Reading Group Emergent Strategies

With our human gift of reasoning, we have tried to control or overcome the emergent processes that are our own nature, the processes of the planet we live on, and the universe we call home. The result is crisis at each scale we are aware of, from our deepest inner moral sensibilities to the collective scale of climate and planetary health and beyond, to our species in relation to space and time – Adrienne Maree Brown.

For the third and final session of the Iniva x Laundry Arts Reading Together Society, we will be reading a small extract from the progressive organising manual Emergent Strategies by Adrienne Maree Brown. This manual recognises our experiences as non-linear and iterative and teaches us how to work with rather than against our emerging selves and the emerging world, in order to shape the societies we want to see. For Maree Brown Emergence as a concept notices the way small actions and connections create complex systems, patterns that become ecosystems and societies. We will then collectively read Paul Chan’s The Unthinkable Community which brilliantly deconstructs notions of community online vs offline.

What matters here is not how directly these groups confront or try to bring about an end to the wrongs, although this is a vital concern. Rather, it is significant enough that they choose to risk interrupting the seemingly entropic drift of things by organizing themselves against the current – Paul Chan

Chan is critical of the online space as a marketplace and urges us to prioritise presence and collective building, underscoring the importance of friction and difference (which are oft sanitised online) for long term survival of social relations.

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The Laundry Arts is a creative platform + studio engaging with the curious, visionary and creatively courageous. Their work is purpose-led, insightful and challenging. They are a growing network of creators and thinkers, leading in their fields, kicking down doors and refusing to be unseen. They curate exhibitions, produce installations, self-publish and collaborate with cultural organisations and brands in the production of experiential content, from dinners to parties and discussions.