Reading guides

I was looking at the existing reading guides the other day, and I think they could do with a rethink themselves. They are overly full of Trotskyist and classical marxist texts and lack anarchist texts. For example the IWMA guide has:
*On The First International - Marx
*The First Four Internationals - George Novack
Anarchism - Marx/Engels/Lenin
The History of Socialist Thought, vol. 2 - G.D.H. Cole
A Short History of The European Working Class - Abendroth
Collected Works - Marx/Engels
Karl Marx: Man and Fighter - Nicolaievsky
Karl Marx - Otto Ruhle
*Karl Marx - Franz Mehring
*Friedrich Engels: His Life and Thought – Carver
*Engels After Marx – Carver
Marx and Engels: A Conceptual Concordance – Carver
Marx and Engels: The Intellectual Relationship – Carver
The Life and Thought of Friedrich Engels – Hunley
Engels and The Formation of Marxism - Rigby
The Letters of Karl Marx - Saul Padover, Ed.
The Revolutionary Ideas of Friederich Engels (International Socialism #65, 1994)

I have been thinking about this in the background for a while.

Basically, what I think we should do is change and expand our current set of further reading guides.

So we rename it libcom reading guide.

Then we go through, add new guides as you suggest with introductory reading, including short notes on the texts next to the links, explaining the perspective, the utility of text etc.

And we break them up into "Introductory Texts", "detailed/advanced" etc and then possibly even "culture" or something listing relevant possibly fictional films, documentaries etc.

As we tidy up guides to add introductory texts we rename them from "further reading guide" to "reading guide".

How does this sound? I know Hieronymous previously said he would be up for helping with this.

Sure, I'm ready to help. And I've got lots of ideas to bounce off all of you.

Hi,
i would be up for helping with this, especially the sections on gay liberation (looking quite lonely just now..) and women. i think the ideas of a brief descriptor of the text or book in question and the seperation of introductory and further reading are good. i think this division should recognise the difference in styles used - some are generally easier for people who don't read so much to get into than others, just more exciting etc. - and they should be in the intro section more than ones it would be easier to find boring or difficult.
I also had a few thoughts about a new image for the gay liberation section (maybe even the name??? dunno its kind of succinct in a way) that would feel more inspiring..found a coupla of possible photos.
let me know if you would potentially like my help on this & i could send you some examples of books with brief descriptors and/or my photo ideas.
just to clarify i have read the content guidelines & about libcom.
yrs dohball

I think this all sounds amazing..

Hi,
Ok i'll send my suggestions under the different catergories that exist just now and specify whether i think they should be under intro, further or connected reading & put a 1 or max 2 sentence summary under each book/article.

i'll have to send them on in dribs and drabs tho cos my work hours are about to go up quite a lot soon. should we make a dropbox so that this thread doesn't get all cluttered or do you want it to be public so people can comment as the process goes on?
love dohball

I would say public is fine

women (Intro)

Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide
By Andrea Smith
In this revolutionary book, Smith, a Native American scholar/activist, reveals the connections between different forms of violence—perpetrated by the state and by society at large—and documents how Native women are impacted. Smith also outlines strategies for eliminating gendered violence.

Color of Violence
The INCITE! Anthology
INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence
Springing from the work of the nation's largest grassroots multiracial feminist organization, this collection expands understandings about violence against women, clarifying how violence operates through race, class, gender, and nationality, and exposing the state's role in condoning and furthering violence.

Undivided Rights
Women of Color Organize for Reproductive Justice
Jael Silliman, Marlene Gerber Fried, Loretta Ross, and Elena Gutiérrez
"Reproductive rights" is just the right to a safe abortion. Right? No! this book proclaims—there's so much more. Vibrant and fierce, Undivided Rights places the experiences, priorities, and activism of women of color in the foreground.

A New View of a WOMAN’S BODY, A Fully Illustrated Guide by the Federation of Feminist Women's Health Centers.
Presents clear, detailed descriptions of vaginal and breast self examination, the complete anatomy of the clitoris, common infections, lab tests, fertility detection, donor insemination, birth control, menstrual extraction, abortion care, surgical procedures and home remedies. With detailed illustrations/anatomical drawings.

