Liz Park: Hi everybody, that everybody enjoy
that slideshow. I hope so.
Liz Park: Well, good evening. And good afternoon
to some of you. Thanks for joining us from
across the continent and for some of you,
especially our presenter Nicholas FOSS
Liz Park: From across the Atlantic. My name
is Liz Park, and I am the curator at the University
at Buffalo art galleries. You know what I'm
going to stop sharing
Their
Liz Park: So for our near. So my name is Liz
Park, the curator at University of Buffalo
art galleries and I have the great pleasure
of welcoming everyone to this event.
Liz Park: For our audiences near and far,
I'd like to begin by acknowledging that we
are hosting this event from the traditional
territory of the hood and the Shawnee confederacy.
Liz Park: The organizers of today's program
and I honor the sovereignty of the Mohawk
chi, yoga on Degas a NATO Seneca and test
group or nations and I begin with this acknowledgement
Liz Park: As a way to recommit to our collective
work as curators historians artists and educators
whose work must be informed by the intertwined
histories of colonialism and various systems
of oppression, as well as their ongoing realities.
Liz Park: Up art galleries as part of a research
university is committed to making safe spaces
for those who seek understanding through art
and culture where learning is cumulative collaborative
and involves making mistakes.
Liz Park: And it is in the spirit of collective
and empowered learning that I welcome all
of you to the first of many programs, you'll
be art galleries will be presenting around
the history of Tolstoy college an anarchist
educational community that was part of UB
from 1969 to 1985
Liz Park: So we'd have invited art and research
group collective question to organize a series
of summer programs leading up to an exhibition
for the fall of 2020
Liz Park: SO WE HAVE JULIE niemi Chris Lee
and Steve showed a risky. Who are the members
of collective question who will share with
us how they came to form this unusual group,
among other things.
Liz Park: But I first heard about collective
question Tolstoy College, about a year ago
when I was preparing to move to Buffalo for
this job.
Liz Park: A colleague named Rachel wolinsky
forwarded me the link to the very informative
New Yorker article about the college written
by Jennifer Wilson, one of our
Liz Park: Esteemed speakers today. And since
my arrival here in Buffalo, I've been picking
up bits and pieces of its history.
Liz Park: Whenever I meet colleagues that
you be who say that they've been at the university
for a long time, I would ask if they know
about Tolstoy college
Liz Park: And most of the time, and to my
disappointment, the answer was no. So why
pick up this little known history. Why invite
collective question to make trouble. Why is
this relevant here and now and at an art organization.
Liz Park: toaster college is the seat that
germinated many inquiries and movements at
UB and beyond.
Liz Park: For instance, gender and sexuality
studies was an emergent field a scholarship
that the college help precipitate at UB and
on and off campus. The college lead anti war
activism and encourage students to participate
in the cities. Many emergent food cooperatives.
Liz Park: The college open the radical new
possibilities to pursue alternative models
of learning.
Liz Park: Working and being and they asked
difficult questions that we continue to ask
today.
Liz Park: How do we understand the cultural
construct of masculinity and massage honest
and patriarchal societies. How do we understand
pacifism, when the state of sanctioning violence
through the military and the police.
Liz Park: Tolstoy college. Imagine the modeled
worlds with an unwavering conviction that
I think is characteristic of artists creative
expressive inquisitive and air possible
Liz Park: 35 years after it close it stores.
We are revisiting and celebrating the college
because it matters more and more that we look
at not only what we learn, but how we learn.
Liz Park: And it matters more and more to
us curators artists, writers that we and anyone
invested in the arts that we look at how existing
systems of knowledge can be redesigned realigned
and reimagined to unfettered creativity from
serving oppressive systems of authority.
Liz Park: Before I turn it over to Julie Chris
and Steve for further introduction to Tulsa
college. I want to thank the support of our
gallery stuff.
Liz Park: Obstacle least the director Linda
soda. The finance manager Emily Reynolds marketing
manager who was making our event technically
possible tonight.
Liz Park: And Jillian Daniels our student
assistant for the semester. We'd also like
to acknowledge the support of the university
archives, especially Bell off house.
Liz Park: Who granted us permission to use
some of the marvelous images from Tulsa colleges
archive. If you've been following us on Instagram.
Liz Park: And a few housekeeping notes reminder
that tonight's program will be approximately
90 minutes and is being recorded.
Liz Park: Please keep your microphone muted
to avoid background noise and use the chat
box for any questions for the speakers and
the organizers Jill will be monitoring the
chat box for questions throughout the symposium,
to four, to our moderators
Liz Park: Thank you again for joining us.
And I'll turn it over to Julie.
Julie Niemi: Um, first off, hi everyone that
I can see and not see here on zoom
Julie Niemi: I'm really happy that everyone
you know took time out of their day to day
to join us in this space.
Julie Niemi: You know, during a very kind
of difficult time in the world, to say the
least. And I also just really want to extend
my gratitude to Liz Julian Emily and all the
panelists, especially
Julie Niemi: For taking, you know, time out
of their evening to really kind of share for
very different yet some how related through,
I would say hopes for
Julie Niemi: Hopes unnecessary needs for a
better future and ways of organizing ourselves
through kinship community and really questions
of, of the urgency of how to do so right both
right now. And historically, so
Julie Niemi: I'm really appreciative for everyone
just for coming together to kind of think
together and individually and hopefully this
will be kind of the beginning of many conversations
as Liz mentioned just moving into
Julie Niemi: A year long project with buffalo.
So in a way, this is a homecoming of sorts
for Tulsa college and one that is
Julie Niemi: You know, very, very needed to
kind of go back to the beginnings of it and
to really look at it.
Julie Niemi: And spend time with this topic
in the place in which it originated. So I'm
Julie I'm I'm part of collective question
with Steve and Chris
Julie Niemi: And I just thought it would be
helpful. Very briefly, just to kind of give
you an overview of what we do and how we started
to do it and then let Steve and Chris kind
of give more details as they speak but we
joined together as a collective and artists
collective in 2017
Julie Niemi: All not really nuts. I didn't
know Chris and Steve. Steven Chris met each
other through buffalo, but we were all in
our own way, working on this topic and we
each kind of have different perspectives with
how we met but
Julie Niemi: It kind of came around the point
of there were certain archive boxes that were
checked out at Buffalo and then the curiosity
that sparked as to where those archival boxes.
Julie Niemi: So, um, so it's an interesting
thing, you know about the process of research
and and you know who's looking at it, and
sometimes it can feel, you know, long term
academic research can feel sometimes very
individual and very siloed so
Julie Niemi: My perspective and my sort of
history with this project was I was a graduate
student at the Center for curatorial studies
at Bard College and was really interested
in
Julie Niemi: You know, these questions of
what is it to have collectivity and kinship
and radicalism within an institution. So that
was kind of honestly my baseline question.
Julie Niemi: And I knew that I was interested
in looking at kind of historical examples
of such. And so through this process. I started
working with a few artists and researchers
while at Bard Jen actually being one of them.
Julie Niemi: To look at different facets of
the archives and create kind of a set of research
questions that specifically kind of spiraled
out of post college
Julie Niemi: As Liz mentioned, you know, totally
college was this educational anarchist community
at the University of Buffalo. That was one
of nine different colleges and
Julie Niemi: They were, you know, a collective
of of students and faculty that were really
invested in these questions of how to live
and what to live for, and also really invested
in alternative ways of organizing themselves
in in within and without an institution.
Julie Niemi: And so I began really looking
at this from the perspective of a graduate
student as a curatorial student
Julie Niemi: And as a way of kind of utilizing
this very unique history and you know as one
does with the process of research, you start
to notice that there are a lot of other communities
that existed as well. So this is one of thousands
of stories.
Julie Niemi: And that should always, you know,
be something that is remembered that it's
one little moment.
Julie Niemi: In history and one that kind
of continues through the relationships and
the network of relationships that come out
of, out of that particular history.
Julie Niemi: Um, so yeah, so I started to
do this research and started to really talk
to some of the former members of Tolstoy College,
which I'm not sure if there are any in the
audience today but if so please, please let
us know you know later on in the program just
to sort of understand
Julie Niemi: How and what this community looked
like and really kind of scouring different
archival materials to understand what the
makeup of the classroom was and what the particular
Julie Niemi: You know, organizing structure
of those classrooms looked like and and so
I'll just sort of stop there for now and turn
it over to, I believe, Steve.
Julie Niemi: Just to fill in a little bit
more about the particular our particular approach
to this and you know hopefully we'll have
more chance to more of a chance to talk together
soon. So thank you.
Christopher Lee: Julie. Um, so yeah, I'll
just continue the sort of like origin story
of collective question or just by speaking
a bit to my entry points here. So like Julie
mentioned
Christopher Lee: We, we kind of found each
other because we are looking at boxes in the
archives and finding that someone else to
check them out and
Christopher Lee: Stephen our like, who the
hell else is looking at this stuff. And it
turned out later that it was Julian we connected
to Akron, who's also on the call curator at
squeaky wheel.
Christopher Lee: But anyway, um, my, my entry
point was, I was teaching at UB in the art
department, up until about a year ago and
I
Christopher Lee: ran a reading group with
a few grad students
Christopher Lee: Where we were reading about
anarchism through, you know, a handful of
texts and one of the texts that came up through
grad student named Carl sports graduated.
A few years ago I was in Texas. He's in Texas.
Now he forwarded this Jen's article and it
just blew me away. I was like, what
Christopher Lee: I'd been there already for
maybe there was my second or third year and
had no idea this was going on and so
Christopher Lee: It was just a really sort
of inspiring example because it it, you know,
located in the in located in the place where
I was, you know, not too far away, like literally
space, you know, in terms of like the buildings.
Christopher Lee: That that these kinds of
things were possible that it was possible
to sort of organized kind of educational project
around the principles of anarchism
Christopher Lee: And and so I started to look
at the the archival materials. I was looking
particularly for Silla by
Christopher Lee: Just this just to see like
how, you know, how did they right so you know
this. This is one of the things that I hate
most as an educator is writing so
Christopher Lee: And you know, we have a whole
thing about that but
Christopher Lee: So I wanted to look at how
they wrote, so by n, there were just some
amazing examples. I mean, Jill Jill's background.
You can see it's not a syllabus, but it's
a poster for a course that's, you know, in
the form of a comic right about
Christopher Lee: You know, the sort of geopolitical
hierarchy.
Christopher Lee: But, you know, there was
also examples of Silla by that were written
as poems. There are examples of grading, rubrics
that were written as jokes. Right.
Christopher Lee: Did the ways that the sort
of like conventional features of syllabus
were treated were treated with some irreverence
and I kind of call it kind of class on Sunday.
It was inspiring for me because
Christopher Lee: I wondered like why why can't
we do this now. And so this question of, like,
what, how to sort of re, re revive or reconstitute
toast like college is for me like one of the
Christopher Lee: Interesting cut sort of creative
questions that I think collective question
undertakes you know i think i think the in
one way we think about all of our sort of
Christopher Lee: Convenience as sort of temporary
reconstitution the college and the way that
we sort of try to, you know, think about the
archive, you know, not as a sort of like static
in the past, but something we try to live
now and then learn from. So I'll leave it
at that and pass it on to Steve.
Steven Chodoriwsky: You know, there was there
was a day in 2017 in March when I was able
to acquire a 45
Steven Chodoriwsky: By the name of which was
called his whole blues.
Steven Chodoriwsky: And being myself in Buffalo
at the time.
