Attention all socialists, anti-capitalists, philosophers, feminists, communists, historians, neo-luddites and anarchists in the Triangle area…
On May 20th at 7pm Internationalist Bookstore (405 W. Franklin St. in Chapel Hill) will be hosting the first of a series of reading group meet-ups on the ex
cellent book Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body, and Primitive Accumulation. Of interest to anyone invested in dissecting the histories of class struggle under feudalism, the privatization of the commons and wilderness areas, the rise of science and
rationalist thought, the witchhunts, and women’s resistance to the proletarianization of free peasants, the book has received a renewed
interest of late in anti capitalist, anarchist, and anticiv circles. From an online description of the text:
“Caliban and the Witch is a history of the body in the transition to capitalism. Moving from the peasant revolts of the late Middle Ages to the witch hunts and the rise of mechanical philosophy, Federici investigates the capitalist rationalization of social reproduction. She shows how the struggle against the rebel body and the conflict between body and mind are essential conditions for the development of labor power and self-ownership, two central principles of modern [capitalist] social organization.”
The first meeting of the reading group will discuss the books introduction
and first two chapters: “All the World Needs a Jolt” and “The Accumulation
of Labor and the Degradation of Women.” For those interested in getting a
further background of some of the concepts laid out in Federici’s
introduction, in particular Marx’s “primitive accumulation” and Foucalt’s
“biopower,” short excerpts of relevant texts will be available as well.
Would you like to order a copy from Internationalist Books? Do you want us to e-mail you related texts to this group? Contact us below.
