The core values of mutual aid and autonomy dictate that each individual has the intrinsic right to exercise her or his own will, but that as a corporate body, individuals work to support each other.
VICTORIA, SONGHEES TERRITORY, BC - Events include art shows at Solstice Café and Dark Horse
books, an Anniversary Dinner for Camas Collective Books, as well as
music and poetry nights. On Friday, the 12th, a do it yourself (DIY)
fair will be taking place at the Victoria Event Center.
Visitors can expect to learn how to fix your bike, make stencils, use
and write linux, and even go on a plant ID walk. The DIY fair will be
followed by an all-ages punk show, also at VEC (1415 Broad Street).
The
Bookfair itself opens its doors at the Cool Aid Downtown Activity
Center (755 Pandora) at 11:00 Saturday morning. Over thirty
booksellers, zine distributors, and presses selling their wares and
educating the public will form the backdrop for the nine
workshops
held throughout the weekend. These workshops include discussions
regarding the struggles of indigenous peoples from Oaxaca to Vancouver,
how-tos on starting up co-ops and distros, and talks about how to apply
anarchist principles to interpersonal relationships, religion, and
cooking.
For those
who want to stretch their legs, an anti-colonial tour of the city of
Victoria will take place at 3:00 on Sunday. Attendees can expect to
find out why anarchists refer to Victoria as Songhees territory,
discover the role art plays in achieving social justice, and learn how
to be more self-sufficient in a time when dependency on oil and
imported goods is gouging everyone's pockets.
As workshops organizer Matthew Cook explains,
- "If we are to maintain any dignity in this era, rebellion is a necessity."
Participants include booksellers, presses, zine makers, and
artists from all over North America and abroad, as well as affiliate
groups Students Against War, the Victoria Anarchist Reading Circle,
Camas Books, and Food Not Bombs. TAR (Temporary Autonomous Radio)
99.1FM, Pirate Radio will be broadcasting during the Bookfair on
Saturday, Sept 13, from 12pm onwards.
Expect live interviews, commentary, and music in true anarchist style!
Food
Not Bombs will prepare food, and a family space will offer parents and
children to read and hear stories, make crafts, and rest.
As
non-discriminatory and accessible cultural events, the Festival of
Anarchy and Bookfair will highlight the power people hold as
individuals, and the radically positive changes that may be achieved
when acting in concert.
The
Victoria Anarchist Bookfair Collective places high priority on
accessibility. We aim to avoid replicating the barriers in society
that exclude and marginalize people. Because anarchism eschews
representation and privileges personal choice, the supportive, curious,
and skeptical are all encouraged to act directly: come and see how
anarchism works.
The press is invited to come down and find out what organized
anarchy looks like. We will be opening up our no photography policy by appointment in order to allow for participants and press
alike to take some snapshots and contribute to the visual record
of the event.
For more information, including complete lists of booksellers, distros, workshops, festival events and musicians, as well as our
statements of solidarity and principles, see our webpage:
www.victoriaanarchistbookfair.ca
The
Victoria Anarchist Bookfair is volunteer-organized by members of the
Victoria Anarchist Reading Circle. Our Community Partners include: The
Victoria Cool Aid Society (Downtown Community Center), Dark Horse
Books, The Camas Bookstore Collective, Victoria's Food Not Bombs,
Wildfire Bakery, Solstice Café, the Cornerstone Café, and many generous
individuals.
- "Anarchists have often compared this open cooperative
social structure to a biological organism. Organisms are living beings
which evolve of their own free will through a process of perpetual
becoming that is unbounded and non-deterministic. Similarly, an
anarchist society emulates this openness through a harmonious social
structure that is free, dynamic, and ever-evolving."
-Allan Antliff, "Open Form and the Abstract Imperative: Herbert Read and Contemporary Anarchist Art",'Reading Read', Ed. Michael Paraskos, London: Freedom Press, 2007.
- "Solidarity with our dreams will not make us
feel less alone, as long as it is not translated into concrete acts of
legitimate support for all the peoples that assume the illusion of
having a life of their own in the distribution of the world)."
-Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez, Nobel Lecture (1982)
- "Rats
and roaches live by competition under the laws of supply and demand. It
is the privilege of human beings to live under the laws of justice and
mercy."
-Wendell Berry
Contacts:
Jessica Ziakin: Communications organizer
jessz@uvic.ca
(250) 995-0234
Kim Croswell: Web-mistress
victoria@victoriaanarchistbookfair.ca
(250) 361-4986
TAR (Temporary Autonomous Radio)
temporaryautonomousradio@yahoo.com
Info: www.myspace.com/temporaryautonomousradio
No, organized anarchism is not an oxymoron! And no, anarchism is not synonymous with chaos. Rather, anarchists seek to organize in a federated, that is, non-hierarchical, system that allows for self-governance. 