OUR BODIES, OURSELVES The Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, 2005
Collectively written this book gives wide-ranging health information for women in a straight-forward and supportive way from a feminist perspective. OBOS began in 1970 as a small newsprint pamphlet that was so popular it morphed into a best-selling book reprinted into 18 languages.

The Clitoral Truth : The Secret World at Your Fingertips by Rebecca Chalker
Q: What female body part has over 6,000 nerve fibers, is the key to women's sexual pleasure, and has managed to elude countless female anatomy books? A: The Clitoris. History… cool anatomical drawings…personal accounts…how women can ejaculate…full body pleasure…empowerment etc.

For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of the Experts Advice to Women
by Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English
Explores the US history of how experts usurped women’s age old skills and then set themselves up as the sole authorities on everything from work to love. The onslaught of advice that followed has always been justified as being for her own good - but in fact that ‘scientific’ guidance has again and again contained arrogant and unscientific judgements about women’s bodies, minds and ‘nature’ as this book details thoroughly with wry humour.

FEMINIST THEORY
From Margin to Center
bell hooks
Feminism’s goal of seeking credibility and acceptance on already existing ground—rather than demanding the lasting and more fundamental transformation of society—has shortchanged the movement, hooks argues.
A sweeping examination of the core issues of sexual politics, Feminist Theory argues that contemporary feminists must acknowledge the full complexity and diversity of women’s experience to create a mass movement to end women’s oppression.

Women, Race & Class (1981)
by Angela Davis
Davis explores how both sexism and racism are deeply rooted in capitalism and the class system. She traces the varied history of black womens’ ongoing struggle for freedom in the US and how it intertwines with both workers self-organisation and the womens liberation movement.

Gay liberation (intro)

That's Revolting!: Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation ed. Matt Bernstein aka sycamore
The anthology consists of personal histories, rants, interviews, conversations, activist struggles, practical advice and glamour. Contributors include early gay liberation rabble-rousers, counterculture demons, fringe artistes, renegade academics, the dispossessed, the obsessed and various other enemy combatants. In other words, That's Revolting! is a book by a bunch of freaks, fruits, perverts and whores who are dedicated to resisting homogenization, globalization and all the other evils of this ravaging world.

Politics of the Heart: A Lesbian Parenting Anthology
by Sandra Pollack and Jeanne Vaughn
Compulsive reading - 60 personal reflective accounts of different relationships to motherhood and parenthood.

Revolutionary Voices: A Multicultural Queer Youth Anthology, edited by Amy Sonnie,
An anthology created by and for radical queer youth (aged 16-24) committed specifically to youth of colour, young women, transgender and bisexual youth, (dis)abled youth, and poor/working class youth. The anthology introduced a host of radical young writers and artists, many of whom continue to publish and create today.

sorry steven never noticed what you said about 'detailed/advanced instead of further. just take anything i'v put under further before as belonging in that new catregory, whatever you decide to call it. (tho i'v put stuff into that category that i don't know if you'd really call detailed or advanced like interviews with people, its more that its kinda specific rather than being generally introductory to that area of life/thought...)

GAY LIB INTRO

Exile and Pride: Disability, Queerness and Liberation by Eli Clare
Clare’s writing, with passion, insight and a poet's sense of language, on his experiences as a genderqueer activist/writer with cerebral palsy permanently changed the landscape of disability politics and queer liberation, and yet Exile & Pride is much too great in scope to be defined by even these two issues. Instead it offers an intersectional framework for understanding how our bodies actually experience the politics of oppression, power, and resistance. At the heart of Clare’s exploration of environmental destruction, white working-class identity, queer community, disabled sexuality, childhood sexual abuse, coalition politics, and his own gender transition is a call for social justice movements that are truly accessible for everyone.

WOMEN detailed/further/advanced ?

Staying Alive
Women, Ecology and Development
Vandana Shiva

Shiva looks at the history of development and progress, stripping away the neutral language of science to reveal its interconnections with ecological crises, colonialism, and the oppression of women. She focuses on how rural Indian women experience and perceive the causes and effects of ecological destruction, and how they conceive of and initiate processes to stop the destruction and begin regeneration.

