Haymarket Books Live

Making connections between the movement to abolish police and prisons in the US and the struggle for liberation in Palestine and beyond. ——————————————— A historic multiracial rebellion has exploded and sustained across the U.S. in response to the police lynching of George Floyd and others brutalized and killed at the hands of US police. This uprising has coincided with the escalating colonization and annexation of Palestinian land, supported by the white supremacist Trump administration. Organizers on the ground in the U.S. and in Palestine are using this moment to demonstrate the ongoing connections between colonization and modern militarized policing, and why in order to combat U.S. racial monopoly capitalism and imperialism, we must abolish policing, and all aspects of settler carceral regimes. This discussion will bring together activists and scholars to examine movements organizing to dismantle the Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) and free political prisoners as part of liberation struggles led by Black people in the U.S. and Palestinian people in occupied Palestine. Presenters include: Zaina Alsous, an organizer with the Dream Defenders Nyle Fort, a minister, activist, and Ph.D. candidate at Princeton University Derecka Purnell, human rights lawyer, organizer, and writer. Sandra Tamari, Palestinian organizer based in St. Louis, Missouri and is director of the Adalah Justice Project. Randa Wahbi, former international advocacy coordinator at Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association in Ramallah. Co-sponsoring organizations: Jewish Voice for Peace (South Florida and New Orleans chapters), DSA Palestine Working Group, Dream Defenders, Adalah Justice Project, Palestine Legal, and Haymarket Books. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/dND8keciMFo Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

The Root Slam presents an all Black Latinx book release celebrating The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNext. Featuring performances by Elizabeth Acevedo, Nicole Sealey, John Murillo, Julian Randall, and Jennifer Falú and co-hosted by Gabriel Cortez and Tianna Bratcher. Featuring: ELIZABETH ACEVEDO NICOLE SEALEY JOHN MURILLO JULIAN RANDALL JENNIFER FALU TIANNA BRATCHER GABRIEL CORTEZ -------------------------------------------------------------------- The mission of The Root Slam is to create an inclusive, socially just space to promote the artistic growth of the Bay Area poetry community. We are guided by values centering the voices of Black, indigenous, and people of color artists; queer, trans, gender non-conforming, and women poets; working class/low-income, disabled, im/migrant and undocumented folks. For more, follow @TheRootSlam on Facebook, IG, and Twitter www.RootSlam.org

A conversation about abolitionist politics and transformative justice between Asian activists, authors and organizers. This panel explores abolitionist politics and practices among Asian organizers and cultural workers whose projects include prisoner support, anti-deportation work, disability justice, gender and sexual justice, anti-imperialism and anti-borders, and transformative justice. Speakers: Victoria Law is a freelance journalist that covers the intersections of incarceration, gender and resistance. She is the author of Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women and the co-author, with Maya Schenwar, of Prison By Any Other Name: The Harmful Consequences of Popular Reform. She is also the co-founder of Books Through Bars NYC. Mia Mingus is a writer, educator and community organizer for transformative justice and disability justice. She is a prison abolitionist and a survivor who believes that we must move beyond punishment, revenge and criminalization if we are ever to effectively break generational cycles of violence and create the world our hearts long for. She is passionate about building the skills, relationships and structures that can transform violence, harm and abuse within our communities and that do not rely on or replicate the punitive system we currently live in. For more, visit her blog, Leaving Evidence. Tamara K. Nopper is a sociologist whose research focuses on the racial wealth gap, credit scoring systems and the push for alternative data, and the intersection between racism, financialization, criminalization, and punishment. She has experience in Asian American, immigrant rights, and anti-war activism. Anoop Prasad is a Senior Staff Attorney at the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco and also a part of Survived and Punished and Asian Prisoner Support Committee. Anoop’s work has focused on defending formerly incarcerated people from deportation with a particular focus on Cambodian refugees and domestic violence survivors. Sarath Sarinay Suong (he/him) was born in the refugee camp of Khao I Dang after his family fled Battambang, Cambodia during civil war and immigrated to his hometown of Revere, Massachusetts. To cope with the violence and pain of growing up poor, queer, and refugee, he became a community organizer, centering the intersection of race, class, gender, and sexuality. Sarath moved to Providence, Rhode Island in 1998 to attend Brown University where he majored in Ethnic Studies with a specific focus on Southeast Asian resettlement, resilience, and resistance. There, he became a co-founder and former Executive Director of Providence Youth Student Movement (PrYSM), a community organization of Southeast Asian young people, queer and trans youth of color, and survivors of state violence organizing collectively against state violence. Sarath is also a founding Co-Chair of the Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE), an organization dedicated to working with Southeast Asian youth to organize for education justice. Sarath sits on the advisory board of the Immigrant Justice Network . And he is currently the National Director of Southeast Asian Freedom Network (SEAFN), a movement family of Southeast Asian grassroots organizations founded to fight against detention and deportation. Harsha Walia has organized in anti-border, Indigenous solidarity, migrant justice, feminist, anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist movements for two decades through many community groups and organizations. She is also the author of Undoing Border Imperialism, co-author of both Never Home: Legislating Discrimination in Canadian Immigration, and Red Women Rising: Indigenous Women Survivors in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside, and contributing member of the Abolition Journal. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/GL2ZbqlJRQI Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

