Abusablepast

A slide with a white box and dark text reading “example” below an excerpt of the White House’s Executive Order “Improving Education Outcomes by Empowering Parents, States, and Communities” accompanied by a poem titled “[record of transfer]”: instructions: remain solvent. comply with terms, as outlined in the policy, as amended without notice, as interpreted by the holder. where self-direction exceeds design, debt may be used to re-establish form: • debt to structure. • debt to discipline. • debt to contain. used to be, you could name what you owed and to whom. our instructions: remain solvent, stay still. please, submit your forms again to ensure proper processing.

A slide with a white box and dark text reading “example” above an excerpt of a White House Executive Order title amended to “Expanding Migrant *Carceral Quarantine at Imperial Station Guantanamo Bay to Full Racist Xenophobic Capacity” *a place where people are kept between life and death for an indefinite period (Paik 113). Below is an amended memorandum alongside learning goals for a lesson plan adapted from this artwork.

From a digital or analog collage, photo, drawing, blackout poem, video, or anything else, select artworks will be incorporated into openly licensed teaching materials. See more info about Executive Dis/Order at abusablepast.org/call-for-sub.... More questions can be directed to thepedlab@gmail.com.

A slide with a dark red mauve gradient background and white text reading “Call for Submissions for The Executive Dis/Order Project: Refusing Compliance” from “The Pedagogy Lab & Center for Feminist Studies, UC Santa Barbara in collaboration with The Abusable Past.”

The Pedagogy Lab & Center for Feminist Futures at UC Santa Barbara is seeking submissions for The Executive Dis/Order Project: Refusing Compliance.

This project is looking for original art on executive power and its effects on democracy to build a visual archive of resistance to US suppression. /1

From Italian American radicalism, to the Black freedom struggle, radical Iranian theory and praxis, and drug war policing’s ties to Palestine solidarity repression, these works offer the interconnectedness of history to this current moment. We invite you to read more at linktr.ee/theabusablep... /2

A slide with a red background and white text that reads “Luigi Mangione, Giuseppe Zangara, and the Forgotten History of Italian American Radicalism by Sonia C. Gomez” with a short description that reads “Tracing the long 20th century history of Italian American radicalism through Giuseppe Zangarw and Luigi Mangione, Gomez illuminates their connections through their twinned disillusionment with capitalism and political resistance borne from chronic pain.” Accompanied by a black-and-white collage from left to right Giuseppe Zangara in prisoner uniform, Luigi Mangione in prisoner uniform surrounded by police escorts, and a Giuseppe Zangara portrait with three other men and a looping white arrow behind to point at the body text.

A slide with a red background and a photograph from the Black Freedom Studies speaker series at Schomburg Center with four people seated on stage in the center with audience members in the foreground. The white text reads “State Violence and the Black Freedom Struggle by Lucien Baskin” and description “As part of Conversations in Black Freedom Studies (CBFS) hosted by the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Lucien Baskin interviews Mary Frances Phillips, Françoise Hamlin, and Orisabmi Burton for an event on State Violence: Prisons, Police, Politics.”

A slide with a red background and a poster in red, gray, white, and black depicting a woman with her arms in chains breaking free surrounded by other revolutionary women and text reading “Hail To the Working and Struggling Women of the World.” The white text on the slide below reads “Radical Iranian Theory and Praxis Microsyllabus by Tagereh Aghdasifar, Arash Davari, Alexander Jabbari, Amira Jarmakani, and Goonar Nikpour” and a description reading “Spanning Iranian revolutions and revolutionary thought, carcerality, sociality, movement building, and the development of critical SWANA studies/Ethnic Studies, this micro syllabus facilitates engagement with radical Iranian thought instead of provincializing such work as area studies or even “counter-terrorism” studies.”

A slide with a red background and a color photograph depicting a line of NYPD amassing to crack down on the International Women’s Day Global Strike for Gaza standing along the shoulder of a city street as passerby walk in front of them. Below, white text reads “Policing Solidarity: Lessons from the Drug War by Nadja Eisenberg-Guyot” and a short summary ”By linking drug policing to the repression of the Palestine solidarity movement in Turtle Island, Eisenberg-Guyot enumerates how the specific mechanisms and tactics of the drug war inform and reify U.S. settler-colonial, imperialist, and racial capitalist interests domestically and abroad.”

It would be an understatement to say 2025 so far has been difficult in the midst of political uncertainty and mounting assaults against our most vulnerable. Throughout this time, the Digital Collective has remained steadfast in our commitment to publish critical work and offers these pieces… /1

Forum 7.0 // People’s University for Gaza, Introduction - The Abusable Past It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023. In response to Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel unleashed an unrelenting genocide upon Palestinians in Gaz...

Please read more here: abusablepast.org/forum-7-0-in...
🍉❤️‍🩹 6/6

Forum 7.0 // People’s University for Gaza, Introduction - The Abusable Past It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023. In response to Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel unleashed an unrelenting genocide upon Palestinians in Gaz...

...Many themes, lessons, and challenges emerge.
We hope that this forum fulfills multiple purposes: that it will serve as an archive, a teaching resource, and a guide for future programming that will inspire those who continue struggling for collective liberation. /5

Forum 7.0 // People’s University for Gaza, Introduction - The Abusable Past It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023. In response to Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel unleashed an unrelenting genocide upon Palestinians in Gaz...

