language

Notes on Anarchy and Hegemony in the Realm of Definitions

Notes on Anarchy and Hegemony in the Realm of Definitions

From Libertarian Labyrinth by Shawn P. Wilbur

The notes that follow are preliminary, as I try to bring together a number of considerations regarding vocabulary, definition, theoretical clarity and such. They begin with some questions raised about the translation of Proudhon’s work, pass through a discussion of Proudhon’s own approach to the definition of key terms — which I hope will be useful as we begin reading and discussion of Justice in the Revolution and in the Church — and end with some general thoughts about anarchists’ engagement with the question of definition in the present.

Crash Goes the Alphabet

Time for a new one!
by Ian Blumberg-Enge
Fifth Estate # 413, Spring, 2023

a review of
Breaking the Alphabet by Sascha Engel. Ardent Press 2022

Critiques of language and its objectifying, alienating effects are older than history itself (history defined as the linear, language-based story of civilization). Those early incarnations still exist today in mystical and spiritual practices like no-mind meditation, ecstatic dance, and mantra.

TOTW: policing language or challenging ruts?

The point of changing words, or limiting the words we use, is to change behavior. I avoid saying "interesting," as I rely on it too much. I also discourage people from saying they’re sorry, which is so frequently a platitude, or a way of getting out of a situation, or empty in a variety of other ways. I have sometimes suggested in the past, with people who know of and are indulgent with my foibles, that when they’re tempted to say “sorry” they instead say “fuck you”, which has had some funny repercussions, and is not something I recommend for the neophyte.

Plant Anarchy

Plant Anarchy

New book available now. A fuller, much expanded treatment of the iteration/repetition/deixis framework that Sascha Engel first introduced in his Breaking The Alphabet, expanding it to analyses of - and techniques against - institutionalized domestication in everyday life, the state, machinery and computation (including of the "AI" variety).

Breaking the Alphabet Hilaritas Podcast

Book cover of "Breaking the Alphabet" by Sascha Engel

From Hilaritas Press Podcasts

In this episode, Mike Gathers chats with Sascha Engel on the Hilaritas podcast about the themes of his book, "Breaking the Alphabet," the tyranny of the written word, the critique of language, and the Anti-Alphabet. This hour long interview takes a deep dive into Sascha's creation--the anti-alphabet--and how it can help us transcend the controlling boundaries of writing, the alphabet, and authoritarian iteration.

Anarcho-Buddhism or Buddhist Anarchism?

Bhante Akaliko approves this message

From No Selves, No Masters by reed w ingalls

A friend of mine who teaches foreign language reminded me today of a curious problem in English. We don’t often take the time to understand what our compound words and prefixes do to the meaning of a term. For example, anarcho-communism is often used synonymously with anarchism, libertarian socialism and so on. However, the order of the words and hyphenation indicate that communism is the subject, and anarchism is the modifier. What kind of communism? Anarchist communism.

Call for an arabic network of anarchists

from anarab2022.noblogs.org

We call upon our comrades, individuals and collectives, for an arabic-speaking network of arab and/or arabic speaking anarchists and libertarians and/or living in north Africa, the arabian peninsula and surrounding regions. We announce our will to build this network in order to strengthen solidarity, mutual aid, support, discussion and exchange criticism, news, knowledge, skills and experiences, theoretical and practical. We ask you to contact us and share this call with whom it may concern.

Invecchiare Selvatico on Immediatism Podcast

Invecchiare Selvatico's book Black Blossoms at the End of the World, with poetry and songs by Nazel Pickens, is a compilation of essays, fragments, scribbles, letters, rants, songs, and ramblin's discovered in a secluded backwoods cabin. Written by a primary editor of Green Anarchy magazine who has used a variety of names, these essays are timely and relevant to our lives. "Can Bricks Break Diametrics? On Decapitating Two~Dimensional Binary Thinking" challenges our language and ideas, potentially leaving us better anarchists for having considered these. "Their World is Virtually Done" is a rant on "the almost encompassing grasp technology has over humans."

Pivot to Spanish

nature is a language, can't you read?

From The Anarchist Library by anonymous, ex-Montreal Anarchist Bookfair Collective

What follows is a very inflated argument for the first of three proposals[1] I had for the development of “language policy” with respect to the Montreal Anarchist Bookfair. When I started writing, the intended audience was no larger than the other people who make the book fair happen, i.e. members of the Montreal Anarchist Bookfair Collective (MABC) and a slightly larger circle of volunteers and friends. I began writing in the spring of 2020, before the 21st iteration of the book fair on May 17 of that year, although I had drafted shorter texts on much the same theme in earlier years, also for a readership within the collective and the next innermost circle of collaborators. Most of the writing was done over the summer of 2020, after the 2020 book fair was over and, more importantly, after I decided that I wanted to leave the collective, which was at some point in early June.

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