Steven Chodoriwsky: And actually having an
office in Hayes Hall in the School of Architecture
and Planning.
Steven Chodoriwsky: I proceeded to play his
whole blues on loop in the atrium of haze
Hall.
Steven Chodoriwsky: As a sort of Camembert
maybe commemorative as a commemorative reconstitution
you know of that event that's the thing that
you heard if you came in a little bit earlier,
that was this the recording of the recording.
Steven Chodoriwsky: In Hayes Hall, a little
bit echo eight people coming by asking, what
is this. Who is that I know that, like, I've
heard that somewhere before. Um, and just
for a little bit of context that that piece
was produced
Steven Chodoriwsky: During a time of significant
campus unrest in 1970 for a specific encounter
with where faculty and students came to Hayes
hall where the president of the university
at the time his office was and they came to
talk to him and were proceeded to be arrested
and the recording was then
Steven Chodoriwsky: Produced to defray legal
costs to the best to my understanding, and
maybe Mike can actually speak to that, even
better than I can. But
Steven Chodoriwsky: That this is as an artifact,
be not just treated as as archive celebration,
but also start to become activated in the
space. And I'll leave it at that for now.
But we can continue to talk about that. Maybe
through some of the work.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Of our of our of our guests
as well.
Julie Niemi: Well, um, so. Okay, so one of
the things I guess I also want to mention,
and then I'm going to turn the floor over
to our four panelists for the for the evening,
but um
Julie Niemi: I guess one of the things to
that we really honed in on or it's an ethos.
I guess that's a better word.
Julie Niemi: For how we like to kind of organize
ourselves as a collective and how we like
to approach research and also what I think
the three of us and many who approached the
archive of Tolstoy college can can see is
that there's really the spirit of working
together and
Julie Niemi: And I really fully do believe
in that, in the sense that like no work has
ever done alone, you know, and so, especially
with with research, it's, it's like there's
constantly
Julie Niemi: Gaps and holes and unknowns and
blind spots and it's it's interesting to bring
people into to a research project.
Julie Niemi: Research Project and do a research
question to see where those kind of gaps and
unknowns can be filled in.
Julie Niemi: So that's kind of how we came
to organize the symposium today of opening
it up and you know you on this panel. There's
two separate panels.
Julie Niemi: We're first going to hear from
Jennifer Wilson and from Nicholas boss where
they'll speak to the tensions of anarchism
and education.
Julie Niemi: And then followed by another
panel with Michael Brzezinski and chameleon
on Rashid, who will speak more to the themes
intentions around poetry and policy.
Julie Niemi: But um you know it's it's interesting
because we work kind of as artists as researchers,
as curators as writers, as all of these sort
of hacks that I'm sure many
Julie Niemi: On this zoom can can relate to,
you know, but the interesting thing is just
seeing where we can kind of find new themes
to look at and new questions and new thoughts
and sort of pass that on
Julie Niemi: To a collaborator that we bring
on and we've worked with Camilo before as
well as Jen and as with Michael
Julie Niemi: Thanks for joining us.
Julie Niemi: As a new member but you know
to just kind of like present new new perspectives
on the archive and on the research and on
their own research that somehow
Julie Niemi: Builds on to the new archive
of totally college and under the new archive
of questions that we have of how to live what
to live for what is state power. What is power.
What is the university, etc, etc. Lots of
questions. I know.
Julie Niemi: Um, but anyway, I think it's
important to all sort of just speak very briefly
to the first panel with Jen and with Nick,
as I mentioned before, I worked with Jen on
the CCS Bard
Julie Niemi: It was both an exhibition that
I did, and also a publication, which is here,
kind of in the background, but also if anyone's
interested I have PDFs left of it, but I'm
Jen and I actually go back many, many years.
We met working for brock obama in 2008 as
volunteers, I believe, and
jenniferlouisewilson: You work as a volunteer.
I just showed up at a party.
Julie Niemi: That's right. Okay. Thank you,
Jim.
Julie Niemi: So I met Jen as a very young
person working for Obama and was introduced
again to her research on toasting college
through the New Yorker article in 2015 and
Julie Niemi: You know immediately as a new
student at the Center for curatorial studies
reached out to her about this particular article
Julie Niemi: And therefore began two years
of kind of back and forth of what this is.
And Jen, kind of, I guess, shepherded me through
the project and kind of helped again fill
in gaps.
Julie Niemi: Around Tolstoy as an educator
and also around archival material. So, it
was also in her generosity that I really was
able to dive into this and
Julie Niemi: Open this up and really think
about opening this up to other to other people
as well.
Julie Niemi: So Jen today is going to talk
a little bit about her experience of research
on toaster college and also her experience.
I believe with Leo Tolstoy as a figure, very
briefly in 10 minutes but hell. We're going
to do it.
Julie Niemi: And then after Jen speaks, we're
going to hear from Nicholas boss who's going
to give more of kind of a narrative survey
of his education in the UK from 2010 to now
specifically thinking about framing of this
topic around austerity resistance.
Julie Niemi: To it from the experience of
an anarchist free school based in squats in
central London at the time.
Julie Niemi: So I want to turn the floor over
now to gin and
Julie Niemi: let her take it from here. Thanks,
everyone. Thank you.
jenniferlouisewilson: This is just so unbelievable
to me when I wrote this piece. I thought maybe
someone will retweet it on Twitter.
jenniferlouisewilson: I didn't imagine that
there would be many years later, like an entire
conference about Tolstoy college
jenniferlouisewilson: But I think that helps
me maybe understand like how some of the Tolstoy
college folks felt when I called them and
jenniferlouisewilson: Like, I think I called
Charles pike, who had not been associated
with Tolstoy college for almost 50 years at
that point and I told him, I said, Hi, I'm
writing a story about you for The New Yorker,
which you do have a few minutes speak.
jenniferlouisewilson: So I think that, yeah,
this is all really exciting. And I think it's
very much in the spirit of Tolstoy college
how this kind of
jenniferlouisewilson: baton of kind of research
keeps getting kind of passed on and kind of
circulated. So I'm really excited to be here.
jenniferlouisewilson: So a lot of people have
said that they found out about Tolstoy college
through my article. So I thought I would be
to just say a little bit about how, like,
I found out about Tolstoy college
jenniferlouisewilson: So, and mine is all
like Chris at mine is also a syllabus story.
jenniferlouisewilson: Um, okay. Um, so I think
to this through Tolstoy, the writer my teach
DS and Russian literature.
jenniferlouisewilson: And I wrote a lot about
Tolstoy's political thought for my dissertation.
I think there's this idea of Tolstoy, particularly
in the US that he's like this bourgeois writer
of, kind of, you know,
jenniferlouisewilson: novels about rich people
but that really could not be further from
the truth and in particularly in the last,
like, three decades of Tolstoy's life.
jenniferlouisewilson: He wrote all these like
political essays that called for abolishing
the state abolishing private property. He
actually renounced the copyright to all of
his future work.
jenniferlouisewilson: He was a pacifist. And
interestingly enough, this is why he was actually
denied the Nobel Prize for Literature, which
is supposed to be a Peace Prize, but they
said that he had denied the right of nations
to self defense.
jenniferlouisewilson: The Russian government
had him under non stop police surveillance
and he was excommunicated from the Russian
Orthodox Church specifically for his kind
of ideas about non violence.
jenniferlouisewilson: So, you know, he was
the most famous living writer at the time
he corresponded with people like Gandhi and
a lot of radicals and reformers in the United
States would send him letters and send him
materials.
jenniferlouisewilson: Like one of the things
that you would do if you were trying to get
a movement off the ground is you would actually
write to Tolstoy.
jenniferlouisewilson: And you would ask him
if he would be willing to write like a letter
on your behalf or if he'd be willing to write
the foreword to your manifesto. So he was
an incredibly international
jenniferlouisewilson: Figure, so that's just
to say, I wasn't surprised at his ideas would
have, you know, kind of eventually made their
way to Buffalo.
jenniferlouisewilson: Um, these Tolstoy and
communes kind of popped up all around the
world in South Africa in
jenniferlouisewilson: Sort of Asia, these
sort of like agrarian anarchist communities
where people would try to practice the ideas
of Tolstoy, so
jenniferlouisewilson: non violence for them
that kind of like vegetarianism. So they are
these, like, kind of like anarchist vegetarian
colonies that sort of sprouted up all over
the world, including the United States, including
in upstate New York.
jenniferlouisewilson: Um, so I was putting
together like a sample syllabus for the job
market on Tolstoy and I was looking for essays
on like some of these essays on these topics.
jenniferlouisewilson: And I just happen to
notice that there were a lot of collections
that came out and like 1967 1968 1969
jenniferlouisewilson: In English, these kinds
of compilations of Tolstoy's essays on non
violence and civil disobedience. And I just
thought, oh, that's interesting. Like 1968
like I wonder
jenniferlouisewilson: I wonder, you know,
in the midst of the anti war movement in the
United States. Like, I remember thinking like,
I wonder if there may be had been kind of
a resurgence of interest in Tolstoy.
jenniferlouisewilson: Around that time in
the late 60s, in the midst of the anti Vietnam
war protests.
jenniferlouisewilson: And of course you know
also that year 1969 Sergei founder chokes
adaptation of war and peace had won the
jenniferlouisewilson: Academy Award for Best
foreign film for 19 for for Russia and 1969
and we're in pieces, very much kind of, you
know, an anti war film, um,
jenniferlouisewilson: So yeah, I guess I was
just like, wondering like, oh, you know, I
wonder if those ideas have been percolating
around that time, like a wonder of any new
Tolstoy in any new told stories kind of were
cropping up in the late 1960s.
jenniferlouisewilson: So I really truly just
did a Google. This is good. I like this is
all thanks to Google. I hate to say it, but
I just did like a Google Book Search.
jenniferlouisewilson: For like Tolstoy Vietnam
War. And then the result, I found a book by
someone named Charles Haney
jenniferlouisewilson: That said, it was called
a memoir of the new left. Um, there was just
which I later learned was just kind of like
a kind of a Charlie Haney who ended up being
a really important
jenniferlouisewilson: Teacher at Tolstoy college
but he had a long history of activism, but
there was just kind of these passing references
to his time at Tolstoy.
jenniferlouisewilson: College. I'm in Buffalo,
and I at the time thought, oh, maybe that's
like, Oh, interesting. Maybe that's like one
of these little, these little Tolstoy in communes
maybe popped up in Buffalo.
jenniferlouisewilson: At that time, my Google
Tulsa college Buffalo and I was shocked to
find out it wasn't just a little Tolstoy caught
like Tolstoy and commune. This was actually
fully ensconced within the State University
of New York buffalo. Um, so that was pretty
surprising to me.
jenniferlouisewilson: And so I but still like
even on that website where I found out found
out about Tolstoy college was the library's
website and they just had like a really short
paragraph about tools to a college and
jenniferlouisewilson: So I really didn't know
quite what this was accepted has something
to do with Tolstoy and something to do with
kind of anarchism, and it was at SUNY. Um,
and so, at the time I had like a postdoc that
came to the travel research fun
jenniferlouisewilson: Which I always thought
I would really use to go somewhere like like
glamorous, like, you know, like a conference
in Brazil or something.
jenniferlouisewilson: But I just had such
a strong. I don't know. There was something
about this that just really piqued my interest
and I thought there might really be something
there. So I
jenniferlouisewilson: booked my flight to
Buffalo and booked a few nights in a hotel
and just was like, you know, I, I'm going
to go to the university archives and see what
I can find.