Front line health care workers discuss waging an intersectional, anti-racist fight against Covid-19. ---------------------------------------------------- With states reopening around the country despite record levels of Covi-19 cases and a growing death toll as well as a national debate about whether public schools are safe to resume in-person classes this fall, it is clear that government officials don’t care about the human cost of this pandemic. Health care workers on the front lines of the crisis have been in the trenches, seen the devastation first hand and continue to organize against the inactions and callousness of the policy-makers. Hear from front line nurses and health care workers about their battles in the hospitals and the nursing homes against Covid-19 and why the fight against this pandemic is intricately linked to the struggle for Black lives and for dignity and respect in the workplace. What is the current shape of the Covid-19 crisis? How is it impacting ordinary people and health care systems and what can we be doing to fight back? Speakers*: Elizabeth Lalasz is a registered nurse at Stroger Hospital in Chicago, a steward with National Nurses United, and delegate to the upcoming 2020 California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee Convention. She contracted COVID-19 and then returned to work on a COVID-only unit that primarily served people incarcerated in Cook County Jail. Sarah Jaffe is the author of Necessary Trouble: Americans in Revolt and a Type Media Center reporting fellow and an independent journalist covering labor, economic justice, social movements, politics, gender, and pop culture. She is the co-host, with Michelle Chen, of Dissent magazine’s Belabored podcast, as well as a columnist at The Progressive and New Labor Forum. Also featuring: Tammera Campbell Ashley Payne ---------------------------------------------------- Co-sponsored by Haymarket Books: https://www.haymarketbooks.org Labor Notes: https://www.labornotes.org/ ---------------------------------------------------- Order a copy of Necessary Trouble: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781568589923 Pre-order a copy of Work Won't Love You Back: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781568589398 Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/_74zCgTge9Q Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

A conversation with leading Atlanta-based organizers about the deep, intersectional, and transformative struggle for Black liberation. ---------------------------------------------------- Much of the ‘back of the house' organizing that has made the current rebellion and political moment possible goes unseen. So often images of protestors in the streets capture our collective attention and imagination. People often think that protests and marches define organizing. However, so much of what Black organizers do involves more mundane and less sexy work like: mutual aid, transformative justice, fundraising for bail, working to fight evictions, healing and carework. This work helps lay the groundwork for getting people to imagine the abolition of policing and other violent systems in order to build support networks (and worlds) that don’t rely on the logics of anti-Blackness. This behind the scenes work is also gendered, racialized, and classed labor that many Black queer, trans, non-binary, and disabled femmes perform. Why is this organizing work important? How is it beautiful/artful? How do we elevate/celebrate it? How do we invite people into this beautiful work? Speakers: Mary Hooks is the co-director of Southerners on New Ground (SONG). SONG is a political home for LGBTQ liberation across all lines of race, class, abilities, age, culture, gender, and sexuality in the South. We build, sustain, and connect a southern regional base of LGBTQ people in order to transform the region through strategic projects and campaigns developed in response to the current conditions in our communities. SONG builds this movement through leadership development, coalition and alliance building, intersectional analysis, and organizing. Mary’s commitment to Black liberation, which encompasses the liberation of LGBTQ folks, is rooted in her experiences growing up under the impacts of the War on Drugs. Her people are migrants of the Great Migration, factory workers, church folks, Black women, hustlers and addicts, dykes, studs, femmes, queens and all people fighting for the liberation of oppressed people. Monica Simpson is the Executive Director of SisterSong, the National Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. She uses an interdisciplinary approach to activism by calling her artistic and healing practices into the implementation of SisterSong’s mission. Based in the historic West End in Atlanta, GA and founded in 1997, SisterSong amplifies and strengthens the collective voices of Indigenous women and women of color and ensures reproductive justice through securing human rights. SisterSong’s headquarters is known as the “MotherHouse” and is a national organizing center for feminists of color. Toni-Michelle Williams is a community organizer and advocate for black trans justice and liberation. She serves as the Leadership Development and Programs Coordinator for the Solutions NOT Punishment Coalition (SNaP Co) in Atlanta, GA. With SnaP Co she successfully launched the Trans Leadership Connection internship program (TLC) in 2015. In 2016, the program released “The Most Dangerous Thing Out Here is the Police,” a report on trans people’s experiences with Atlanta Police Department. Tiffany Lethabo King is an associate professor of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Georgia State University. She is the author of The Black Shoals: Offshore Formations of Black and Native Studies (Duke University Press, 2019) and a co-editor of the book Otherwise Worlds: Against Settler Colonialism and Anti-Black Racism (Duke University Press, 2020). ---------------------------------------------------- Co-sponsored by Haymarket Books: https://www.haymarketbooks.org Sister Song: https://www.sistersong.net/ Southerns on New Ground: https://southernersonnewground.org Watch the live event recording: Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

