Some background //
In fifth grade, I was very fortunate to be introduced to punk rock. Propagandhi, The Descendents, Strung Out and the like. It was a time when I was beginning to suspect that I wasn’t being fed the full story of things in school and I just felt a bit weird about our national rituals and holidays. While it was mostly white men in the bands I grew up learning from, it was incredibly affirming to know I wasn’t alone in questioning the schemes of things. Going to shows and playing music was also an unsuspectingly great way to connect with my body and “dance”, considering our American “mind over matter” approach to everything.
Jumping ahead to c. Gregorian 2015 (skipping over a couple decades existential quandary and social justice activity) I was fortunate to expand my counter-hegemonic explorations through learning about the works of Octavia Butler and subsequent field of “visionary fiction”, a genre coined by the brilliant writer and organizer Walidah Imarisha.
I wanted to know why and how “normal” things in “America” came to be. And I wanted to create something in the spirit of Visionary Fiction and Octavia’s Brood (shoutout to author Morrigan Phillips for the excellent advice and discussions!), from the position I found myself as a white American male. Around this time, additional illuminating works found me, such as Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation by Silvia Federici; Indigenous Peoples History of the United States by Roxanne Dunar-Ortiz; Medicine Stories by Aurora Levins Morales; Concerning Violence, the docupic inspired by Wretched of the Earth; The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin; and Beloved and Playing in the Dark by Toni Morrison to name a few.
This all set in motion the self-as-subject interrogation of white American male identity that has become White Vinegar.
Take a gander at some pieces of textual brilliance on the current reading list. Let me know what content / material you’re consuming!
Dancing on Our Turtles Back, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson
https://arpbooks.org/Books/D/Dancing-On-Our-Turtle-s-Back
Undrowned, Alexis Pauline Gumbs
https://www.akpress.org/undrowned.html
Imperial Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest, Anne Mcclintock
Re-enchanting the World: Feminism and the Politics of the Commons, Sylvia Federici
https://www.pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=961
Cré na Kille / Graveyard Clay, Máirtín Ó Cadhain
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300227062/graveyard-clay/
And if you’re a nerd about “how things got to be the way they are” like me, here are some suggested readings from mentor and White Vinegar collaborator Teresa Basilio Gaztambide!
Discourse on Colonialism, Aimé Césaire
https://nyupress.org/9781583670255/discourse-on-colonialism/
Aftershocks of Disaster ed. Yarimar Bonilla
https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1333-aftershocks-of-disaster
Puerto Rico Syllabus: A list of resources for teaching and learning about the current economic crisis in Puerto Rico
https://puertoricosyllabus.com/
Orientalism, Edward Said
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/159783/orientalism-by-edward-w-said/
How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, Walter Rodney
https://www.versobooks.com/books/2785-how-europe-underdeveloped-africa
The Accumulation of Capital, Rosa Luxemburg
https://www.routledge.com/The-Accumulation-of-Capital/Luxemburg/p/book/9780415304450
The Colonizer and the Colonized, Albert Memmi
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/203878/the-colonizer-and-the-colonized-by-albert-memmi/
Amilcar Cabral
The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories, Partha Chatterjee
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/75695.The_Nation_Its_Fragments
With love,
Erick