Abortion without Apology : A Radical History for the 1990s
By Ninia Baehr
Stories of the Society for Humane Abortion—otherwise known as the Jane Collective— (began as an underground referral group and eventually decided to perform the abortions themselves, carrying out nearly 12, 000 between 1969 and 1973) record the experiences, successes, and ideas of this early wave of activism, and provide astute analysis for building a broader reproductive freedom movement in the 21st century.

The Revolution Starts at Home
Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities Edited by
Ching-In Chen, Jai Dulani & Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha with preface by Andrea Smith
The extent of the violence affecting our communities is staggering. But to effectively resist violence out there, we must challenge how it is reproduced—often by those we call friend, lover, ally—right where we live. This collection offers potentially life-saving alternatives for survivor safety while holding perpetrators accountable while building a revolution where no one is left behind.

Prostitutes: Our Life edited by Claude Jaget
A series of interviews with sex workers, some of who have become politically active in fighting for sex workers rights.

Some of My Best Friends Are Naked: Interviews With Seven Erotic Dancers by Tim P. Keefe
Interviews with women working at the Lusty Ladies club in the US (where workers later unionized) about working conditions, motivations, pleasures, dislikes, fun, exploitation, customers and crazy shit.

bit post drunk darts playing .. but these are ones i made earlier x

Gay Lib - Further

Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde
Zami is a carriacou (a carribean island) name for women who work together as friends and lovers. Partly autobiographical, partly mythical this book explores the life of Audre Lorde from her childhood to her later youth.

Women - Further

Breast Cancer: Poisons, Profits And Prevention by Liane Clorfene-Casten
Exposes the revolving door between the petroleum industries, the multinational pharmaceutical industry, the FDA (food and drug administration, this is a stateside book) and the larger cancer research charities. Explores and draws attention to research that proves and/or indicates that ever increasing levels of environmental pollution are causative in breast (and other) cancers. Argues that women’s grief and anger over the loss of loved ones to breast cancer is being manipulated in the interests of powerful profiteering businesses.

Quiet Rumours An Anarcha-Feminist Anthology edited by the Dark Star Collective
This book reprints older writings from an anarcha-feminist perspective in order to “preserve and pass on significant works to younger/newer comrades.” Many of these were first reprinted as single pamphlets by the Dark Star Collective and include pieces by Peggy Kornegger, Cathy Levine, Joreen, Emma Goldman, interviews with Rota Zora (a militant feminist guerrilla group which was involved in violent direct action against patriarchal institutions in Germany throughout the 70’s and 80’s) and material from Mujeres Creando (anarcha-feminist street activists in Bolivia).

Angry Women (Research 13) Edited by Andrea Juno and V. Vale
Sixteen women (many but all of them performance artists) including Wanda Coleman, Diamanda Galas, Annie Sprinkle, bell hooks, Valie Export, Carolee Schneemann are interviewed covering a large range of topics including power, anger, sex, racism, singing, capitalism and dildos.

Touch me Touch Me Not: Women, Plants and Healing by the Shodhini Collective
An inspiring and detailed account of a women’s collective project in India that works to improve the health of women in a number of communities in the – area. They take the fullest definition of the word health e.g. challenging physical violence within their communities by confronting abusive men, recording and utilising traditional healing techniques, assisting with varied gynaecological problems and providing menstrual extraction.

Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution by Adrienne Rich
Before Of Woman Born, there had been little to no scholarly feminist analysis of the institution of motherhood. The author interweaves reflections on her personal experiences of motherhood with analysis of the historical development of the currently prevalent role of motherhood in the west. She explores and questions the effects of this division of labour on the psyche of women.

Gay lib - Intro

Lesbians Talk Safer Sex Edited by Sue O’Sullivan & Pratibha Parmar

Takes a discussive rather than prescriptive approach to the questions of what safer sex means when it comes to lesbian sex. An international group of HIV and Aids workers, sex educators and interested lesbians frankly discuss questions and controversies.