jenniferlouisewilson: And of course what I
found was you know just unbelievable. This
wasn't just a college where people taught
courses on anarchism taught courses about
anarchism, which, you know,
jenniferlouisewilson: A lot of colleges today
have classes about anarchism and Marxism radical
is I'm like that's not
jenniferlouisewilson: That's not interesting
what was interesting was that it was actually
anarchist in the very running of the school
so faculty and faculty meetings they would
jenniferlouisewilson: Talk about, you know,
what are your household expenses. What are
my household expenses and based on that they
would decide everyone salary some thinkable
jenniferlouisewilson: Right now, like, and
I'm for so many of us who've been in academia,
um, you know, students would decide syllabus.
jenniferlouisewilson: Students would decide
what their grade was going to be would argue
with each other about like, Well, you know,
I need this. A because I'm going to law school
and someone else I'd be like, Yeah, but you
didn't really contribute
jenniferlouisewilson: And so everything literally
every aspect of the running of the school
was collectively decided
jenniferlouisewilson: Um, so I just thought
this was the most fascinating thing in the
whole world, and I wanted people to know about
it.
jenniferlouisewilson: And, you know, writing
for an academic journal. I knew would take
years, which I did. It took three years. Um,
but I knew if I could maybe write it for a
magazine that would come out sooner, which
is which is what I did. So, this I did the
research and
jenniferlouisewilson: The summer of 2015 and
came out in New York or January 2016
jenniferlouisewilson: I still back then. I
was still an academic I've since left academia,
but I was an academic then and what you and
I wanted to write a full length, like a very
long academic article about Tolstoy.
jenniferlouisewilson: So I was presenting
it at conferences and things like that. And
I presented my research at a conference.
jenniferlouisewilson: Actually at Harvard
and a bunch of the guys from holster college
came
jenniferlouisewilson: And which is so funny.
These like hippies at this like radical college
for here at Harvard.
jenniferlouisewilson: And so they came and
I give a presentation and there was a Q AMP.
A and all of the people who I knew from academia
were just talking about this as a kind of
like utopian
jenniferlouisewilson: kind of experiment and
the guys from Tolstoy college were like
jenniferlouisewilson: Wait, I don't, I don't
get it though. Like you all are professors.
Why can't you all just like get together and
plan this and and do it and execute, like,
you know, they couldn't understand why this
seems so impossible to the rest of us and
jenniferlouisewilson: 30 seconds. So you know
I have since left I I thought about that exchange
for a long time. I was like, why is it so
jenniferlouisewilson: I'm thinking, well,
why can't we just get into a room and do this
together. Um, and I have my opinions about
what that is.
jenniferlouisewilson: Um, and I shared them
a bit with Nick, but I know that he has had
better experiences in academia and I'm really
excited to hear about what others are thinking
about how something like this could be possible
again or possible in a different kind of permutation.
Okay.
nic vas: Hi. Sorry, I'm a little bit useless
with some I am Nick.
nic vas: I first thanks to everyone for the
invitation and preparing this and Jennifer
for this introduction to
nic vas: Tulsa College in your and your research.
nic vas: My personal experience in academia.
So it's not necessarily like Tolstoy College,
although I teach in a business school.
nic vas: This business school is grounded
in this tradition called critical management
studies. Some of you I'm sure know it.
nic vas: Which is, you know, loudly speaking
quickly speaking, it's like a broad umbrella
term to house.
nic vas: Very big heterodox family of critical
thinking and critical thinkers and practitioners
nic vas: There, I did a PhD in community organizing,
specifically something about visual community
organizing,
nic vas: We turned it into a comic one
nic vas: Element of that comic for research
was this, which I don't know if I can share
it and I don't know how to share it doesn't
seem to share it.
nic vas: Okay, it's not sharing. Alternatively,
that. Okay, so I'm going to get started now.
nic vas: Part of this
nic vas: Tradition in the critical management
studies is also related to other experiences
in the UK like
nic vas: Queen Mary University, which has
a critical management studies Business School,
which used to be around for a while, by Stefan
or Harney who is a co author with Fred Multan
you probably heard of them. The whole concept
of under commenting.
nic vas: Kind of informs this this experience
and from them. It is that I took this idea
that the only possible relationship to the
university. Today's a criminal one my arrival
into university, however, is
nic vas: Not criminal. I didn't do any of
these illegal things that I'm going to tell
you right now about some of these things at
the time we're into legal but I need to find
a way to share the screen with you so
nic vas: Please bear with me. And if you can
stop the timer for a second.
nic vas: Because I'll share screen. Here we
go.
nic vas: Where are you here.
nic vas: Share and now I'm going to put. Do
you see it.
nic vas: Okay, so this is going to be 10 years
in 10 minutes from this thing called the really
free school
nic vas: To the business school. This talk
is very personal. It's a witness narration
of things that I've experienced, but it's
mixed up in a fictional way with ways in which
nic vas: colleagues and friends also experience
this transition to the higher education industrial
complex.
nic vas: So in 2010 the Conservative Party
in the UK and the Liberal Democrat coalition
came to power they invented this term. The
Big Society in order to this was a slogan,
with which they tried to both severe austerity
measures to deal with the financial crisis
of 2008
nic vas: On these two people that you see
here.
nic vas: To the right is David Cameron former
PM and leader of the Conservative Party, to
the left is
nic vas: Sir Nicholas William Peter collect
PC. He's the Deputy Prime Minister and he's
currently the vice president for global affairs
of communications out Facebook. I don't know
if he has anything to do with the takedown
of FB pages that him in the last two days,
but probably so what he did.
nic vas: As a Liberal, Democrat and I don't
know why this is going automatically what
he did. As a Liberal Democrat was to
nic vas: Backtrack on a pledge that they were
not going to triple tuition fees they did.
nic vas: And so students rebelled.
nic vas: The outrage of this so called
nic vas: Treason went well beyond the constituency
that the Liberal Democrats effectively conned
into
nic vas: The first student demonstration was
as massive as the anti war anti war demonstrations
from 2003
nic vas: Even hundred kids came out in support
of the very fragile and precarious status
quo.
nic vas: At the time, the situation is very
much worse now. So there was very serious.
nic vas: Situations and conflict industry,
some students almost got killed by the police.
It was very intense were
nic vas: A good number of
nic vas: Demonstrations, the first one.
nic vas: Saw a massive rave at the conservative
headquarters. It was occupied by
nic vas: Students for roughly
nic vas: 10 minutes the student movement then
erupted with occupations across campuses mass
demos with some echoes of past Yun mobilizations
like this one from obviously from 68
nic vas: This time, the only difference is
that social media supported or facilitated
a very agile and
nic vas: astute way of organizing between
students occupations in universities all across
the country.
nic vas: Or beyond the single issue of higher
education and raising tuition fees. There
was an emergence of a more expansive understanding
of of the problem. So clearly, with higher
education in the UK. This is not just
nic vas: About fees clearly class. It's very
racist system and so on. In 2011 in the beginning
of 2011
nic vas: In the heart of London in Bloomsbury
surrounded by university buildings and empty
residential, commercial properties.
nic vas: Built by
nic vas: All the criminal trades of empire
a collective in the squad formed the really
free school. This was to address education
issues, but the wider context of austerity
and the impositions liberalism, what the collective
used to call the tiny little issue called
Capitalism.
nic vas: The plan solidarity actions with
the Arab Spring.
nic vas: It was very ambitious, there was
a lot of energy and with the concept of the
really free school they tried to read recuperate
term preschool back from the conservatives
who were trying to use the term preschool
to
nic vas: Basically dismantle in the state
supported education, the method of the really
free school was to squat empty management
empty buildings and run education programs
open to all but cops journalists.
nic vas: The really free school understood
that constant self education and projects
that promote a debate about radical politics
politics were necessary the time and always
really
nic vas: Yeah, and they were centered around
on our keys practices and
nic vas: Values, I guess. So the idea was
to build this and then see the three horizon.
nic vas: Based on freedom, subject to tell
me self governance mutual aid anti racism,
anti fascist anti be Turkey and so on.
nic vas: policies for this weird
nic vas: You just keep going forward on a
line on the wrong.
nic vas: Let's move page on this.
nic vas: Just a second place. OK. So the really
free school was running
nic vas: Many, many programs.
nic vas: Practical like
nic vas: Wood carving.
nic vas: Sorry, what would work carpentry.
nic vas: You know, if you wanted to learn
about
nic vas: electricals you can you can do that.
There was, there was a lot of space for
nic vas: Many experiences many practical many
ideas.
nic vas: And practical programs I
nic vas: Apologize. I don't know what's going
on with that for the text here.
nic vas: And I cannot moving forward for some
reason.
nic vas: Just the second piece.
nic vas: Right.
nic vas: So you could learn about hacking
plumbing carpentry cooking and so on.
nic vas: The RFS help build part of the student
movement at the very end when finally the
trip and nutrition fees went forward.
nic vas: And they, they also supported and
give space for people to to rest but also
organize
nic vas: The word literally battles in the
streets, like I mentioned a number of people
created this thing called the book blog which
probably heard of. If you want guides on how
to build this stuff to protect yourself from
cops and other
nic vas: Things and you can find it online
at the Victorian Albert museums disobedient
objects exhibition and the archive.
nic vas: So there was an intensification of
everything security policy in
nic vas: The intensity of policing at the
time was
nic vas: Becoming even worse 2011
nic vas: Saw
nic vas: A resistance to to police policing,
a very clear expression of that after the
killing of Mark Duggan at the hand of the
police.
nic vas: Inevitable tensions battles against
bay leaves landlords
nic vas: Created a situation where people
burnt out in directly free school part of
the problem was media harassment tablet newspapers
went
nic vas: Hard on the really free school because
the second mentioned that the occupied used
to belong to Guy Ritchie, they found a way
in. That is the film director that makes all
this East London not working class heroes
or criminal
nic vas: Movies.
nic vas: But yeah, they, they were constantly
attacking these people, these were super young
nic vas: organizers who all of a sudden were
accused of every single problem here, it's
after one weekend that how's the eviction
people wanted to protect their identity. So
they were all wearing a beanie John's face.
nic vas: From the really free school and from
this moment in the student movement, the question
arose. How do you keep this rebel Cosmo vision.
How do you sustain a space. Well, some members
of the collective friends and comrades ended
up in different projects contributing to
nic vas: For instance, Occupy, but the question
of impermanence precarious living precarious
living conditions was very real. A lot of
people entered Academy, but also continuing
different instances of interventions on direct
action.
nic vas: And yeah, within University it. This
is just one way of addressing issues through
established education, but keeping in mind
that education and
nic vas: You know, academia, the higher education
industrial complex itself is not enough. So
we need to keep organizing outside experiences
like this, I think, are super helpful for
you. Thank you. I think I overstepped by ultimate
Steven Chodoriwsky: That's great. Thank you
for both I'll jump in for a split second,
but I'd like to maybe we have a few minutes
to go.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Back and forth a little
bit if there's anything I would love to hear,
maybe to start from from Jennifer, actually,
if there's anything, Jennifer, that you may
want to respond to remark back towards
Steven Chodoriwsky: The work of Nicholas,
because I think even with the differences
in contexts, or geographic context, the sort
of
Steven Chodoriwsky: The problem. The
Steven Chodoriwsky: The educational problem.
