Partisan Gardens

In this episode of Partisan Gardens, we explore the competing utopias at stake in the struggle to stop Cop City in Atlanta. Cop City is itself a grim utopia, a vision concocted by cops and politicians of a depopulated, fake city that will actually bend to their will.  On the other side are the diverse...

In this episode of Partisan Gardens, we explore the competing utopias at stake in the struggle to stop Cop City in Atlanta. Cop City is itself a grim utopia, a vision concocted by cops and politicians of a depopulated, fake city that will actually bend to their will.  On the other side are the diverse utopian dreams of the movement to defend the Weelaunee forest, which connect that forest to visions of Black liberation, collective care, food autonomy for the surrounding neighborhoods, and a world without police.  Underlying all these dreams is the long historical reality of Muscogee inhabitation and stewardship of that land.  The effort to defend the forest has helped initiate an indigenous re-migration to the land.  This longer history, concealed since the 1830s by white supremacist violence and settlement, is in turn enriching the movement's idea of what it means to stop Cop City, to win.

 

 

This month on Partisan Gardens, we interviewed Hannah Kass, a food systems researcher and graduate student at University of Wisconsin – Madison.  Kass recently published an article in the Journal of Peasant Studies that aimed to extend radical critiques of contemporary food systems and efforts to reform them.  The article, “Food anarchy and the  State...

This month on Partisan Gardens, we interviewed Hannah Kass, a food systems researcher and graduate student at University of Wisconsin - Madison.  Kass recently published an article in the Journal of Peasant Studies that aimed to extend radical critiques of contemporary food systems and efforts to reform them.  The article, "Food anarchy and the  State monopoly on hunger," has generated excitement and debate across academic and grassroots food advocates and researchers.  As a contribution to this discussion, we asked Hannah to share some of the background of the article and to dig in on some of its most charged contributions.

Here is a PDF of the article and here is Hannah's twitter (https://twitter.com/hkasserole).

For this episode, we share a candid and generative conversation between Kay and Sarah, shortly after World’s End, Sarah’s farm, hosted a week long group retreat. They share reflections on that experience, and the role of farms in hosting urban visitors. They touch on the strange idea of owning the land, reflecting on the concept...

For this episode, we share a candid and generative conversation between Kay and Sarah, shortly after World’s End, Sarah's farm, hosted a week long group retreat. They share reflections on that experience, and the role of farms in hosting urban visitors.

They touch on the strange idea of owning the land, reflecting on the concept of ownership, and how that has driven World’s End Farm to seek a cooperative model. They discuss the transition from a for-profit farming model to a donations-based approach growing food, treating farms as powerful spaces for change.

But there is also a balance to be struck: between prioritizing relationships and valuing respite, between the ingrained pleasure response we get from buying things for ourselves and undercurrent of exploitation in most commercial goods. Their conversation stresses nuance, balance, and being kind to ourselves while striving for a more careful relationship with the world.

For this episode, we finish sharing an ambitious two-part interview with Doug, a life-long deserter, commune-dweller, and bioregionalist organizer currently living in western Canada. Doug is interviewed by his nephew, a contributor to a militant network of communes in the region. Doug continues to share invaluable recollections on the experience of living underground and in...

For this episode, we finish sharing an ambitious two-part interview with Doug, a life-long deserter, commune-dweller, and bioregionalist organizer currently living in western Canada. Doug is interviewed by his nephew, a contributor to a militant network of communes in the region.

Doug continues to share invaluable recollections on the experience of living underground and in exile in Canada and Sweden, while refusing US military service in the Vietnam war, the different horizons of the counter-culture in North America and Scandinavia, and the origins of the bioregionalist movements. We are excited to share the interview due to the many lessons and resonances Doug’s reflections offer for today’s collective efforts at reinhabitation and resistance.

We encourage you to listen to the first half of the interview here:  http://www.partisangardens.org/podcast/june-2022-learning-from-bioregionalism/

This month, we begin sharing an ambitious two-part interview with Doug, a life-long deserter, commune-dweller, and bioregionalist organizer currently living in western Canada.  Doug is interviewed by his nephew, a contributor to a militant network of communes in the region. Doug shares invaluable recollections on the experience of living underground and in exile in Canada...

This month, we begin sharing an ambitious two-part interview with Doug, a life-long deserter, commune-dweller, and bioregionalist organizer currently living in western Canada.  Doug is interviewed by his nephew, a contributor to a militant network of communes in the region.

Doug shares invaluable recollections on the experience of living underground and in exile in Canada and Sweden, while refusing US military service in the Vietnam war, the different horizons of the counter-culture in North America and Scandinavia, and the origins of the bioregionalist movements.  We are excited to share the interview due to the many lessons and resonances Doug's reflections offer for today's collective efforts at reinhabitation and resistance.

If you're inspired by this interview and would like to support contemporary initiatives in that region, we would suggest you check out the fundraiser for the Gray Coast Guildhall.