Sheffield Anarchist Bookfair

Stalls

The list for the 2012 Sheffield Anarchist bookfair stalls confirmed so far.

Anarchist Federation http://www.afed.org.uk/

Collective Action / Plan C (shared) http://www.anarchistcommunist.org/

Solfed http://www.solfed.org.uk/

North East Anarchists http://neanarchists.com/

AK Press http://www.akpress.org/

Freedom Press http://www.freedompress.org.uk

Radical Books

PM Press http://www.pmpress.org/

Now or Never http://www.nowornever.org.uk/

Mayday Books

Print Project

Feminist Zines

FemCells

Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) http://iww.org.uk/

Lincoln Underground Collective http://lincolnundergroundcollective.wordpress.com/

Leeds Surrealism Group http://leedssurrealistgroup.wordpress.com/

South Yorkshire Hunt Sabs

Sheffield Animal Friends http://www.milliondollaryack.com/saf/

Dave Douglas

Films Showing

The list for the 2012 bookfair films showing (to be confirmed)

El Cine Libertario
11:00 – 12:00 FILM: De Toda La Vida. 60 mins. Spanish with
English Subtitles
In the midst of the Spanish Civil War, 1936-39, a daring social experiment took place as the working class threw off the shackles of capitalism and the state to fight for a better, brighter world. Despite this being a struggle for the emancipation of all sexism was still rife, even amongst the revolutionary workers. Women were marginalised to traditional roles as wife, nurse or whore. In response to this the Mujeres Libres, Free Women, were formed. With a membership of some 30,000 women they fought on the front lines, shut down the brothels and engaged in popular education in both town and village. The fi lm features a series of interviews with surviving members of the group and as such is a vital oral history of the period and of the development of anarchism and feminism.

12:00 – 12:30 “Solidarité Syndicale : Lessons from Montreal
Earlier this year Premier Jean Charest introduced a proposal into the Quebec legisture to almost double the rates of tuition fees that students to pay to enter university. In response students organised through the radical coalition CLASSE (formed by the student union ASSÉ – an openly anti-capitalist, feminist and anti-colonial organisation) called a state-wide general strike. Over the past few months, and in spite of a new ban on spontaneous protest, thousands of students have been mobilised in support of the strike. Demonstrations happen on an almost nightly basis blockading roads, picketing campus buildings and mobilising the wider public. This is while being organised on a grassroots level with the democratic decisions of departmental general assemblies at the core of this new movement. Come and see a selection of short films and interviews on one of the most vibrant and popular expressions of anti-austerity resistance to date.

12:30 – 13:10 FILM: Call it Sleep. 40 mins.
Call it Sleep is a global, strategic evaluation of the social forces comprising the society of the spectacle. It is conceived from the view that, if individuals are to gain control over their lives, the world of hierarchical power must be destroyed. Call It Sleep is the first visual work produced in the United States which makes use of the situationist technique of detournement – the devaluation and re-use of present and past cultural production to form a superior theoretical and practical unity. Completed in May of 1982 and entirely self-financed Call It Sleep is an essential, and far more accessible in terms of its French counterparts, introduction to the situationist method and the unique conditioning of advanced capitalism.

14:00 – 14:40 London Book Fair Shorts
description.

14:40 – 15:40 – On the frontline: Greek Shorts
Greece is currently at the centre of a global financial storm. Pushed to the absolute extremes of austerity Greeks often presented in the media as selfish, hot-headed or corrupt. These series of films will look at the other side of the story focusing on the realities of life at the forefront of the austerity offensive and the rich cultures of resistance that have allowed the Greek people to push back against the murderous policies of the EU and IMF.

15:40 – 17:10 – FILM: CATASTROIKA – PRIVATISATION GOES PUBLIC
The creators of Debtocracy analyse the shifting of state assets to private hands. They travel round the world gathering data on privatization in developed countries on the day after Greece’s massive privatization program.The documentary uncovers the forthcoming results of the current sell-off of the Greek public assets, demanded in order to face the country’s enormous sovereign debt. Turning to the examples of London, Paris, Berlin, Moscow and Rome, Catastroika presents a compelling outline of the future further shift of wealth away from the public into privatehands. Essential viewing in respect to the policies of the government in the UK.

The list for the 2012 bookfair talks.

Big Room:

12-1 Sheffield IWW – 1. ABC of workplace organising – Ideas and history
The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) is an international, revolutionary union with over a hundred years of organising history across the globe. This meeting will explore both the background and contemporary issues in the struggle for labour organisation, what the IWW has to offer and the need for a militant and grass-roots approach to building confidence and solidarity at work.

