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A friend is passing on today…
agitatejournalWhy the Chinese are Making a Catastrophic Mistake in Xinjiang
agitatejournalby Daanish Mustafa Malice against children is emblematic of evil in the Abrahamic religious tradition. The Old Testament tells the story of how the Pharaoh ordered the murder of every male Hebrew child born in Egypt to protect himself against the Messiah—Moses (es)—that the shamans had foretold would destroy him. Ironically, he ended up…
యింకో ద్వేష భక్తి గీతం! Another Ode to Hate-riotism
agitatejournaloriginal poem in Telugu by Afsar, translated into English by N. Venugopal యింకో ద్వేష భక్తి గీతం!~అయినా ప్రేమిస్తూనే వుండమని కదా చెప్తావ్. గోడలన్నీ నెత్తుటి మరకలవుతాయ్, వీధుల్లో తల ఎత్తుకొని నడవలేను. పసిపిల్లాడి లాగు విప్పి మరీ సున్తీ పరీక్షలు చేస్తావ్. యిప్పటికీ నా పేరు కంటే నా చివరి పేరు మీదే నీ వూనిక. నేనెక్కడా లేను. నేనేమిటో యెవరికీ అక్కర్లేదు. శాసనాలు చేయక్కర్లేదు ఆదేశాలు కాగితాల మీదే…
The Most Lethal Virus Is Not COVID-19
agitatejournalThe escalating panic and fear surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic is palpable across the social spectrum. The Governor of California has ordered the entire to state to “shelter in place” for the foreseeable future, meaning we can leave home only for essential tasks. Yes, the virus is yet to be fully known and controlled; yes, the incidence of infection is increasing and cannot be predicted accurately; yes this virus causes death. And yes, we must keep washing our hands and taking other precautions and maintaining physical distance. We must also practice social solidarity. This means involving ourselves in mutual aid, supporting healthcare workers, and finding effective ways to support workers and families in precarious situations and small businesses at risk of not surviving. At the same time, must keep socializing virtually through dancing, music concerts, and other creative, inspiring, and healing, as well as fun, gatherings.
NAPM Yuva Samvad: Young People’s Political Persecution and Resistance | NAPM युवा संवाद: युवाओं का राजनीतिक उत्पीड़न और प्रतिरोध
agitatejournalThis article is a summary of the National Alliance of People’s Movements‘ month-long campaign on ‘Young People’s Political Persecution and Resistance’ that took place in July 2021. This summary was originally published on NAPM Yuva Samvad:Towards Deepening Dialogues, Diversity and Democratic Values. In solidarity with all comrades facing political persecution and remembering human rights defender…
Doing History through Art: An Opening
agitatejournalBy Ponni Arasu and Kamala Vasuki *This is the first installment in the ongoing series Holding Movements, Agitating Epistemes convened and co-edited by Ponni Arasu and Richa Nagar.* What does it mean to document history? What does it mean to document the history of a place that has lived through a prolonged war? What does…
Holding Movements, Agitating Epistemes: Introducing a Multipart Series on Remembering, Retelling, and Dreaming for Justice
agitatejournalConvened and co-edited by Richa Nagar and Ponni Arasu To invoke movements in search of justice is to summon many layers of lived existence—including motions, moments, rhythms, relationships, and visions—that are, by definition, fluid and uncontainable. What might it mean, then, to document or analyze a movement? Is it possible to hold and feel the…
Moving Memories: An Archive of Bangladeshi Queer Migrants in the US
agitatejournalCurated by Efadul Huq and Rasel Ahmed for SAADA Moving Memories is an archive of Bangladeshi Queer migrants in the US. The archive is hosted by SAADA (South Asian American Digital Archive) and was created in partnership with Queer Archives of the Bengal Delta. The exhibit centers the voices of ten Bangladeshi queer migrants whose…
Maadathy: An Unfairy Tale– Screening and Panel Discussion
agitatejournalby Leena Manimekalai, Bhavana Goparaju, Ajmina Kassim, and Semmalar Annam in conversation with Roja Suganthy-Singh On October 15th, 2021, AGITATE! launched the North American tour of Maadathy: An Unfairy Tale in collaboration with the Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota.1 The event included a screening of this film, followed…
“She has one thousand eyes, Our Mother Goddess Maadathy”: Exploring separation and invisible labor through Leena Manimekalai’s strategic deifications
agitatejournal
by Drishadwati Bargi Director Leena Manimekalai’s Maadathy: An Un-Fairy Tale (2021) belongs to a historical moment when anti-caste cinema and in extension an anti-caste audience have already acquired a vibrant presence in India and the diaspora, thanks to the works of Nagaraj Manjule, Mari Selvaraj, Pa. Ranjith, Neeraj Ghaywan among others. What is perhaps unique…
Sci-Fi as Accessible Movement Building: A Review of Larissa Lai’s “The Tiger Flu”
agitatejournalby Chloe Dunston The Tiger Flu is set in the year 2145, which author Larissa Lai depicts as a “time after oil” divided by factions, gender, disease, and technology. After years of greedy leadership, environmental degradation, and the exhaustion of fossil fuels, Saltwater City and its outskirts stand alone in what was formerly Vancouver, Canada.…
The Black Radical Tradition Can Help Us Imagine a More Just World