A conversation between Cliff Conner and Sarah Lazare about the history of scientific corruption and abuse and prospects for change today. ———————————————— The atomic bombs that ended World War II heralded the rise of the United States to first place in the realm of science. Expectations of what American science and technology could accomplish in an era of peace were virtually unlimited. Disease would be conquered and hunger eradicated. New industries and inventions would create global prosperity, and the rockets that had carried German bombs would instead extend human exploration to the moon and beyond. Seventy-five years later, we look back and wonder: What happened to the dream? That’s the question Cliff Conner explores in his new book, The Tragedy of American Science. The book’s subtitle, From Truman to Trump, defines the timeline of this history of scientific corruption and abuse—from the nuclear bombs that obliterated two Japanese cities, through the Cold War and the never-ending “War on Terror,” to the existential threat posed by global warming and the pandemic today. It’s not a happy story, but it’s one that must be confronted if the tragedy is to be overcome. Clifford D. Conner is a historian of science at the School of Professional Studies, CUNY Graduate Center. He is the author of A People’s History of Science (Bold Type Books, 2005) and biographies of three revolutionaries: Jean Paul Marat, Arthur O’Connor, and Colonel Despard. You can get a copy of his latest book with Haymarket, The Tragedy of American Science, today. Sarah Lazare is web editor and reporter for In These Times. She comes from a background in independent journalism for publications including The Nation, The Intercept, and Jacobin. A former staff writer for AlterNet and Common Dreams, Sarah co-edited the book About Face: Military Resisters Turn Against War. Sarah got her start in journalism reporting for the Independent Media Center movement. ———————————————— Order a copy of The Tragedy of American Science: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1467-the-tragedy-of-american-science Order a copy of A People's History of Science: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781560257486 Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/VFHRzkSjocc Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

A conversation between labor and community activists about centering the fight against racism in the fight for public health care. ------------------------------------------------------------------ COVID-19 has shone a spotlight on the intersection of racism and healthcare in this country. Chronic racist inequity has produced terrifying outcomes in terms of the disproportionate effect the virus is having on African-Americans and Latinx people. The protest movement that erupted after the murder of George Floyd sharpened a national conversation about racism in this country. Many have demanded that institutions which hurt people be defunded, and that this money be redirected towards healing communities. Join a conversation of labor and community activists who will be discussing work they and their organizations are doing as it relates to this topic. ------------------------------------------------------------------ Stacy Davis Gates is the Vice President of the CTU and the Executive Vice President of the IFT. This past fall, she helped to lead a 15-day strike and to negotiate an historic contract that provides for smaller class sizes, ensures a nurse and social worker in every Chicago public school, secures sanctuary protections for immigrant families, and supports students and families experiencing homelessness. Jeffrey Howard, VP of SEIU 73, is a third-generation union member with 29 years of experience, serving at all levels of leadership in the union movement. He is a proud veteran of the United States Air Force. In his labor career he has served in many different capacities from shop steward to secretary-treasurer. Linda Rae Murray, MD, MPH has been a voice for social justice and health as a basic human right for over 50 years. In the Cook County Health System she previously served as Chief Medical Officer for primary care, and is speaking as a member of Physicians for a National Health Program. Damon Williams is a movement builder, organizer, educator and media maker. Damon is the co-founder of The #LetUsBreathe Collective and AirGo Media, and is speaking as a member of the Black Abolitionist Network. Elaine Mister will be moderating the event. She is a nurse case manager at UCMC, and was a leader in organizing her fellow nurses to become members of NNU. Presented by: Black Abolitionist Network, Chicago Teachers Union, National Nurses United, Physicians for a National Health Program Illinois and SEIU 73. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/hf3IZfSG0LI Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

