especially his evening forays to the neighbourhood pub. With no peace of mind, Bongoman pushes back and devises a series of tricks to force her out of his house. None of the tricks works out, and Bongoman finds life unbearable in his own house. He reports an assault against him by his mother-in-law to the police but finds himself in jail as the perpetrator of the assault Bongoman storms out of his house in protest after a brief interlude in jail, taking up residence in the local park, where he has to contend with some unsavoury night-time characters for rights to the more comfortable sleeping spaces and has to fight to assert his position in the pecking order. How will Bongoman rid himself of this terrible relative? Does he have any more tricks up his sleeve?
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IGOLI EGOLI
USD $ 14.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageIGOLI EGOLI
Contents
IGOLI
On love (xxxiii) 13 Dorothy Masuku in Sophiatown 2018 14 Re-Map 16 On love (xxxiv) 18 56 Chapman Street 19 Yesterday Today Tomorrow 20 Marlboro Winter 21 Diepsloot Winter (pre-loadshedding) 22 Only in Jozi 23 Dispossession 24 Ontvangs B Helen Joseph Hospital 25 Mammogram Waiting Room Roodepoort 26 Pholosong Emergency 27 1st Road 28 Inclines 29 Counterclock Clock 30 airbnb Meldene 32 Meldene to Melville, COVID-19 late third wave 33 Excess death or, Acer rubrum 34 Westdene Winter or, Masculinity 35 Shrieking yellow 36 Fleurhof 37 Intraction Extraction 38 On love (xxxv) 40 Moon Garden 41 On love (xxxvi) 42 Garnets or, On love (xxxvii) 43 Spirit 44 Lower 4th Westdene or, On love (xxxviii) 45 On love (xxxix) 46 Natalia Molebatsi and Bab’Themba Mokoena in dance 47 Maps 48 inimba 49 On love (xl) 50 On love (xli) 51 Footsteps 52 inimba (ii) 53 On love (xlii) 54 iSothamilo or, On love (xliii) 55 big little forest 56 On love (xliv) 57
EGoli
or, Only in Jozi (ii) or, On love (xlv) 62 Origins 63 metsi/amanzi/emanti/mvura/madzi/ruwa/water/ /l’eau/ 65 Down Main Street Melville or, Umsebenzi 66 Umsebenzi (ii) 67 Footsteps (ii) 68 Where will we go? 69 RosesRunways 70 On love (xlvi) or, Umsebenzi (iii) 71 72 Wealth 74 Recipe or, Wealth (ii) 75 On love (xlvii) 76 sodade (iii) or, Joy of Jazz Sandton 2017 77 Mushrooms in Mint or, On love (xlviii) 78 Footsteps (iii) 80 Distances 81 Only in Jozi (iii) 82 Greenhill Grocer or, On love (xlix) 83 Only in Jozi (iv) or, On love (l) 84 Fidel Castro at Lillisleaf Farm 2017 or, On love (li) 87 After the launch of Cradles or, 2018 or, On love (lii) 90 sodade (iv) EGoli or, On love (liii) On love (liv)
A new collection of poems by Salimah Valiani. IGoli EGoli is a sociopolitical reading of Johannesburg drawing on its famous, and not so famed, people, places, plants & pronouncements.
First published by [email protected]
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International Brigade Against Apartheid: Secrets of the People’s War That Liberated South Africa
USD $ 27.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageInternational Brigade Against Apartheid: Secrets of the People’s War That Liberated South Africa
We hear for the first time from the internationalist secretly working for the ANC’s armed wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), in the struggle to liberate South Africa from apartheid rule. They acted as couriers, provided safe houses in neighbouring states and within South Africa, helped infiltrate combatants across borders, and smuggled tons of weapons into the country in the most creative ways. Driven by a spirit of international solidarity, they were prepared to take huge risks and face great danger. The internationalists reveal what motivated them as volunteers, not mercenaries: they gained nothing for their endeavours save for the self-esteem in serving a just cause. Against such clandestine involvement, the book includes contributions from key people in the international Anti-Apartheid Movement and its public mobilisation to isolate the apartheid regime. These include worldwide campaigns like Stop the Sports Tours, boycotting of South African products and black American solidarity. The Cuban, East German and Russian contributions outlined those countries’ support for the ANC and MK. The public, global Anti-Apartheid Movement campaigns provide the dimensions from which internationalists who secretly served MK emerged. Edited by Ronnie Kasrils. First published by Jacana Media (Pty) Ltd in 2021, ISBN: 978-1-4314-3202-8, this Daraja Press edition is available in North America and East Africa.
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Life Histories from the Revolution: Three militants from the Kenya Land and Freedom Army tell their stories
USD $ 5.00 USD $ 18.00Price range: USD $ 5.00 through USD $ 18.00Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product pageLife Histories from the Revolution: Three militants from the Kenya Land and Freedom Army tell their stories
In the early 1970s, Donald Barnett — who worked with Karari Njama to produce Mau Mau From Within (published by Daraja Press) — also worked with three militants of the Kenya Land and Freedom Army to enable them to tell the story of their experience in fighting for freedom and against British colonialism. These rarely acknowledged militants were Karigo Muchai, Ngugi Kabiro and Mohamed Mathu. Their stories were published in 1973 by LSM Information Center (Richmond, British Columbia, Canada) as part of a series entitled Life Histories of the Revolution, as The Hardcore: The Story of Karigo Muchai; The Man in the Middle by Ngugi Kabiro; and The Urban Guerrilla by Mohamed Mathu.
As part of its mission of Nurturing reflection, sheltering hope and inspiring audacity, Daraja Press is please to republish the three booklets as a book that will help a new generation of activists — Kenyan and international — reflect on a history that might inspire audacious struggles to continue the struggle for freedom that was the goal of the Kenya Land and Freedom Army.
Donald Barnett’s introduction to each booklet contained the following text:
The life histories in this series have been recorded and prepared as historical documents from the revolutionary struggles of our time. The techniques and methods employed at each stage of the process, from initial contact to final editing, have therefore been chosen or fashioned with the purpose of guaranteeing the authenticity and integrity of the life history concerned. These stories, then, to the best of our ability to make them so, constitute a body of data and testimony as revealed by a few of those history-makers normally condemned to silence while others speak on their behalf.Select options This product has multiple variants. The options may be chosen on the product page