Zen and the Art of Photographing Protest

081013_ClimateDemo_227“Protest photography is much more than extreme street photography. Coverage of protest forms our social memory, it creates a permanent record for history, spreading the ideas behind the protest and fertilising social change.” says David Hoffman, co-founder and senior moderator of the EPUK photojournalists network.

However, he continues, “there’s something very Zen about protest photography. Caught on the fly, seen and recorded in a fraction of a second, protest photographs are truths. Not an explanation of the truth. Not a commentary or an analysis.

This article explores the importance and the effect of protest photography – and the ways in which the state and the police attempt to neutralise and manipulate images of political dissidence.

Read the article here >>

 

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From: Stream

The New Hampshire Rebellion

Walking for change; marching to make a difference…

In the small but politically important American state of New Hampshire, hundreds gathered on a wintry day, many at the end of a 150mile long, 11-day march across the state in freezing temperatures. This movement, led by the reformer and law academic Lawrence Lessig, sees itself as one of the front lines in the battle against the continuing corporatization of our world. At the rally in front of the State House in Concord, NH, 15 year old Ella McGrail delivers this rousing and impressive speech for the reclamation of democracy.

[Dispatch posted by the Bureau for Agent Aa in the field]
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From: Stream

The Fires of Resistance

thailand-red-shirt-burning-tires-2Fire is perhaps the most visual and emotive symbol of protest and resistance movements…

Jarret Martineau explores the role of anger in Indigenous and Black struggles for freedom in the U.S, suggesting that in the post-colonial historical context, collective expression of rage and resentment is a necessary precursor as well as fuel for liberation. Jarret Martineau is a Cree/Dene doctoral candidate in Indigenous Governance at the University of Victoria and this essay is inspired by Frantz  Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks and Sean Coulthard’s Red Skin White Masks. Read the essay here >>

Meanwhile, on the ground, read this post by Zig Zag on anti-fracking actions by Mi’kmaq activists, who have been using burning tyres to blockade vehicles engaged in shale gas exploration. Zig Zag, aka Gord Hill, is a writer and activist from the Kwakwaka’wakw nation.

Photograph from Red Shirts protest in Bangkok featured in Warrior Publications blog; AFP photographer unknown.
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From: Stream

The Revolution will not be Chauvanised

female_revolutionariesAs in most areas of history, the contribution of female activists and revolutionaries has often been ignored; it is mostly men who have become famous as the leaders of resistance and revolutionary movements. This article by Kathleen pays tribute to ten women “who you probably won’t ever see plastered across a student’s college T-shirt.”
Read the article here >> 

(Image by unknown illustrator.)
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Posted in Movement, Roots
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From: Stream

The Meaning of Freedom

angela davismeaning-of-freedom-206x300Angela Davis is a veteran of the U.S. civil rights movement and a rare voice for collective movements for change in contemporary America. The Meaning of Freedom is a speech interrogating the reality of liberty in a society that runs on long-term institutionalised racism and has transformed both militarism and incarceration into profit-industries.
Read an extract here >>
Read a short introduction to her vision here >>
Read a new interview discussing race in America >>

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From: Stream

From Tents to Debt: Striking for Democracy

The Occupy Wall Street encampment at Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan covered with tentsIn the aftermath of the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011, Astra Taylor was part of a group of activists that set up Strike Debt. Intending to raise $50,000 to buy up what they considered unjust and unnecessary medical & educational debt, they ended up with $700,000 which they used to abolish millions of dollars of debt. Heather Smith interviews Astra about the campaign. The two discuss democracy, anarchism and the challenges of building coherent momentum for enduring change out of the highly diverse eruptions of Occupy and similar anti-capitalist movements.
Read the full interview here >>>
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From: Stream

36 Hours with the Instigator of Ukraine’s Revolution

making a digital (google map) of the district and making plans for election day

Photo-journal following Mustafa Nayem, the 33-year-old Afghan-born Ukrainian whose Facebook post in November 2013 is credited with kicking off the protests in Kyiv that led to the ousting of president Viktor Yanukovych three months later.
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Facing Up To Reality – and Activating The Great Turning

joannamacy27“It needs to be done in groups so we can hear it from each other. Then you realize that it gives a lie to the isolation we have been conditioned to experience in recent centuries, and especially by this hyper-individualist consumer society. People can graduate from their sense of isolation, into a realization of their inter-existence with all.” Interview with deep ecologist, elder and activist inspiration, Joanna Macy

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Africa’s Musical Activists: a New Generation of Griots


“Africa produces its fair share of aspirational pop with glossy videos featuring fast cars and seemingly faster women. But peer under the hedonistic surface and you discover there are musicians all over the continent who are worthy successors to the griots, Africa’s traditional storytellers.” Article by DJ Rita Ray. Read >>

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From: Stream