I guess emerges in different in different
places and I'm sort of struck by
Steven Chodoriwsky: The for both of you that
need to speak personally about it. I think
one of the things about the totally archives
for us.
Steven Chodoriwsky: And the way that they
they come, they come to us and the information
that are in the syllabus is the importance
for personal reflection on these contexts
and how these contexts. In fact,
Steven Chodoriwsky: They, they buoy they they
they they literally form the institutions
are they form the counter the counter proposals
for institutions.
Steven Chodoriwsky: So yeah, maybe. Maybe
start with with that you know what why the
need for the personal reflection and also
if there's something back and forth between
the two of your works that you might want
to address.
jenniferlouisewilson: Um,
jenniferlouisewilson: Yeah.
jenniferlouisewilson: I, well, I don't know,
I think, on some level, academia invites a
lot of stuff like we're a lot of reflection,
um,
jenniferlouisewilson: I think you give so
much. I mean, again, I'm speaking from the
United States. You give so much of your life.
You know, I gave to my PhD and my postdoc,
I gave 10 years of my life.
jenniferlouisewilson: So it is in a very significant,
you know, really important period of time.
So I think it is important to really kind
of understand what did I give my life to and
jenniferlouisewilson: And I think that Tolstoy
college asked me some really hard questions
about that and I didn't feel like I had good
answers and but I think that hearing Nick's
presentation. I think one thing that really
strikes me is
jenniferlouisewilson: This idea of protest
itself as being a form of of pedagogy, um,
you know,
jenniferlouisewilson: Because, interestingly,
to me, like so. Charles kind confounded Tolstoy
college left. Pretty soon afterwards. And
he, I asked him, you know, Why did you leave,
and he said that he said that every day. Like,
no one would come to class because they were
at a protest.
jenniferlouisewilson: And he just wasn't quite
sure what he was doing there anymore. And
I thought that was an interesting kind of
answer and then obviously Charlie Haney really
took over who very much spa.
jenniferlouisewilson: Protests going to protest
as a really as an important part of pedagogy,
just as much as just as important as going
to class. And so I guess I was just curious
from Nick if he has any thoughts about
jenniferlouisewilson: Whether students felt
that in the act of protesting the seas. They
were perhaps learning more than they were
even learning in class.
nic vas: Many people made that claim and and
i i'm pretty sure that everyone experienced
this.
nic vas: But there is a sense of urgency and
there's a lot of practical stuff that you
earn in those spaces. There is a lot of ways
of interacting where you cut through, especially
in the UK, you cut through the, the whole
you know
nic vas: Performance of, you know, deference
to authority when that comes pretty quickly
when cops are, you know, trying to bash your
head and so
nic vas: Especially in situations like that
where people are, you know, perhaps be getting
university or or the library or trying to
use the spaces for what the, you know, we're
supposedly originally intended to which is
also not true, but it's a contested space
because it
nic vas: It's supposed to hold you know some
kind of
nic vas: Again, I started school and in the
case of the UK as you've seen very recently,
especially with
nic vas: After the the killing of George Floyd
in the US, HOW IT the repercussions here in
education spaces, especially in Bristol, for
instance, with the course and statue. These
are teaching moments, all of a sudden you've
got people realizing we never learned our
history.
nic vas: And when we bring it up in a business
school, it always felt really strange, but
all of a sudden there is there is a moment
where
nic vas: You can you can take that energy
within the class, but also support our own
process of of learning outside. So I think
a lot of us learned a lot in this process
is and I think that this is also why
nic vas: A lot of people engaged in in education
and very different levels. Even when people
are doing on oh yeah childcare or something
like that. But I was interested about the
whole
nic vas: Because
nic vas: When I was in the US. It seemed to
me that within academia. In the United States,
it's
nic vas: It's pretty violent how you need
to
nic vas: Act in order to advance your career.
nic vas: I don't know if there is something
that you can reflect on that because it seems
to be the case that we're going to
nic vas: Have to intensify things over here
as well.
jenniferlouisewilson: So I think that, yeah,
one thing that really struck me kind of a
disconnect between how a lot of, kind of,
you know, activism in the United States around
higher ed works versus pollster colleges and
jenniferlouisewilson: The push. I think a
lot of people I know, is to push for more
tenured positions and Tolstoy college. I think
it's really important to remember. None of
these guys, except for I think maybe want
none of them were tenured professors. They
were basically lectures at Johns.
jenniferlouisewilson: You know, people who
a lot of them are very did not have a lot
of money.
jenniferlouisewilson: And you know, I think
that we have this notion of tenure or the
idea of 10 years but it protects you. You
can be more outspoken, but anyone who's ever
done any organizing on a campus knows the
tenured professors are nowhere to be found.
jenniferlouisewilson: Like it is primarily
driven by people who are in very precarious
positions John's graduate students. These
are the people really pushing for unionization
jenniferlouisewilson: And I think that's kind
of worth thinking I think about when we think
about, well, what is it going to take to really
transform higher education is it about creating
kind of more
jenniferlouisewilson: More like kind of more
security for a certain group of people or
is it about something a bit more
jenniferlouisewilson: So it's something that
I would say leads more into society because
I was thinking is like, you know, yeah, the
guys from toaster college were really broke,
but it was a bit easier to be broke back then.
jenniferlouisewilson: Right, like they like
healthcare has become just astronomically
expensive in the United States we have fewer
social programs. There's a much scarier kind
of, you know, there's a lack of a safety net.
jenniferlouisewilson: So I think that that's
also another thing like really not just organizing
with any the academia, but also thinking about
who's precarious kind of across industries
and how to see academics as workers, not just
as kind of these rarefied beings who write
who read Tolstoy.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Sure. Um, this super grapes.
I think one of the limitations of this format
is that we will cut everybody short but one
of the strengths of the format is that these
are all introductions to the conversations
that are going to extend
Steven Chodoriwsky: Forward for many months.
So I'm going to leave it there. And we're
going to start to move forward. Hopefully,
there are some residences in the next two
but Nicholas Jennifer thank you and feel free
to chime in a little bit later on.
Steven Chodoriwsky: I'm going to transition
a little bit to our second two presenters
Mike and Camilla.
Steven Chodoriwsky: The, the loose frame that
we had me and pitched in their direction was
that the tensions and the connections between
poetry and policy.
Steven Chodoriwsky: And I think if I can maybe
even speak.
Steven Chodoriwsky: To the, to the structure
of this as a space where there's a kind of
Steven Chodoriwsky: cross pollination with
the idea of Tolstoy in the back of our minds,
you know, this thing that is Tolstoy, those
of you who are joining us in there like you
actually. We still don't even know what to
psychologists, we still don't actually know.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Does it, does it exist.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Does it exist now. And
these questions of Best of the best digital
of a thing that came in the past or the, the
question of the tangential
Steven Chodoriwsky: You know, from toaster
college I think are really present in our
minds as a way to frame to Michael who and
Camilla, who have both more in very many different
hats inside and out of, let's call it education.
Yeah, maybe or institutional institutions
being creative being experimental
Steven Chodoriwsky: Inside and out an institution.
So I will pass it over to Mike, please, who
has offered nothing but a blank slate to me
in order to introduce him. So I thank you
for that. Looking forward to hearing from
you.
Michael Basinski: Thank you.
Michael Basinski: And I hope everybody is
a comfortable
Michael Basinski: Like the Seneca here and
I'm a former student and lecturer from Tolstoy
college
Michael Basinski: And a former curator and
now simply a poet or a simple poet with too
much to say and too short a time limit. So
we have limits wherever we go.
Michael Basinski: One of my fondest memories
from the mid 1970s at Tolstoy was meeting
Jake Kramer and Henry Fath I believe that
was his last name. They were old men.
Michael Basinski: And they were real members
of the I WW the Industrial Workers of the
World, they were and our co syndicate lists.
Michael Basinski: An article cynical ism informs
the type of anarchist. I have always hoped
to be cynical ism is a form of union. We're
working people work together with our hierarchy.
One big union in the spirit of mutual aid
and this is
Michael Basinski: An image of what that union
is all right. That's the I WWE, we would be
public service right here in the six hundreds
that is educational workers.
Michael Basinski: That is teachers, the office
help and the janitorial staff all as one unit.
Michael Basinski: I use this model nuts proposals
is that I deal with no corrupting hierarchy
to impose limits. I just feel a little more
spontaneous and a little more creative and
i think i anarchism offers an alternative
to patriarchal hierarchy.
Michael Basinski: Power and I have to make
clear that from my point of view that to bring
others into share and the apple pie of power
isn't an endpoint, there must be a completely
different pie cherry or pineapple or shaped
like a fire, fire hydrants
Michael Basinski: Or a spoon or something.
Amorphous then arco syndicates impulses for
me and alternative
Michael Basinski: You know, I'm here to offer
some comments on archives and on poetry.
Michael Basinski: Any of you interested in
arc ism or anarchism should seek, I think,
or make a contact with the anarchist lobby
day collection at the University of Michigan
where Julie hurghada is curator. She's an
old colleague of mine. I met at an underground
scene conference in the early 1990s in Chicago.
Michael Basinski: She should know all about
what you are doing.
Michael Basinski: So what is a poetry Kunar
curator from the University at Buffalo New
steam library doing it underground scene conference.
Michael Basinski: Let me say that archives
are collections of material that offer facts,
but not only the facts that are a lot, but
only the facts that are allowed in or sneaking
Michael Basinski: Some dilemmas which imposed
limits or institutional purpose and agenda
and tradition collecting policy and most problematic.
Michael Basinski: Budget which buys and processes
material pays processing archivists sets processing
schedules and therefore access to collections
and pays the electric bills and one of the
most important aspects provide shelter and
safety for collections without basic at collect
Michael Basinski: For psychology passed into
history, more than 35 years ago and the collection
had to sit and wait for you. And this is not
a particularly long time
Michael Basinski: Today institutions are looking
to cut libraries, archives, staff, and they
don't want to build more buildings, particularly
buildings that are warehouses, which fill
Michael Basinski: Quickly with collections
in waiting, keeping the door has doors open
is an uphill battle in whatever institution.
Michael Basinski: With only processes curators
librarians and archivists as frontline defense.
These individuals record and organize
Michael Basinski: Everything that is in a
collection, but they work under hierarchal
limits and constraints and backlogs that are
really decades long WHEN I LEFT THE COLLECTION
WE HAD A 17 year backlog.
Michael Basinski: I have no great faith that
waiting Collections. Collections in waiting.
Waiting collections will remain forever.
Michael Basinski: Weeding a term used by administration
to erase collections is a reality collections
inch storage could very well be waiting for
the next truck to the landfill.
Michael Basinski: I would say good researchers
do it now because use is equal to value is
equal to longevity support archives everywhere.
They are a functioning socialist institution
in our society.
Michael Basinski: And I suggest you build
a personal relationship with whatever archive
you wish and support it. You all have to build
it.
Michael Basinski: Higher conversation impose
imposition suggests that research is limited
to providing a thesis or simply defining a
moment in time.
Michael Basinski: I say engaging creative
research and reading, which was most exhilarating
intimate educational experience possible.
Michael Basinski: When you engage your collection
read everything and look for connections links
and follow them and archive is a web a network
that expands beyond the immediate box in front
of you. Don't be limited.
Michael Basinski: By the quest for an end
product.
Michael Basinski: As a person who spent his
entire life working in the internet sheer
delight of papers and letters and books and
archival stuff.