Join us for a virtual teach-in on the resurgent revolutionary wave sweeping the Middle East and North Africa. ———————————————————— The Syrian regime has consolidated its power in the past few years with the assistance of its allies, Russia and Iran. However, the conditions that led to the uprisings are all still present, especially dictatorship and social justice. These conditions have actually only gotten worse. The recent anti-regime demonstrations provoked by the socio-economic crisis in the Sweida and Daraa provinces under regime control indicate how intolerable the situation has become.The Assad regime and other regimes in the region believe that they can maintain their despotic rules by the continuous use of massive violence against their populations. This is doomed to fail, and new explosions of popular protest will inevitably happen, just like those of 2019 in Sudan, Algeria, Iraq and Lebanon, which have been described as a “Second Arab Spring”. The panel participants will analyze the current situation in Syria and Sudan, and the overall context of the uprisings as well as the regional prospects. ———————————————————— Sara Abbas is a Sudanese Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at the Freie Unversität Berlin. Her doctoral research focuses on the discourses and practices of women members of the Islamist Movement and al- Bashir's formerly ruling party in Sudan. Most recently, she has been researching Sudan's resistance committees which emerged out of the 2018 revolution. She is a member of SudanUprising Germany and the Alliance of Middle Eastern and North African Socialists. Gilbert Achcar is a Lebanese academic, writer, and socialist. He is Professor of Development Studies and International Relations at SOAS, University of London. He has written extensively on politics and development economics, as well as social change and social theory. His publications include The Clash of Barbarisms: September 11 and the Making of the New World Disorder (2002), published in 15 languages; Perilous Power: The Middle East and US Foreign Policy (2008), with Noam Chomsky; the critically acclaimed The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli-War of Narratives (2010); The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising (2013); and Morbid Symptoms: Relapse in the Arab Uprisings (2016). Joseph Daher is a Swiss-Syrian socialist activist, academic, and founder of the blog Syria Freedom Forever. He is part of the Wartime and Post-Conflict in Syria project, at the European University Institute, Florence (Italy) and works at the University of Lausanne. He is the author of "Hezbollah: Political Economy of the Party of God" (2016, Pluto Press) and "Syria after the Uprisings, the Political Economy of State Resilience" (Pluto Press and Haymarket 2019). He is also a member of the Alliance of Middle Eastern and North African Socialists. ———————————————————— Order a copy of Joseph Daher's book, Syria After the Uprisings here: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1292-syria-after-the-uprisings Order a copy of Gilbert Achcar's book, Morbid Symptoms here: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781503600317 Order a copy of Burning Country: https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745337821/burning-country/ For further reading on this topic, check out Haymarket Books' list of books for resisting empire: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/blogs/99-haymarket-books-for-resisting-empire ———————————————————— Co-sponsored by Haymarket Books: https://www.haymarketbooks.org Pluto Press: https://www.plutobooks.com Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/GEMoCj0PnfQ Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

The BreakBeat Poets Live! is a virtual, multi-generational showcase of some of the illest writers on the planet rock. Each chapter features writers and performers who are part of the Haymarket Books family. Chapter 4 features Destiny Birdsong, Mahogany L. Browne, Camonghne Felix, Jacob Saenz, and Nate Marshall. Watch the live event recording: Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

Join Haymarket Books and Mondoweiss for a conversation on the end of Zionism with Ali Abunimah, Philip Weiss and Nada Elia. ------------------------------------------------------ Zionism — the assertion that Jews have a right to violently establish and maintain an ethno-religious state in the homeland and at the expense of the Palestinian people — was, at least in the United States, a mainstream belief with support across the political spectrum. In recent years, that consensus has crumbled. Palestinians have led the global BDS movement that highlights how Zionism violates the rights of all Palestinians, and younger generations of Americans, including Jews, are turning away from an ideology that is more and more openly aligned with the most reactionary, right-wing and white supremacist forces. Similar changes are happening all over the world. Though Zionism is on the retreat ideologically, Israel retains immense power and impunity. What will it take to change this apparent stalemate, and shift the balance towards liberation for Palestinians? ------------------------------------------------------ Ali Abunimah is executive director of the widely acclaimed publication The Electronic Intifada, an independent nonprofit publication focusing on Palestine. He has written hundreds of articles and spoken on the topic all over the world. He is the author of ​One Country, A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse​ (2007) and ​The Battle for Justice in Palestine​ (2014). Philip Weiss is a writer who had a long career in mainstream journalism before starting a blog on the Middle East that is now Mondoweiss. Nada Elia is a long time activist, a teacher, writer, political commentator, and frequent contributor to Mondoweiss. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/Ak2xud6nCjc Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks