The Bird

I love to read and learn more about the world, especially when I'm having a flareup with my chronic illness so can only rest on the sofa or in bed. This is a compilation of the nonfiction books I read and recommend. I'll have a separate post for fiction!

Pedagogy Of The Oppressed by Paulo Freire. I wrote an essay based on it here: https://reshapingreality.org/2022/09/06/ways-of-learning/

Anarcho-Blackness: Notes Toward a Black Anarchism by Marquis Bey digs into the intersection of race and Anarchism. It diagnoses the problems we face and ways to combat injustice as well as supporting Black folks and making sure no one is left behind in our fight for justice.

Anarchic Agreements: A Field Guide to Collective Organizing by Ruth Kinna, Alex Prichard, Thomas Swann, and Seeds for Change. This is a short but fantastic book that goes through how to write an agreement (or constitution), how to organize groups of people - for example, types of organizing strategies one may use, and tips on how to deal with interpersonal (or conflict between organizations) conflicts. Jam-packed with useful tips and examples for such a short book!

The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred by Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is by far one of the best science books I've read to date! Explores the beauty of the universe and the science of understanding it, while also digging into identity, race, and the how the current way of doing science is rooted in racism. It spells out a different way we can explore and do science that is based more in equity and justice.

How to Blow Up a Pipeline by Andreas Malm discusses how the current actions to fight climate change are ineffective and offers alternatives. There's a lot of great tips on how to do direct action as well as how certain types of indirect action can support the more direct forms.

Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing Work by Akilah S. Richards and Adebayo C. Akomolafe. This digs into the oppressive ways learning is done in modern culture and explores alternatives (much of the book parallels Freire and have great overlap in ideas and more just ways of being).

The Sea is Rising and So Are We: A #ClimateJustice Handbook by Cynthia Kaufman. This book covers various ways to get involved in the Climate Justice fight. It has overlapping ideas with Malm's book, though it doesn't push as far as Malm does.

Overcoming Burnout by Nicole Rose is one of the best books I've read about Burnout from the point of view of a marginalized person doing activism and mutual aid work. Excellent advice.

The Care Manifesto: The Politics of Interdependence a culture and community of care to fight against the uncaring and eugenics policies being thrust on us in present times.

Designs for the Pluriverse: Radical Interdependence, Autonomy, and the Making of Worlds by Arturo Escobar. His writing heavily influences me as it unravels and rebuts the idea of a "one world" and how the only way forward is to live in a world in which "Many Worlds are Possible" a.k.a. the pluriverse. It is heavy on theory, but there's a whole chapter devoted to a case study of a valley in Colombia that re-imagines a new way of building community and relationship to the land - how one would go about reversing capitalism's harm to the landscape and people's imagination and how to re-introduce a pluriverse where many worlds are possible.

Red Nation Rising: From Bordertown Violence to Native Liberation by Jennifer Nez Denetdale, Radmilla Cody, David Correia, Melanie K. Yazzi, Nick Estes, Brandon Benallie. Absolutely fantastic critique of America's violent colonialist capitalist systems, how they harm Native populations, and ways to fight them.

Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene by Donna J. Haraway. Beautiful read that explores Climate Change, how we need to restore relations with one another and our planet, and ways to go about doing that. It's full of gorgeous prose, and some interesting re-imagining of humanity near the end of the book.

Dancing on Our Turtle's Back: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation, Resurgence, and a New Emergence by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson. One of the most beautiful and engrossing books I read this year. It digs into Nishnaabeg cultural ways and how they are fighting to dismantle colonialism's hold on their way of live and being.

The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Wengrow and David Graeber digs into how the way we discuss history as this linear line of growth is wrong and doesn't actually match the data. Humanity is full of creativity and has experimented with many different ways of being in society throughout history. To try to trace this development line from hunter/gatherer to capitalism is to ignore vast stretches of history and evidence of multiple different ways of being in community.

Followups that I read this year which are okay but not as easy to read or get into:

Old Gods, New Enigmas: Marx's Lost Theory by Mike Davis discusses Marxism and its application in our current society. It's very dense material.

Democracy Against Capitalism: Renewing Historical Materialism by Ellen Meiksins Wood digs into how Democracy cannot exist within Capitalism; she draws heavily on a lot of Marxism and Socialist theorists to prove this. It's also very, very dense theory.

So that's it for nonfiction this year! I read a lot more than I realized. Good thing I kept track with storygraph app.

I wrote this original on my Mastodon account of TheBird@kolektiva.social. I thought folks here might like it as well.

I feel like there's a basic misunderstanding as to what accessibility is. This is likely because it is a complex topic covering a lot of spaces within society.

How we exist within a community is all rooted in access to various aspects of that community. Abled-bodied people already have access to tools, resources, information, spaces, etc., for most of their needs, so they don't usually have to ask for them. Yet at the same time, some societal systems are hostile even to abled-bodied folks! Accessibility design breaks down those harmful systems to create systems and spaces for all to exist, participate, and thrive.

Accessibility has multiple layers (often called spaces). Which access tools are used depends on what is needed for the situation.

Physical space encompasses how we navigate the environment in-person. Examples is ramps, well-kept walkways with no trip hazards, doors that open with push of button, rooms set up with easy to roll/walk down pathways. This is often what most people think of when they see the term accessibility.

Information space encompasses how we obtain, retain, and access information virtually or in-person. Captions, transcripts, high contrast options, color blindness options, image descriptions, etc are in this realm. This is often neglected, but it's one of the most crucial access needs so that we all have the ability to take in and process the information being shared.

Transportation space encompasses how we move from point A to point B and vice versa. It involves public transportation access (that includes wheelchair access), open street concepts, affordability of car or alternate transportation, affordability of ambulances.

Sensory space encompasses how we sense the world around us. This is perhaps the most forgotten part of accessibility I've noticed. For example, having affordable food options for food intolerances or allergies, creating no-heavy-fragrance zones to avoid triggering allergies or chronic symptoms, having a space to recover from sensory burn-out at events, etc.

Community Space is how we relate/interact with one another. Uplifting/boosting the voices of our most vulnerable. Making sure community areas are accessible in all spaces. Sharing stories in accessible ways with one another. Listening and doing conflict resolution together that meets the access needs of all involved. Moderation and creation of safer spaces is part of this too.

Justice Space is how we organize together. This also overlaps with all of the above. Making sure everyone has a voice, especially those most affected, and that they are included in decision-making processes. Organizing access to affordable housing, food, clean water, and walkability/rollability of shared environments. Organizing for liveable wages and financial assistance. Justice space requires designing and implementing these types of initiatives with embedded access tools and methods, so that no one is left behind or neglected.

There is likely other spaces of accessibility that exist beyond what I covered here.

I mostly want to get people thinking about all the ways they interact in the world - physical, digital, relational, organizational, etc. -- and think about what was needed for that to happen.

Expanding accessibility in all avenues of society brings us closer to a more equitable, equal, diverse, inclusive, and just society. We cannot ever have such a society if we do not design access from the get-go in our community building and organizing.

If y'all would like me to talk more about any of this, or want me to dig deeper into ways we can design access together, let me know. I love to write about it.

I also got a lot of good book recommendations! There's so many great authors out there talking about this and getting published too! I'll post some later. :)