Michael Basinski: I fortunately had a wonderful
collection pile collecting policy. The policy
of the poetry collection is to collect all
Anglophone poetry publications of the 20th
century, and now 21st around the world.
Michael Basinski: The initial impulse, the
initial idea was to create a bibliography
Africa, a bibliography is paradise and Paradise
is an important word as is the word all all
the sacred and all the profane.
Michael Basinski: A collecting policy has
to offer limitless collecting creativity.
Michael Basinski: That's why I was in. That's
why I was at zoom conference in Chicago seeking
a femoral unsanctioned poetry.
Michael Basinski: Poetry
Michael Basinski: The realm of the home is
filled with limits and conventions and Scooby
Snacks for all those who obey. There is a
central sanction contemporary personal philosophical
form of poetry that is offered as a template
to
Michael Basinski: To what did they do to measure
to measure the poet success 90% of the poetry
follows this form, the poet is rewarded for
Michael Basinski: Adhering to convention for
navigating in the tiny wading pool of poetry,
there is a poetry to one side of this center
that introduces various sociology social class,
race, gender, age blood language parents and
Frank visions.
Michael Basinski: There is a poetry on another
side that precedes itself as a higher academic
poetry and then there are various little poetry's
on other sides visual poetry and conceptual
poetry and a Senate poetry.
Michael Basinski: Of course, this is a simple
back but I suggest that all of these poetry's
which I read it. Enjoy. See it all over here
someplace.
Michael Basinski: Remain in the comfort of
their conventions which we accept along with
the brilliance and intellectual prowess and
acrobatics and sociological realities of poet
authority.
Michael Basinski: In poetry conventions involve
beginning at the top of the page being confined
to the page.
Michael Basinski: Poems being black and white
pages comprise the various standard fonts
that movie eyes from right to left with no
indication of the hand and poems containing
only sanctioned words composed of sanction
letters and poems that demand a predetermined
reading convention.
Michael Basinski: My responses support.
Michael Basinski: What here's to an arco cynical
ism was a wondering how I might extend beyond
the conventions, knowing that they are a facet
of me that I am a puppet of poetry structure
and that I desperately want poetry treats.
Michael Basinski: So I imagined a type of
syndicate list poem that I call an open M.
O. P. M. Which at first was a typo. I thought
that was a good place to start.
Michael Basinski: The open
Michael Basinski: The open invite all forms
of poetry to be part me meaning to be part
of it, meaning rhyme sonnets image visual
work abstract constructions narratives confessional
performative sound instructional
Michael Basinski: Understand ability and with
no understand ability incorporating snippets
of real pictures and my hand and color, etc,
etc.
Michael Basinski: And then how to read most
parts want you to read them as they are manifested
there like a recording reframe I suggested
improbable an improvisational recitation.
Michael Basinski: With no particular notion
of this is the right way. The right meaning
with no start here in one place and no end
in another with a release of immediate imagination
with a variable duration.
Michael Basinski: Always an evolution in flux
with instantaneous neologism sound ringing
reading crying screaming inventing letters
and symbols and translation of such and all
other language patterns in one big union of
poetry.
Michael Basinski: And this is kind of what
I've been doing that. So there's sort of like
this. You see there. These creatures that
exist on the sheets of paper I'm moving too
fast.
Michael Basinski: There are little ghost in
my finger and some of semak writing and there's
little vol animal crawling across the page.
And there are some symbols.
Michael Basinski: A and more vol animals are
all different sizes. The biggest I've made
is for a sec. By four feet by six feet.
Michael Basinski: There's a little bigger
one. And you can see here is an E, that isn't
an E and E that isn't any and a symbol for
an improvisation.
Michael Basinski: This is my own meetup extra
later they have. I thought the alphabet had
tough to few letters.
Michael Basinski: So I decided to invest some
of my own letters in their meetings and this
is one of them. My great improvisational doc.
Michael Basinski: So when I look at that.
I can say anything that is in my particular
mind at any particular time she had immediate
reading of the poem. And here's someone pondering
what is
Michael Basinski: Going on and my thumb and
a tone and a thumb in a tongue and a thumb
in a tongue and some isn't a butterfly from
the tongue. And so I'm going to target a butterfly
and another butterfly.
Michael Basinski: And the Yeti and everybody
knows that the Yeti is the totem animal of
these particular ponds and yet is sometimes
Michael Basinski: Thank you.
Christopher Lee: Thank you Mike. That was
amazing.
Christopher Lee: Hand it over to communion
now and then you'll hear from me again.
Christopher Lee: In a minute. Thank you, Chris,
can
Kameelah Rasheed: Do I follow that. Hi, everyone.
I'm really excited to speak with you guys.
Um, I usually start off every talk that I
give
Kameelah Rasheed: Talking about like my brain
is more enjoyable than a sieve, which often
means that I have for sensory gating so a
lot of information flex my head these public
talks with my own sort of way to sort of shake
them out. So I'm appreciative.
Kameelah Rasheed: Of everyone being here so
I can have some space to shake some things
out of my brain.
Kameelah Rasheed: As my stamps for firing
as everyone else speaking. I'm just thinking
about a lot of ideas before I jumped into
what I want to talk about with regards to
poetry and policy. I first wanted to
Kameelah Rasheed: Just mention a couple of
things that connected to me. Is there more
speaking, the first thing was really beautiful
hearing about hear me. Hello everyone sort
of came to understand and
Kameelah Rasheed: Sort of find our current
college remind me a lot of Octavia still Butler's
notion of primitive hypersensitive sort of
process of arriving at something without intending
to be there and
Kameelah Rasheed: Laterally reading across
many different texts are in waiting for the
sort of cross pollination. So immediately
excited to know and learn a bit more about
this process of like looking for something,
but not going exactly
Kameelah Rasheed: But sort of allowing yourself
to wander, but thinking about the intuitive
as still being intentional and thinking about
learning as something that's about on reverses
arriving at a destination and
Kameelah Rasheed: And someone else had mentioned
something around the vestigial on tangents
and I
Kameelah Rasheed: Maybe this is why my brain
is like a bowl another sip, I kind of like
nothing's changed. Nothing's vestigial. Everything
is that has relevance of
Kameelah Rasheed: And so thinking about learning
that's not driven by capitalism where anyone
can pursue any sort of line of thinking because
there's no imperative to arrive.
Kameelah Rasheed: At a particular time. And
so sort of pursuing this notion of learning
being more about being generated productive
and we sort of surrender to the interest in
being generated, which doesn't require producing
a lot but requires being in eat those focus
of trying to build networks.
Kameelah Rasheed: And so with all that. My
name is Kayla identify as a learner, meaning
that even though I make art objects. I think
about myself don't murder makes
Kameelah Rasheed: My research and thinking
visible unnecessary went through a lot of
different projects, sometimes installation
sometimes arts and crafts sad sometimes the
publication.
Kameelah Rasheed: But my real interest in
thinking about how I think alongside others
and sort of politics of revision that allowed
me to be perpetual learning with other people.
Kameelah Rasheed: And I came to understand
about this lovely college when I was invited
to some way with all of the people here at
Kameelah Rasheed: Question to sort of think
about a lot of ideas. And that's particularly
interesting for me because I started thinking
about
Kameelah Rasheed: Sort of like the legacy
that I have with experimental schools and
education. I grew up in Northern California
and the small town called is called auto and
that town.
Kameelah Rasheed: Basically created this whole
school system K through 14 include come to
your college I paid them 12 and it was run
by people in the community and like bedroom.
Kameelah Rasheed: Homes porches corners churches
anyone's their space. It was part of that
consortium or colleges in the 60s and 70s.
Kameelah Rasheed: Where there was a large
focus on how do you actually do something
within communities black communities with
a focus on learning that is sort of removed
from institutions.
Kameelah Rasheed: Where the goal may have
been around standardized patient or standardization
of any other contexts and also you see found
out my mom went to college on my bed and CSD
Kameelah Rasheed: Yesterday, I didn't know
much about up until like literally a day ago
which was also slow sort of focus on how do
I organize. So you see curriculum to be more
focused on organizing and more focus on studying.
So same theory in history.
Kameelah Rasheed: And then I guess as another
piece of context at a high school history
teacher and 2013 I left that work, and now
I'm doing curriculum development for high
school social studies in New York City, which
is
Kameelah Rasheed: Quite an interesting job.
And as we get into more things around policy
and poetry, thinking about the policy imposed
by state standards and sort of
Kameelah Rasheed: My role in that process.
So in learning more about college. One of
the questions that surface a lot for me is
thinking about the university as container
for anarchist practices sort of experimentation
and thinking about anarchy.
Kameelah Rasheed: And the sort of politics
is sort of dispersed politics as something
that interrogates it on the container.
Kameelah Rasheed: And the container, the university
comparing the state can have any structure
where the blue itself as fashionable. Right.
And so a couple of questions that surface
from being sort of thinking about what does
it mean to be a college
Kameelah Rasheed: You're college and what
does it mean to be absorbed by that contains
it rather than being absorbed by that exceeds
it
Kameelah Rasheed: So how do you become part
of an institution which holds values that
are different from yours without being absorbed
by those values either implicitly or explicitly
Kameelah Rasheed: And I know to be here. So
super cool. I like looking at celebrities
here after read the article super excited.
It was one of the questions that was mentioned
was
Kameelah Rasheed: Your question computer or
the state of your Murphy, where he says if
the State wants to fund its demise.
Kameelah Rasheed: That's great. And I was
really excited about this question about whether
or not the state funds its own device so much.
What are we talking about in five minutes.
I was notified of
Kameelah Rasheed: Our sort of Tupperware and
live containers excess. Um, and before I get
there. I just wanted to mention through the
dangers of trying to create a craft and Harrison,
which is about noting narratives between things
Kameelah Rasheed: So we say something's in
relationship to something else. But we're
really saying that
Kameelah Rasheed: The thing that I observed
with my limited central capacity is related
to the other thing levels are my limited perception
capacity.
Kameelah Rasheed: So we do a lot of flattening
of the service of comprehension, but I still
want to talk about this relation policy and
poetry.
Kameelah Rasheed: I'm at a talk that I gave
you folks are there's fear. There's another
speaker who happened to go right before me
and I was speaking about analogy and how it's
a sloppy minutes. My name is Martha, Kenny.
Kameelah Rasheed: And she talks about this
idea of speculative comparison, where the
goal is not to create dependent on relationships
with the goal is to actually think about relationships
agile and
Kameelah Rasheed: Open to possibility. And
so what I want to try to do now is to run
through 12 comparisons that I'm making policy
and poetry as quickly as possible.
Kameelah Rasheed: So the first notice here
that all of us know examples of code of poetry,
but we don't know military and all of us are
examples of policy, but we don't know policy.
Kameelah Rasheed: Wikipedia tells us that
policy is deliberate system of principles
to guide surgeons to words rationale comes,
it is intense and it's around procedure and
protocol and it does not tell you a policy
is different from a law because the policy
simply suggestions things while law compulsory.
Kameelah Rasheed: And Wikipedia also tells
us that poetry is thinking about the aesthetic
language towards evoking meeting and some
extent of opiate particular emotion.
Kameelah Rasheed: So keeping speculative comparison
and analogy has a sloppy minutes back of my
mind.
Kameelah Rasheed: Here, a couple of the ways
I saw simulations. Um, I think about policy
float your boat containers and they have specifically
for this is possible.