Gay lib - further

Lesbian Erotics Edited by Karla Jay

A series of short essays on the variety of lesbian sexual experiences and ways in which they are portrayed in mainstream culture. A mixture of personal and more theoretical reflections and stories.

Lesbians Talk Violent Relationships Edited by Joelle Taylor and Tracey Chandler

The first book on abusive lesbian relationships to be published in the UK. Basing their research on an extensive survey of survivors own experiences, the authors draw up a picture of how abuse happens and how we might deal with it.

gay lib - intro

This is What Lesbian Looks Like edited by Kris Kleindienst

Twenty six writers, some famous, some known only to their local communities interweave writing about everyday life and larger political questions. Shares a focus on the necessity of grassroots organizing.

Women - intro

Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today’s Feminism Edited by Daisy Hernandez and Bushra Rehman

Series of short pieces in four categories: ‘Family and Community: A litany for Survival’ ‘Our Mothers, Refugees from a World on Fire,’ ‘Going through Customs’ and ‘Talking Back, Taking Back’. Gloria E. Anzaldua says the young writers “bear eloquent witness to the splintering effects of colonialism, conflicts between realities, and contradictions and challenges common to these times.”

women - further

Silences by Tillie Olsen

A study of the needs and work of creation and the circumstances that obstruct or silence it, such as gender, class and race. Her observations include that prior to the late 20th century, all the well known women writers in Western literature either had no children or had full-time housekeepers to raise the children and that between 1850 and 1950 only eleven black American writers published more than two novels.

Pacific Women Speak Out for Independence and Denuclearisation Edited by Zohl de Ishtar

Indigenous women write of their resistance against incredible odds. They tell of the impacts of invasion and war, nuclear weapons systems, nuclear testing, militarization, human rights abuses, sexism, tourism, non-indigenous settlement, mining, industrialisation, imposed economic dependency and all the manifestations of colonization.

Borderlands/La Frontera The New Mestiza by Gloria Anzaldua

Anzaldua writes in both prose prose and poetry
describing her childhood along the Texas-Mexico border and her experience of being caught between two cultures and alien in both. Historically and mythically she traces the migrations of pre- Astec Indians from what is now the US southwest to central Mexico and, then, back centuries later as mestizos descendants of both Indians and Spanish Conquistadors.

Assata An Autobiography by Assata Shakur

Shakur explains what drew her to become a member of the Black Panther Party and reflects on her life in struggle. Now living in Cuba where she fled after a successful escape from US prison she creates an account of her life that moves back and forth between her childhood and adult life with verve and passion.

Companeras Voices from the Latin American Womens Movement Edited by Gaby Kuppers

Twenty- five interviews and essays from contributors who include, women from A Wives of Steelworkers Union group, a Mexican sex-worker who stood for parliament, women members of the Brazilian Workers Party, of SOFA, a forum for rural women and market sellers in Haiti, of the Paraguayan Peasant’s Movement , of the Cuban Women’s Federation, of the National Co-ordinating Committee of women in El Salvador, of the Association of Guatemalan Widows, of the black organization Mundo Afro in Uruguay and more.

Feminism, Animals and Science The Naming of the Shrew by Lynda Birke

Birke, whose previous research was in animal behaviour, works as a biologist and feminist at the University of Warwick. Here she examines how ideas of animals are constructed in different areas of biological science and how these intersect with feminist critiques of modern science. She also addresses the human/animal opposition implicit in much feminist theorizing, arguing that the opposition helps to maintain the essentialism that feminists have so often criticized. She then explores how these questions interrelate with concerns of the environmental, feminist and animal rights movements.

I'm thinking of asking some mates (currently mostly non libcom members) to help with this. also of course a number of these book overlap with other catergories, mainly race. just to check - is what i'm doing so far ok with libcom and going to be used?
ys dohball

hi , just wanting to check in... is what i'm doing so far OK and going to be used... wanting to check generally and b4 i ask mates to help. love dohball

Bump for JK and others.

Dohball, just in case you're interested Rosa Noir provided links to most of the content in Quiet Rumours here.