1.15-2.15 Collective Action / Plan C Towards organisation: Regroupment and building counter-power in the present crisis.
Collective Action and Plan C are two new initiatives emerging out of recent experiences of a combative – but ultimately unsustainable – student movement, faltering anti-austerity coalitions and in the pressing context of an ongoing and escalating crisis. In similar and also divergent ways, both put forward the concepts of organisation, Regroupmemt and a critical investigation of the political and social terrain as key tasks for revolutionaries at this time.
There will be a short presentation by both groups on their ideas, followed by a guided discussion of key themes.

2.30 – 3.30 Anarchist Federation, St Imier Speaking Tour
In August 2012 anarchists from all over the world will be gathering in St Imier, Switzerland for a week of events to mark the 140th anniversary of the founding of the Anarchist International- a major split with the authoritarian international of Karl Marx.
This split represents a fundamental divide between those who believe that communism can be imposed from above, and those who believe that we can only have true communism if we have freedom as well. How we get where we want to go is as important as where we want to go.
The following issues will be discussed:
• The background to St Imier and what was involved in the split
• How the struggle against authoritarianism continued in key revolutions
such as Russia and Spain
• The debate about human ‘nature’ and why humans do not need
authority to flourish
• The role of authoritarian tendencies in struggles today eg the cuts
movement, the strikes in the public sector, the student movement and
within the anarchist movement itself.

3.45 – 4.45 Crisis
How do we understand the current economic crisis? As a plethora of individual, albeit interconnected, crises of credit, sovereign debt, Greece, Spain, the Eurozone, etc? Or as a crisis of capitalism? If we consider crisis as integral to capitalism how does this understanding affect our current struggles? To what extent can we develop alternatives to capitalism in the present? A discussion begun by contributors to The Accumulation of Freedom.

smaller room:

11-12 LaDIYfest: one year on
How the collective has grown since its inception at last years bookfair, what we have achieved, what we want to do in the future and what people from community groups across Sheffield might like to see happen next.

12-1 Kerb Crawled – responding to street harassment
We’ll be creating a safer space to talk about our experiences of street harassment such as cars pulling up, being whistled at and having abuse shouted at us. Then, if you want, you can create pages for a zine on the subject which will be printed and published online. http://northern-indymedia.org/zines/2180

1.15 – 2.15 Sheffield IWW. ABC of workplace organising – practical skill share
Building a union in the workplace can appear intimidating, takes time and confidence. In this meeting union organisers will offer practical insights into basic rights and workplace law, skills such as public speaking and representation, handling case work and first steps towards forming an organising committee and membership drive.2. ABC of workplace organising – practical skill share
Building a union in the workplace can appear intimidating, takes time and confidence. In this meeting union organisers will offer practical insights into basic rights and workplace law, skills such as public speaking and representation, handling case work and first steps towards forming an organising committee and membership drive.

2.30 – 3.30 Femcells – Why Aren’t We Represented On The Barricades?:An Anarcha- Feminist Workshop With FemCell’s North and South.
A talk followed by a workshop looking at the current role of Feminism within Activism. We’ll be discussing the rising third wave of Feminism [Slutwalk, Manarchist Meme's etc.], along with questions of intersectionality covering race, class as well as gender. We’re interested to hear other women’s experience of activism, how we can attract more women to activism and the role of gender in ‘burn out’.

3.45 – 4.45 Lincoln Underground Collective Anarchism in a sleepy town
A discussion of the actions, methods & capabilities of organising groups in small towns & cities; engaging with the public, participating in workers’ struggles & agitating depoliticised areas, using LUC’s activities over the past year as an example.

Richard White who describes himself as a anarchist geographer.

Post-bookfair Events

Saturday Evening

Social drinks at the Red Deer from 6pm, which also serves Vegan food till 9pm.

Sunday 24th June, top of Fargate at 12:30

Radical Walk

A walking tour of the city centre highlighting the radical working class history of the city. Designed and produced by Andy of Sheffield Anarchist Group (1990s) we are happy to bring this introduction to the city out of the Sheffield Anarchist Archive.
Look for the red and black flag!

BBQ hosted by Sheff ield Animal Friends
Sunday 23rd June, 14:30 Weston Park

After a busy day of fervent book buying, talks, films and meetings come and relax in Weston Park with some scrumptious vegan food. BYOB and tunes.

Three-sided Football

Sunday 23rd June, 15:00 Weston Park

Three-sided football is a variation of football with three teams instead of the usual two. It was devised by the Danish Situationist Asger Jorn to explain his notion of triolectics, his refinement on the Marxian concept of dialectics, as well as to disrupt one’s everyday idea of football. Unlike in conventional football, where the winner is determined by the highest scoring of the two teams, no score is kept of the goals which a team scores, but conversely a count is taken of the number of goals conceded and the winning team is that which concedes the least number of goals. All welcome!

Just a quick thank you to everyone that attended the Bookfair.
Hopefully next year will be even bigger and better.