Kameelah Rasheed: Policy can only reach so
far. How would you can only do so much and
those parameters those differences are created
both by limitation of our imagination and
logistical concerns, everything can be policy
of everything that
Kameelah Rasheed: I'm both policy number two
folks at the level that they present rhetorical
context that suggest action, but don't necessarily
and post
Kameelah Rasheed: So, number three assets
there pedagogical they're instructed. But
again, with any kind of approach the person
receiving it doesn't actually have to respond
to it and the way that the author has desired
Kameelah Rasheed: Palace incidents. The Protocols
of completing a task meaningful a policy around
how you enter a building a policy around what
happens to support agreement as a protocol
if you don't follow it, it doesn't necessarily
mean that to penalize just means that it may
not be your lunch.
Kameelah Rasheed: Poetry suggested a protocol
for reading. So if you think about enchanted.
For example, which is basically a sentence
that continues without
Kameelah Rasheed: Sort of like punctuation
to say it's the end of that sort of poetic
device suggest the philosophy or spirit or
speaking direction for me. Right. So suppose
you suggest the protocol three
Kameelah Rasheed: And number six poetry and
policy create your own epistemological universe
and internal vernacular. So policy may use
words, always. They're not outside of that
policy and likewise in home will construct
on self reflection self reflective dictionary
and vernacular.
Kameelah Rasheed: A word defined by words
within the phone, they only need that constant
opponent but possible else
Kameelah Rasheed: And even though. Number
seven, they create their own universe is both
poems and policies because they are Language
exists and other universes other ecosystems.
Other inner sexual relationships.
Kameelah Rasheed: With other poems and other
policies and number eight homes and policies
can function as invasive species within assumed
categories of poaching policy.
Kameelah Rasheed: So I think to Michael's
point before around conventions and roles.
Kameelah Rasheed: Of the notion that a particular
poem that breaks structure or breaks convention
sort of can function as invasive species within
a certain category. What does the poem.
Kameelah Rasheed: A policy has written a particular
way can sort of be invasive in that context.
Kameelah Rasheed: And thinking about invasive,
not in the colonial context in the biological
context of where these things are rendered
a detriment necessary but thinking about this
invasion, as a general operation.
Kameelah Rasheed: I have one minute to 910
and 11 and we're going to get through all
them number nine policy, even though most
open poems, a policy and even
Kameelah Rasheed: The most open homes have
a desired outcome policy seeks to execution
of an act towards a certain feature do this,
we can arrive here and poems see comprehension
exuberant self discovery.
Kameelah Rasheed: Or even co construction
and even a poet. That tells you, Oh no, I
don't care about that still cares about people
arriving somewhere, even if it's the summer
is nowhere.
Kameelah Rasheed: Number 10 boat policy and
poetry are open to interpretation was partially
undo everything that I said, which I'm completely
fine with
Kameelah Rasheed: Policy and poetry being
open to interpretation mean that two people
can look at the same policy and behave in
completely different ways and two people can
read the same home and arrive at different
interpretations
Kameelah Rasheed: Which pull calls into question
this idea around being compelled or gesturing
towards a certain
Kameelah Rasheed: Location. And then finally,
I'm both policy and polish while being containers
are exceeded by forums and language that don't
fit neatly into the category of policy poetry.
So I put a gesture, not necessary poem
Kameelah Rasheed: But I think Jeff into our
home hyper local policies, such as the policy
that a teacher, like myself, my have
Kameelah Rasheed: In the classroom, but not
a school I policy. So they're considerations
around skill and dispersal when it comes to
these comparisons. I think I really met those
10 minutes so I'm gonna stop talking. Thank
you.
Christopher Lee: Perfect timing. Thank you.
Christopher Lee: Both of you. That was incredible.
I, I couldn't keep up with my notes I'm
Christopher Lee: Sure, just as everyone else
swimming with ideas and feeling all these
resonances and and you've triggered all these
tangents.
Christopher Lee: And yeah, it feels like a
sort of generative thing. So, I hope, Jill.
Jill has notes think so, I hope, um,
Christopher Lee: Well, actually I had, I had
prepared some questions, but I wanted to sort
of first ask if there were there's anything
that either view wanted to
Christopher Lee: Do to respond to each other
in the immediate since then I could come in
with something, if, if necessary, and then
I'll just also say following that we're going
to open it up to an open general Q AMP. A
but let's start with Mikey just unmuted. So
you want to start
Michael Basinski: I just like the I
Michael Basinski: Like the idea of
Michael Basinski: Invasive Species phone.
Yes.
Michael Basinski: That's it.
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah, I guess I can
Kameelah Rasheed: Respond Michael as you were
speaking I the thing that resonated Nothing,
nothing.
Kameelah Rasheed: Else resonated with you.
Kameelah Rasheed: That kept resonate.
Kameelah Rasheed: For the Scooby Snacks and
and sort of this moving back and forth.
Kameelah Rasheed: Between I want to break
for him but I
Kameelah Rasheed: Also want the Scooby Snacks.
Would you
Kameelah Rasheed: kind of remind feel the
way that we form institutions, why, like we
Kameelah Rasheed: Want
Kameelah Rasheed: To be accepted within the
existing ecosystem institutions, you want
to be recognized as the college when you recognize
the professor won't be recognized, while at
the same time, we don't want to conform to
those particular
Kameelah Rasheed: Engine. So I
Kameelah Rasheed: I think I always remember
Scooby Snacks and this context. I'm sort of
thinking about how you balance building your
own ecosystem.
Kameelah Rasheed: Of like
Kameelah Rasheed: Institutional people ideas,
while still that
Kameelah Rasheed: Like painting your hardware.
It's like
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah, but I still want you
guys to recognize me as the thing that
Kameelah Rasheed: I'm trying to be but also
separate from you because I
Kameelah Rasheed: Think that when you're doing
is not what I want to do.
Michael Basinski: Well, I think.
Michael Basinski: I think I Tolstoy again
and come it came back to
Michael Basinski: Making sure you knew who
you were, and why we're doing things. So it's
kind of self realization that of course you
are. You
Michael Basinski: Want to break form, but
by that you're making form and I, it just
that endless contradiction of being human
and trying to manifest an ideology, you know,
that has an ideal. And I think that's a that's
attention always an anarchist circles.
Michael Basinski: And it's sometimes why co
ops and collective living fails, is because
we don't recognize our humaneness enough and
we're seeking only the ideal without paying
attention to the self. So it's always that
kind of line.
Michael Basinski: I'm satisfied with that.
Yeah. Yeah, I get
Michael Basinski: I understand. I ended at
this stage. Yeah, okay.
Kameelah Rasheed: Make a plug for invasive
species. A friend of mine. She didn't tell
me do this. I promise I friend of mine, wrote
a collection of poetry called invasive species,
which is about the relationship between the
language of his basis species and immigration.
Um, so yeah.
Michael Basinski: Terrific. Yeah.
Christopher Lee: Um, I wanted to, I mean,
this being sort of the prompt that we throw
you being about poetry and policy and just
sort of like speaking from my entry point
to the college thing.
Christopher Lee: You know, like I yeah I don't
know if this is sort of a dangerous comparison
but
Christopher Lee: You know, because Camilla.
You work in social studies policy.
Christopher Lee: curriculum development for
New York City and Michael because you know
you you taught it totally cause but and you
know for a number of years, but also worked
as the sort of
Christopher Lee: Curator and I'm glad that
you spoke about the sort of like archival,
you know, the sort of the policy dimension
of archives
Christopher Lee: I don't know, maybe this
is a simple question or a dumb question, but
I was wondering if you could speculate speculate
a little bit about you know what it might
mean to replace
Christopher Lee: Policy with poetry. Right,
so like
Christopher Lee: I hopefully this trigger
something, but like, what would a poetic budget
and I'm also sort of want to pick up on on
the reference that chameleon made to Octavia
Butler and this sort of notion of primitive
hypertext and sort of like
Christopher Lee: The then sort of non linear
trajectory that that a poetic curriculum might
Christopher Lee: Suggest to open up right
like well what you know what, how could that,
you know, can you do that in in your job like
did you find that you are able to do that
at UB, as you know, as a sort of more embedded
archivist and librarian Michael now.
Michael Basinski: Yes.
How was that
Michael Basinski: I think you'd carry your
politics with you and you exercise them when
you can. So I mean, you've got a liberal
Michael Basinski: an expansive collecting
policy doesn't mean the individual is going
to act upon it. So, wherever, whatever you
are given
Michael Basinski: If you can stretch your
pocket. You can stretch that and and and take
your politics and your images of the way you
wish to live and exist into it. I think you
can then of course, you know, I mean, yeah.
Michael Basinski: Again, it's sort of like
Michael Basinski: I spent
Michael Basinski: 45 years on the campus.
So I mean it's a survival technique and a
survival technique as an invasive species.
I just took over. So, I mean, you might say
that
Michael Basinski: But
Michael Basinski: Yeah, I think you can. And
I don't think the I I I I I just don't think
you give
Michael Basinski: You don't seek a form of
precious this or a form of
Michael Basinski: You, you don't advertise
it. You just, you just do it. And if you have
a certain amount of
Michael Basinski: Given space that you can
manipulate around in the space, much the same
as as Liz Park is manipulating
Michael Basinski: The space in which she exists.
I don't know if Bob Scully says still here
or not.
Michael Basinski: But nevertheless,
Michael Basinski: I was doing similar things
in my fashion. The way Liz has organized this
with all of you.
Michael Basinski: And you know even go it's
it's quite fun to go to these meetings and
to push and pull in one sense, so
Michael Basinski: It's part of the game.
Michael Basinski: It's a, it's a, it's a,
it's a, but but you know if I would always
go in with the notion of that this is this
is humorous rather than serious and I think
that also helps to maybe it's my own quirky
personality.
Michael Basinski: Which I'll accept
Kameelah Rasheed: Chris, I really liked your
question. What can I do any of the things
that I talked about in my day job in the first
answer is no.
Kameelah Rasheed: And I don't like to be like
the silver lining up coven 19 and bubble blah
because people are literally dying.
Kameelah Rasheed: But one thing that did happen
within education police in New York State
was at the regions for cancel.
Kameelah Rasheed: And June. They're also cancelled
and August. And we're all going to keep our
fingers crossed, their castle for eternity,
because the region's functions as a policy.
Kameelah Rasheed: That imposes particular
structure on the way that students learn what
they can learn. And so what did happen this
past semester, is that a lot of students.
Kameelah Rasheed: Who were sort of forcing
to like the nature of like learning through
for the regions and it up at a place where
Kameelah Rasheed: They weren't taking the
region. So their teachers could actually do
what they wanted.
Kameelah Rasheed: And so we saw so many beautiful
things happen where teachers decide to be
products where kids create their own primary
sources.
Kameelah Rasheed: About Cobra. We saw kids
analyzing speeches I work with some teachers
around how to build out these these projects
which are really rooted in my kids identified
an area of interest.
Kameelah Rasheed: For themselves and working.
And so I do think that there is space for
curriculum to be poetic and to engage with
Kameelah Rasheed: Poetry, if this sort of
overarching policy of standardized testing
is removed because that thing dictates everything
Kameelah Rasheed: When I was a classroom teacher
I taught in California, before I came to New
York, California does not have the same regime
around testing. And I remember coming to New
York and be like, what we have to learn this
for what because the test is asked
Kameelah Rasheed: What is this, whereas in
California. I just remember being like
Kameelah Rasheed: This is stuff. We're going
to spend a little bit longer here cuz you
guys seem super interested in my goal is for
you guys to
Kameelah Rasheed: Learn the skill to learn,
but also to be interested in coming to school
to build relationships with one another. So
I do think their space. And I think that um
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah, I'm excited about
the the opening of schools is going to be
terrific. And also I'm excited about what
spaces are open.