agitatejournalby Brian Lozenski Thanks to Truthout and author Brian Lozenski for granting us the permission to reprint this article on AGITATE Now!. You can access the original article here, published originally on June 23, 2020. Just as quickly as protests mounted in cities and towns across the country after George Floyd joined the ever-growing list…
Memory Histories: I Am Not Your Data
agitatejournalBy Anjali Arondekar I am not your data, nor am I your vote bank,I am not your project, or any exotic museum object,I am not the soul waiting to be harvested,Nor am I the lab where your theories are tested,I am not your cannon fodder, or the invisible worker,or your entertainment at India habitat center,I…
Shav-vahini Ganga | Ganga, the Carrier of Corpses | શબવાહિની ગંગા | शव-वाहिनी गंगा
agitatejournalby Parul Khakhar India is going through a devastating second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although this second wave was long predicted by medical and scientific experts, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government under Prime Minister Modi boasted of how India had conquered the virus. The stories from the first wave—of thousands of migrant wage…
Talking Back to white “Burma Experts”
agitatejournalby Chu May Paing and Than Toe Aung In December 2018, Than Toe Aung attended a talk hosted by Parami Institute (now Parami University), self-proclaimed as “Myanmar’s first private, not-for-profit liberal arts and sciences university” in Yangon. The talk featured the well-known journalist Bertil Lintner covering Burma since the era of the former military regime…
When humanity fails: A hopeful reminder
agitatejournalBlack Men’s Stories, By Peter London Global Dance Company
agitatejournalwith commentary from Terrence Pride Upon the backs of our ancestors we journey forward, as the light and fire they held for us expands into a greater present and still greater future. We must not let them down! Remember the tremendous brutality of mind, body, and spirit, they endured, that which still continues. Honor and…
My Palestinian Poem that “The New Yorker” Wouldn’t Publish
agitatejournalby Fady Joudah This piece was originally published in the LA Review of Books on June 7, 2021. RemoveYou who remove me from my houseare blind to your pastwhich never leaves you,yet you’re no moleto smell and sense what’s being doneto me now by you.Now, dilatory, attritional so that the pastis climate change and not…
Announcing AGITATE! Vol. 3 “Stories, Bodies, Movements” coming May 2021: Selections from Dreams as R-evolution by Coral Bijoux
agitatejournalWhen you want to enslave a people,You steal the ability to dream.And when you want to enslave a people,You destroy the ability to dream.And still, when you want slaves,The master has to remember his place.And the slave, hers.And the slave, his.And when you want to enslave a people,You introduce a fear that is embedded in…
Deadly Iran Sanctions: Lessons Learned from Iraq and Palestine, By No Sanctions on Iran Coalition
agitatejournalOn March 16, AGITATE! co-sponsored a webinar by No Sanctions on Iran Coalitions to discuss the deadly effects of sanctions and embargoes on Iraqi, Iranian, and Palestinian peoples. This conversation, featuring Jadaliyya co-editor Noura Erakat, Zainab Saleh, Negar Mortazavi, and Assal Rad, provides a means by which to better contextualize current geopolitical dynamics in the Middle East and the broader…
Sawt al-Bahrain: A Window onto the Gulf’s Social and Political History
agitatejournalCaatinga, Hierarchies, and Pandemics
agitatejournalby Antônio Bispo dos Santos Video Commentary from Carmela Zigoni: Quilombolas in the Context of the Covid-19 Pandemic Throughout the pandemic, quilombolas have been fighting against invisibility and for specific public policies that respect their culture and the vulnerability of their communities. However, they have been systematically victimized by institutional racism. The Covid-19 pandemic…
How to Name and Claim Your Theoretical Approach
agitatejournalby Nadine Naber This essay was originally posted on Nadine Naber’s blog, Liberate Your Research. Since I launched Liberate Your Research, one thing is now more clear to me than ever before. Radical scholars, especially interdisciplinary activist scholars, face disproportionate levels of overwhelm and anxiety in academia. Lacking go-to theories, or theoretical blueprints, contributes to…
Life After an Earthquake is the Labor of Reconstruction
agitatejournalby Emina Bužinkić According to the Volcano Discovery network, over the last 30 days, Croatia was shaken by at least 500 earthquakes, leaving at least seven people dead, dozens were injured, and thousands had to leave their homes. The strongest one — measuring at a 6.4 magnitude — struck the area around Petrinja, central Croatia, on December…
Singhu: The Unwritten
agitatejournalby Simona Sawhney This piece was originally published on Dalit Camera: Through Un-Touchable Eyes— a platform for narratives, public meetings, songs, talks, discussion on dalits. The response of the mainstream media to the protesting farmers at Singhu and Tikri, like that of the government, oscillates between pity and indignation. On the one hand, there…