....Some offer a hyperlocal understanding of their encampment experience, others provide global linkages. Together, they paint a brief but vivid picture of what the encampments looked like, felt like, what they generated, what they challenged, and what it meant to those involved. /4

Forum 7.0 // People’s University for Gaza, Introduction - The Abusable Past It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023. In response to Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel unleashed an unrelenting genocide upon Palestinians in Gaz...

...Some pieces speak to ways that people who have long advocated for Palestinian liberation worked in this new political landscape. Others speak to how first-time activists joined, interpreted, and made sense of these encampment spaces. /3

Forum 7.0 // People’s University for Gaza, Introduction - The Abusable Past It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023. In response to Hamas’ Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel unleashed an unrelenting genocide upon Palestinians in Gaz...

..including experiments with teach-ins, alternative pedagogies, & the expansion of the classroom into the encampments.
The following pieces are part of a forum about student activism & how faculty, students, & community members were involved in the encampments during the Spring semester of 2024. /2

It is difficult to capture how the world was utterly transformed since October 7, 2023…This past summer, the Digital Collective joined those who encouraged a serious reflection on the violent administrative response to a wide range of student activism ... /1

In this piece, Sandhya Shukla reflects on the life and legacy of Vito Marcantonio, highlighting his cross-cultural solidarity and progressive vision, and urges readers to consider how his utopian ideals might inspire contemporary political action.

Read more here: abusablepast.org/congressman-...

Rep. Marcantonio at his office, a trailer, with neighborhood children, ranging in age, from very young to teenagers. They are standing, some posing, some talking, with Marcantonio. The door to the trailer is open with some children standing inside the door frame, laughing. Marcantonio looks down at the child to his right, smiling warmly, with their arms around each other. The trailer reads "Congressional Office of your...Congressman," "Vito Ma....nio, "Meet him here," "PEACE," "Serves you..." Ellipsis in text signals what is blocked by the open door. Buildings line the top frame of the photo, behind Marcantonio's office.

"Seventy years ago today, Vito Marcantonio, the most left-wing congressman in US history, suffered a fatal heart attack. He had by then left office disappointed by McCarthyism and the failure of pro-worker and anti-racist legislative efforts." /1

The deadline has been extended until August 20!

Deadline tomorrow!

Read more: abusablepast.org/pushing-forw...
📸: Promotional material for the 2022 National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day. Source: Congressional Equality Caucus. 3/3

Scott examines the intersections of gender, religion, and sexuality and links these historical patterns to ongoing disparities. The microsyllabus, then, highlights broader systemic issues in healthcare, employment, and housing that continue to affect Black Americans today.
/2

Looking for some reading material this weekend? Check out "Pushing Forward: 25 Years of Black AIDS Awareness," a microsyllabus by Aishah Scott. This piece focuses on how systemic marginalization intensified the AIDS crisis in Black communities. /1

Deadline is today!

"STOP THE GENOCIDE"-- waving various Palestinian flags. The text on top of the photo reads, "The Digital Collective of the Radical History Review Call for Submissions, Reflections from the People's University. Deadline: August 1, 2024."

📸 credit: Montecruz Foto through The Academy Chronicle.
Alt text: A transparent photo in the background of students protesting, holding signs--one that says ...

The Abusable Past seeks contributions that speak to faculty and student experiences with teaching and learning during the Palestine solidarity protests of 2024.
More information here: abusablepast.org/a-call-for-s...

- Engage in critical discussions on institutional constraints and the complexities of practicing radical history within oppressive systems.
More info here: abusablepast.org/call-for-sub...

We seek submissions that:
- Investigate the nature of radical history work and the responsibilities it entails.
- Offer insights into radical history as a topic and methodology.

Abusable Past is accepting submissions for a new forum exploring the essence and boundaries of radical history. We aim to understand the definition of radical history, who practices it, and the challenges they face.

--one that says "STOP THE GENOCIDE"-- waving various Palestinian flags. The text on top of the photo reads, "The Digital Collective of the Radical History Review Call for Submissions, Reflections from the People's University. Deadline: August 1, 2024."

📸 credit: Montecruz Foto through The Academy Chronicle.
Alt text: A transparent photo in the background of students protesting, holding signs...

The Abusable Past seeks contributions that speak to faculty and student experiences with teaching and learning during the Palestine solidarity protests of 2024.

More information here: mtsacecachronicle.com/7839/world/u...

This discussion delves into the historical and systemic connections between U.S. imperialism and the practice of immigrant detention.
Read more here, abusablepast.org/detention-na...
📸 Covers of Elliott Young and Kristina Shull's books: Forever Prisoners and Detention Empire, respectively.

Check out "Detention Nation: US Empire and Immigrant Prisons – Tina Shull and Elliott Young in Conversation." Dr. Elliott Young is a Professor in the History Department at Lewis and Clark College. Dr. Tina Shull (she/her) is an Associate Professor and Director of Public History at UNC Charlotte.

Immigration and Mental Health Collide, Again – The Abusable Past In recent years, politicians in the United States have paid significant attention to two major political issues: firstly, the increased number of asylum-seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border, and secondly, the perceived dangers of homeless individuals with severe mental illness. At first glance, these might appear to be separate political and humanitarian crises; however, major U.S. politicians, such as Donald Trump, have connected them, echoing rhetoric from deep in U.S. history. Re-examining the history of psychiatry and immigration in the U.S. is a crucial exercise, as it reveals the complex and often unseen intersections between these two critical concerns.

📸 St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Washington D.C., one of only two mental asylums ever operated by the U.S. federal government (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)