Kameelah Rasheed: For teachers who have the
capacity to think about this because reality,
also, is that because of the other interlocking
Kameelah Rasheed: Policies that exist around
returning to school, etc, etc. Some people
literally don't have the capacity to thinking
on the poetics of what has already been given
to them, which is teach. Where's the exam.
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah.
Christopher Lee: Thank you. Um, I want to
sort of like thank you both for the the thoughts
and the contributions, I just want to sort
of bracket this part in transition to
Christopher Lee: An open Q AMP. A but it's
want to share. Also in the sort of spirit
of, you know, destabilizing conventional forms
of citation and Valerie ization of, you know,
knowledge, I just want to read a tweet for
you or someone
Christopher Lee: Says something overheard
Christopher Lee: That they overheard actually
Spivak saying, which is. And the Tweet reads.
I once heard gotchas effect describe an academic
field as a field of vision. It's about who
and what you train yourself to see
Christopher Lee: Look for and listen to who
you who you listened to, you know, this is
the profound one for me. So, the field is
not an object or terrain that one masters,
but a mode of seeking in the world that one
cultivates endlessly.
Christopher Lee: And this is a, you know,
I think something that that I think
Christopher Lee: You know, informed in a in
a nother language, perhaps another sort of
ecology will toast, though, is doing. But
I think is something that all of you have
touched on in different ways. And so I want
to just again bracket this by thanking you
all for that.
Christopher Lee: And open it up to questions.
I think I'm going to get a feed of questions
or
Christopher Lee: How's it going to
Christopher Lee: Go if there had been any
Christopher Lee: Or if there are questions.
Now you can type them into the general chat.
Christopher Lee: Oh, there haven't been any
Michael Basinski: Going for a drink.
Michael Basinski: Where would we go
Oh,
Christopher Lee: Well,
Christopher Lee: You know, one of the reasons
that I moved in Buffalo, is because I love
chicken wings, honestly.
Christopher Lee: Okay, obviously.
Christopher Lee: We would go to buy, but here
disputed just
Michael Basinski: Breaking the ice here. So
you'd be free to talk
Christopher Lee: We can go on this tangent,
I can talk about chicken wings.
Christopher Lee: But there is a disputed history
by the origin.
Christopher Lee: If you, if you want to just
jump in and unmute yourself king can people
do that is that functionality lot if you want
to just unmute yourself and ask something
0live: can jump in as well.
Christopher Lee: I see that all of
Christopher Lee: Us unmuted themselves on
Christopher Lee: misread that
Christopher Lee: Sorry, I'm doing my like
teacher mode and just calling on people now.
Julie Niemi: We do have one from Liz
Christopher Lee: Liz. Please go ahead.
Christopher Lee: Is lose their
Liz Flyntz: Lives in here. This is
Liz Flyntz: It. Hi.
Liz Flyntz: This is sort of a vague question
but
Liz Flyntz: I'm hoping it can be more like
a topic of conversation than a question.
Liz Flyntz: What do you think about the influence
of pedagogical architecture as in Tulsa colleges
trailers versus the virtual classroom VERSUS
THE BEAUTIFUL AND WELL APPOINTED classrooms
of Ivy League colleges versus UBS.
Liz Flyntz: Maybe less somewhat less well
appointed classrooms. I'm just a just a feeling
about what you think. What influence do you
think those the spaces have on learning and
pedagogy.
Julie Niemi: I mean, I'm happy to riff on
this.
Jill Daniels (she/her): If
Julie Niemi: No one else wants to take and
go. Um, so
Julie Niemi: Yeah, I, it's a good question.
But I think that I can just speak I guess
from my specific experience rolling the archives
and kind of what occurred to me during that
were
Julie Niemi: These ideas that got very specific
at times about the pink trailers and Michael,
maybe you can fill in some of these gaps,
because a lot of
Julie Niemi: The memories or the memory that
I have from just the archive or some of the
descriptions of the Ellicott campus. The pink
trailer and these ideas of taking, you know,
the classroom into, you know, the
Julie Niemi: The outdoor space. So I honestly
think Michael might might be listening to
this from experience rather than you know
archival finding. So by all means.
Michael Basinski: We had there were trailers
and Tolstoy had a trailer, which was two big
rooms restroom and several little offices,
as I recall, and
Michael Basinski: After that,
Michael Basinski: We had a house on winspear
Avenue. The university used to have houses,
when it was expanding very quickly had bought
Michael Basinski: Residences along winspear
avenue of American Studies in women's studies
and Tolstoy had its own house. And after that
into towns in Hall, which was an academic
in old academic building
Michael Basinski: And I think
Michael Basinski: These while there was institutional
furniture for instance Indies, there were
there were also old couches and people would
bring in, you know, old chairs and we had
the opportunity to decorate and keep books
around that.
Michael Basinski: People thought were significant
and to post slingers and posters that advertised.
Michael Basinski: Aspects of
Michael Basinski: Various communities coming
into interaction with each other in the indie
spaces. So it was a protected space rather
than a public classroom where
Michael Basinski: Half a dozen different classes
would come in and out through the course of
the day and could be could be English geology
math, etc, etc. And these are designated spaces.
So it became what should I say like home or
you felt comfortable doing things in this
space.
Michael Basinski: Leaving your own texts there
to be read.
Michael Basinski: It also allowed you to
Michael Basinski: Not adhere again to this
richness of like the 54 minute, hour and then
the bell rings and you move off someplace
else. So this these classes could go on and
on and on.
Michael Basinski: And this notion of limits.
Michael Basinski: Were by that fact dispensed
so owning your own space or having your own
space created those opportunities that make
that a form of answer, at least.
Michael Basinski: And this is this is this
is
Michael Basinski: These are, again, you know,
pleasant memories.
Liz Flyntz: Yeah, I like that answer.
Jill Daniels (she/her): Oh I'm sorry, I would
also like to kind of add in terms of like
the virtual cap on classroom aspect of that
question is kind of goes
Jill Daniels (she/her): Back into the idea
of like specializing education almost so like
designating which spaces are used as active
sectors of learning as well.
Jill Daniels (she/her): So like a church,
a church that sanctuary could be just seen
as as searching QA until you start maybe teaching
readings or teaching hymns and scriptures
and it becomes the center of learning in the
actual
Jill Daniels (she/her): Purpose of the space
has been changed. So I think that also ties
a lot until like pedagogical architectures,
in which spaces are kind of imbued with meanings
before any actual learning takes place.
Jill Daniels (she/her): So I think that that's
something super special about Tolstoy, is
that they took spaces that may not have been
as opportune for centers of learning.
Jill Daniels (she/her): And they turn them
into active spaces where not only learning
could happen, but then further I guess reasoning
and kind of questions being asked of what
education is itself.
Jill Daniels (she/her): And I think that kind
of ties back into virtual classrooms today
with kids kind of asking. Okay, I'm at home.
Jill Daniels (she/her): I may be in my PJs
but am I still learning in the space in, do
I still have the same connection to the materials
into my classmates learning in the space as
my was in a classroom I think Tolstoy kind
of address that very well.
Michael Basinski: Sure to just have to also
mention that women's studies had their own
a house, as did a American studies for a while
and some of these other college units also
had
Michael Basinski: Trailers in the trailer
complex complex. So,
Christopher Lee: Chameleon and Jennifer wanted
to jump in.
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah, I'll be quick. Um,
there are a couple of things. Thank you for
that question that came up for me around.
Kameelah Rasheed: Architecture. The first
is I grew up as far as I know it, which is
a courthouse still is. Um, and I went to a
Catholic school for
Kameelah Rasheed: For high school. Um, and
part of that movement on my body from my community
to another community for what was considered
to be superior education also meant that you
associate certain environments.
Kameelah Rasheed: And certain people have
withholding valuable knowledge. So for me,
I'm really interested in thinking about learning
that can happen close to home for young people
in particular because it sort of shifts sort
of who is who is given epistemological
Kameelah Rasheed: Authority when when any
space or anybody or anything that could be
something from which to learn. Um, it's sort
of like prioritizing within the scope of learning.
So, I, I've been thinking a lot about like
what does it mean that
Kameelah Rasheed: When desegregation happened.
The notion was that you have to go somewhere
else to learn. You can't learn here because
this space is not a space where learning happens
because it's not good enough.
Kameelah Rasheed: Or in the notion that to
go and learn more about to we're talking being
to go far away to college. And so thinking
about how the communities that in particular
because I work most of high school students
and some grassroots
Kameelah Rasheed: Those premiums themselves
can be like, I really liked you. I really
like this language around active sectors of
learning of I think it's like really beautiful
language.
Kameelah Rasheed: So there's that that I got
really excited about and thought about and
I will be college back home and the ways in
which
Kameelah Rasheed: Every space was sort of
activated church a corner. Everything was
a learning space. And it also got me thinking
about interspecies learning
Kameelah Rasheed: Anyone who ever wants to
interspecies anything, please hit me up, but
there is is really exciting thing for me around
this prioritization of humans as the only
organisms from which
Kameelah Rasheed: That can produce knowledge
and received mountains. Right. And there is
much learning that can be had between myself.
Kameelah Rasheed: And a plant. I learned a
lot from my plan. So there's much learning
that a plant learned from my interaction as
well. And so thinking about this idea of actor
sectors and learning. Also think about an
active relation ality
Kameelah Rasheed: Where it's not human to
human learning. But what does it mean to learn
from the anti surveillance techniques of like
a hawk mouth that vibrates his genitalia,
in order to interrupt the bat echolocation.
Right. That is something to learn
Kameelah Rasheed: Or these other organisms
that are able to engage in anti surveillance
activities and that's something to be learned.
Right. So I think on the question of architecture
is also a question of
Kameelah Rasheed: What to set around specializing
um but also specializing the species with
which were engaging the learning
jenniferlouisewilson: That's amazing. I kind
of like following up on that a little bit.
This idea of, you know, why have we decided
as a culture, particularly in the US that
educate for higher education that you have
to like leave home and go away and I think
jenniferlouisewilson: To bring it back to
Tolstoy himself. He actually refuse to participate
in any of these Tolstoy and communes because
he said no. The goal is not to create a separate
space.
jenniferlouisewilson: For these ideas, but
to make sure they're constantly kind of intermingling
with kind of your everyday life, your normal
life.
jenniferlouisewilson: One point I would say
about, you know, virtual the virtual classroom
so I so I occasionally will like Agile teach
a class here and there and I in spring.
jenniferlouisewilson: I was teaching a class
at Barnard College, which is a school that
has a lot of money, they have a really strong
financial aid program. So a lot of people
from very different economic backgrounds come
to class and everyone sort of equalized right
they all stay in the same dorm.
jenniferlouisewilson: When we switch to virtual.
And so I had no idea who was who came from
money who you know who was who didn't when
we switched to a virtual that came very much
into stark relief.
jenniferlouisewilson: It was very clear, people
say, Oh, I'm Skype it you know I'm zooming
in, from my parents summer home on the lake
versus I had another student who couldn't
turn the sound on because there were so many
people in her living environment, you know,
so many people sharing rooms and sharing space.
jenniferlouisewilson: That she couldn't really
participate in class and
jenniferlouisewilson: You know, I read this
article that was like one of the terrible
things about about the pandemic is that it's
disrupted this system where everyone comes
to campus and is kind of equalized. And I
remember thinking like, Well, why why that's
fake
jenniferlouisewilson: Like that's that's that's
bogus. I'd rather us like fully confront the
difference, the different kinds of resources
that we come to the classroom kind of with
if I do, I do. Kind of think that these different
spaces can reflect and can change, like the
educational experience.
Christopher Lee: Thank you. Um, there's a
question from, I don't know, it's from. But
the question is, is there any overlap with
Black Mountain to black on college and Tolstoy.
Christopher Lee: Maybe Michael. Michael. You
know, I think it was, but
Christopher Lee: You can confirm me
Michael Basinski: Like mom to was another
college
Michael Basinski: And then I think it evolved.
Michael Basinski: Out of
Michael Basinski: A college that was doing
arts and crafts and it was a later manifestation.
So it wasn't, it wasn't one of the early
Michael Basinski: One of the early colleges
and
Michael Basinski: Because you be at that point
inherited lots of faculty from Black Mountain
or or black mountaineers were often visitors
to the campus, it's all it was. It was thought
that white I have Black Mountain to also now
I think black man to was strictly
Michael Basinski: In the eloquent complex
and we should remember that the electric complex
was once imagined to be the home of all of
these camp all of these various colleges and
there
Michael Basinski: And that Tolstoy would in
fact that hadn't evolved would have been a
residential college where students would actually
have
Michael Basinski: Lived in Tolstoy college
as part of the university system so black
mountains was was a little later on.
Michael Basinski: If that's an answer.
Christopher Lee: Thank you.
Christopher Lee: I think we're about at times,
but I just wanted to ask if there are any
other alumni from Tolstoy present
Christopher Lee: If you could
Christopher Lee: If you, if you're
Christopher Lee: open to sharing that your
presence with us.
Christopher Lee: Out of curiosity,
You know,
Michael Basinski: We're all
Michael Basinski: We're all people. Now it's
almost time for bed.
Christopher Lee: That's true.
Christopher Lee: Well, maybe, you know, we've
we've shared a lot of time together today.
And I've certainly gotten a lot out of it
and feel energized by by everything. So, and
it is getting to back dinner time. So maybe
Christopher Lee: Maybe we'll
Christopher Lee: Conclude it there. Oh no,
we wanted to do a sort of like last word.
Didn't we
Christopher Lee: Maybe just sort of like a
last
Christopher Lee: couple, couple of words from
from it and we can go in order of the presenters
today. So I think we started with Jennifer
today didn't
Michael Basinski: Nick.
jenniferlouisewilson: Yeah, just maybe, just
like a last note on this kind of exchange
that Camille, and I just had about like the
importance of doing this kind of education,
work in a way
jenniferlouisewilson: That doesn't feel
jenniferlouisewilson: Separate alright like
that. We don't move this to some sort of kind
of some sort of different space and because
I think one thing that's really important
to remember about the
jenniferlouisewilson: History of colleges,
particularly from
jenniferlouisewilson: The perspective of
jenniferlouisewilson: The administration and
the university was that this was specifically
a tactic from Martin Myerson at Berkeley.
jenniferlouisewilson: Who came to SUNY Buffalo
from Berkeley to make sure that the radical
elements of the student population were somewhat
segregated.
jenniferlouisewilson: And that we're kind
of in their own kind of like, right on the
separate campus.
jenniferlouisewilson: And that it would kind
of make sure that these ideas weren't intermingling
too closely.
jenniferlouisewilson: With the main student
body. And so I think that's something to just
keep in mind when we're thinking about how
to set up these spaces like how do we set
them up in a way that's intentional, but but
also kind of integrated
jenniferlouisewilson: That's all.
nic vas: Yeah, just about species of education.
I just
nic vas: An organization. I remember
nic vas: Learning, for instance, that in in
Johannesburg after the so what a massacre
that churches became spaces for organizing
resistance against apartheid.
nic vas: So any space can can be turned into
a teaching space of learning space. In fact,
if you think about our kids education.
nic vas: Factories know if you think about
women working in factories, you know, they
had to bring their kids in so they would organize
shift, you know, to
nic vas: Deal, would the education of the
children or even self education, there will
always be in some cases, not always. Sorry.
In some cases,
nic vas: There would be someone who, for instance
steps back and opens up, I don't know, capital
Volume one, and starts reading to fellow workers,
provided you know the factories, not to digress,
but there are there are histories of finding
always ways for for self education and learning.
nic vas: About your own conditions, your own
material conditions, how you're being exploited
for instance, and so on.
nic vas: That's my contribution, but my thought
about spaces. But yeah, thank you very much
to everyone for your patience with the technical
stuff that I am the accident that I subjected
to
Christopher Lee: Thank you Nick Michael
Michael Basinski: Thanks, and
Michael Basinski: I feel less cynical after
hearing all of you and
Michael Basinski: Seeing you, all of you so
engaged. One thing I didn't
Michael Basinski: Mention because
Michael Basinski: Of time is
Michael Basinski: When I did meet Jake Kramer,
he was
Michael Basinski: A member of the I WW but
he was also a, a person that was organizing
a group called The Great panthers for senior
citizens to
Michael Basinski: Mobilize and
Michael Basinski: I very much see a continuum
here sort of myself now being as old as he
was, and seeing you all responding to those
same philosophies that it is a continuum.
And I just feel less cynical and that
Michael Basinski: These days, that's hard
sometimes. So thank you all.
Christopher Lee: Thank you, Michael.
Michael Basinski: And we'll conclude with
Chameleon.
Kameelah Rasheed: Everyone. First, thank you
for bearing with my fast speaking for get
really excited. Um, I think the thing I've
been trying to write this essay since
Kameelah Rasheed: February about the politics
of revision and I keep talking about leaky
Miss um and I got really excited about this
because I think it's sort of like a laboratory
Kameelah Rasheed: Quality or eat those necessary
things that don't need to have parameters
are things I don't need to have membranes,
a separate them can sort of
Kameelah Rasheed: leak into one another and
so I'm really excited about the guests. The
way we sort of ended on architecture, because
it makes me think a lot about the need for
Kameelah Rasheed: Many of these principles
and practices which are often surveyed in
specific buildings in specific locations.
Kameelah Rasheed: To actually week. And what
does it look like for a young person in high
school, for example, to go to a building to
like learn one thing, but to then come home
to do something else. And it just reminded
me
Kameelah Rasheed: Of the fact that even though
I grew up in a very important town, the most
memorable learning experiences as well my
science teacher would take us to San Francisco
Creek.
Kameelah Rasheed: To collect water samples
to analyze it, or when they would take us
to kind of point to
Kameelah Rasheed: dissect out pellets like
imagine being this up. Now I realize why was
not popular and elementary school, so I was
like, Let's go dissect out pellets and no
one else was saying that
Kameelah Rasheed: But I think about these
is really important experiences. So I, what
does it mean for learning to leak into every
space versus being contained in sort of the
politics of enclosure and containment um
Kameelah Rasheed: Yeah, we have to stop. Let's
let being sort of weekend that learning happens
whenever, wherever between whatever species
of it or you can happen between ourselves
forever. Yeah.
Kameelah Rasheed: You're great. You can order
them from from the order that I thought about
a couple of times, my husband's not excited
about the house.
Kameelah Rasheed: Thanks, guys.
Christopher Lee: Thank you very much.
Christopher Lee: I think that concludes our
program and I just can't say thank you enough.
Liz Park: To Julie does collective question.
One of the closing thoughts to Steve and Chris
Julie Niemi: Yeah, let's do it. Let's do a
real quick round around the
Julie Niemi: Yeah. Um, first of all, thank
you all. This was really fun and very exciting
to kind of have new
Julie Niemi: New breath, breathe, whatever
into this project. Um, and, yeah, I don't
know, I guess what I'm thinking a lot about
right now. Well Jen brought it up but
Julie Niemi: You know, one of the the sort
of cynical things that I remember from this
and I don't want to spend too much time on
cynicism, but was the fact that it was
Julie Niemi: Trying that the college is in
general. We're part of this Berkeley of the
East thing that Mayor son was really trying
to, you know, since essentially rebrand
Julie Niemi: University of Buffalo with. And
I think one of the things that the tension
that really has kind of kept me interested
in this project now for five years, I guess,
well, is the fact that
Julie Niemi: You know, it was trying to be
something like that. But yet the sort of lineage
and the long term, you know, resilience of
the people who were part of the college's
Julie Niemi: Really were invested in creating
this kind of, you know, close knit community
and can shift that was really the antithesis
of
Julie Niemi: That sort of cynicism at the
time. And so I am really excited now to meet
a lot of you all for the first time, I also
see some of you all again for the first time.
Julie Niemi: And I just, I'm hopeful that
we can kind of keep talking about poetics
and policy and space and the new configurations
of such especially for learning. Over the
next year and just see how that really shifts
and takes on new meeting. So thank you all
very much.
Liz Park: Steve, do you have any closing thoughts.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Um, I want to echo comment
in the in the chat about how this is timely.
Steven Chodoriwsky: For this semester. And
I think that
Steven Chodoriwsky: As someone who, who is
employed to teach and not having not been
able to generate a whole lot of excitement
for the for the act that's that's impending
Steven Chodoriwsky: This, this is actually
really
Steven Chodoriwsky: This is, this has been
energizing in a way that you know makes it
may be possible to enter the year on it on
a on a on a high note. So thank you for that.
Chris
Christopher Lee: I was thinking exactly the
same thing.
Christopher Lee: I'm not ready.
Steven Chodoriwsky: Chris, you can't say that.
Steven Chodoriwsky: What that guy's house
it
Christopher Lee: But yeah, I'm starting classes
next week and I'm not, I'm not ready, but
Christopher Lee: You know, but but but actually
I feel empowered to sort of like
Christopher Lee: I feel empowered to not be
ready.
Christopher Lee: It's an end to be sort of
nimble and and poetic can tangential and
Christopher Lee: I don't know what our palates
are going to look that up.
Liz Park: As a closing thought and announcement.
Well, I want to thank everyone. This really
has been phenomenal. And I learned so much
from all of you.
Liz Park: I want to leave all of you with
one image as we are a visual our organization
and also inspired by Camille is love of interspecies
Liz Park: Relations. The largest to living
organism on Earth is actually mycelium mushrooms
and
Liz Park: When you see mushrooms pop up there.
Just fruiting it's because of rain the mycelium
fruits
Liz Park: Mushrooms. And that's what we see.
So I think of this conversation as the blooming
of a mushroom.
Liz Park: And the, the mycelium our connections
are underground and it will continue to thrive
and you will continue to see these fruits
pop up if you follow us.
Liz Park: As the curator of UV art galleries,
I encourage all of you to follow our activities
by signing up for our newsletter that way
you will receive news about all of our activities,
including future
Liz Park: Future Tolstoy related
Liz Park: Exhibitions programs. However, there
are so many other things that we do that are
in the spirit of this generous open conversation
and learning and connecting through art. So
really, I encourage all of you to keep coming
back and see what we are up to.
Liz Park: Yeah. On that note, thank you so
much. We are so privileged to have all of
the speakers tonight and to have all of you
join. Thank you so much and have a great dinner
or have a great evening of sleep.
Liz Park: Hi.
Julie Niemi: Everyone take care of yourselves.
Julie Niemi: Hi everyone. Oh.
Julie Niemi: Thank you. Bye.
