Caliban and the Witch

In this edited collection of work spanning more than 20 years, Silvia Federici provides a detailed history and critique of the politics of the commons from a feminist perspective. In her clear and combative voice, Federici provides readers with an analysis of some of the key issues in contemporary thinking on this subject. Drawing on rich historical research, she maps the connections between the previous forms of enclosure that occurred with the birth of capitalism and the destruction of the commons and the "new enclosures" at the heart of the present phase of global capitalist accumulation.

Considering the commons from a feminist perspective, this collection argues that women and reproductive work are crucial to both our economic survival and the construction of a world free from the capitalist hierarchies. Federici is clear that the commons should not be understood as happy islands in a sea of exploitative relations—but rather autonomous spaces from which to challenge the existing organization of life and labor.

"Absolutely what we need in these days of spreading gloom. A very well argued case for joyful militancy, and against the dead hand of puritanical revolution. Read it, live it!” — John Holloway, author of Crack Capitalism

Why do radical movements and spaces sometimes feel laden with fear, anxiety, suspicion, self-righteousness, and competition? Montgomery and bergman call this phenomenon rigid radicalism: congealed and toxic ways of relating that have seeped into social movements, posing as the “correct” way of being radical. In conversation with organizers and intellectuals from a wide variety of political currents, the authors explore how rigid radicalism smuggles itself into radical spaces, and how it is being undone.

Interviewees include Silvia Federici, adrienne maree brown, Marina Sitrin, Gustavo Esteva, Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, Walidah Imarisha, Margaret Killjoy, Glen Coulthard, Richard Day, and more.

Being together in the dark awaiting a film or play, we’re actually readying ourselves for a threshold experience, for something else to appear: ‘We catch a glimpse of how the possible and the impossible are in fact threaded together, always have been.’ In these essays on the intersection of theatre, ecology, magic and darkness, Augusto Corrieri unearths forms of knowledge and attention repressed by Western modernity. How can we explore particular modes of attending to worldly things, he wonders, ‘modes of attending that value impossibility, multiplicity, drift, impermanence and dislocation, that hold dear the importance of the un-seen, the un-extracted, the un-consumed. There are things not meant for human eyes.’

Augusto Corrieri is an artist and writer. In his work he deconstructs the apparatus of theatre, inviting spectators to reflect on questions of spectacle and ecology in the twenty-first century. He presents sleight-of-hand magic performances under the pseudonym Vincent Gambini. www.vincentgambini.com

How can we define and document our present? 

Postmortem is a sensitive yet critical metaphor for a world suspended between collapse and reinvention—a diary of the now. Drawing together writers and artists from Europe and the SWANA region, this issue locates areas of tension that define our era. Far from a mere dialogue between regions, it exposes the inner and outer fractures of Western hegemony, unearthing shared emotions. 

From reclaiming histories and narratives in the Arab world to deconstructing digital spaces as arenas of control and resistance—even exposing systemic exclusions embedded in blood donation policies—contributors reveal these tensions as a fertile terrain for dialogue and reflection. 

Through critical essays, narrative writing, poetry, interviews, and contemporary art, the concept of Postmortem unfolds an in-between state where death and rebirth occur simultaneously. Across three interwoven chapters—Metaconnexion, Dissociation, and Fragmentation—the issue engages radically with body politics, othering, post-orientalism, surveillance, decoloniality, freedom, and resistance. 

Both a chronicle and a hybrid object where text, design, and image interact, Postmortem archives a world in flux. Rather than prognosticate, it dissects the present as the essential site for reimagining our future. 

Contributors : Sara El-Jazara, François Peyroux, Nadine Makarem, Soukaina Melhaoui, Louise Mervelet, Manon Schaefle, Marina Mardas, Irina Breitenstein, Amer Al-Dakar

An occult history that grounds the sacred yearning for magic in real life. 

In these essays by scholar and self-initiated witch Brooke Palmieri, occult history, the eternal now, and our magickal queer futures align, connecting us to an enchantment both contemporary and classic. Drawing upon the knowledge and influence of practitioners from Rachel Pollack to Tituba, Palmieri grounds the sacred yearning for magic in real life, whether exploring the gossip of feuding Salem witches, paying the rent by playing "wizard" for news cameras, or detailing the psychic ups and downs of working in an occult bookshop. Written in a voice electrified with love for the craft and its lineage of eccentrics, Bargain Witch shows us witch life in all its quotidian humor and splendor, taking its place amongst the magickal classics that inspired it, a literary ouroboros.

Brooke Palmieri is a writer and artist based in Joshua Tree. His writing considers the past as a supernatural encounter, spanning hundreds of years of queer and trans history, and the magic, mystery, and erotics of working in archives. Bargain Witch: Essays on Self-Initiation is his first book.

L’or et la cocaïne sont les deux matériaux bruts de Mon musée de la Cocaïne. C’est au cours de leur transformation et raffinement que ces deux substances ramènent avec elles une histoire de l’oppression et de l’esclavage.

Dans ce livre, l’anthropologue australien Michael Taussig prend comme point de départ la proposition de bâtir un musée de la Cocaïne (qui serait l’image reflétée du musée de l’Or de la Banque de la République à Bogotá) et dresse un portrait sans concession de la vie des mineurs afro-colombiens aspirés dans le monde dangereux de la production de cocaïne au fin fond de la forêt tropicale, sur la côte pacifique de la Colombie. Il décrit la violence, la pauvreté, mais aussi les croyances qui surgissent des marais envahis de mangroves et des rivières tropicales qui, pendant plus de cinq cent ans, ont attiré, ruiné et décontenancé Amérindiens, orpailleurs, conquistadors et pirates, esclaves africains, ingénieurs russes et guérilleros marxistes.

Mon musée de la Cocaïne se présente comme un assemblage éclectique d’histoires et d’anecdotes, présenté comme autant de salles d’un hypothétique musée de la Cocaïne, au sein desquelles le lecteur est invité à déambuler, en croisant des références qui vont de Charles Dickens à Franz Kafka en passant par la poésie de Seamus Heaney.

A collection of published and unpublished writings of the groundbreaking Chicana writer and self-described "chicana dyke-feminist, tejana patlache poet, writer and cultural theorist" Gloria Anzaldua.

Gloria Anzaldúa (1942-2004) was a visionary writer whose work was recognized with many honors, including the Before Columbus Foundation American Book Award, a Lambda literary award, the National Endowment for the Arts Fiction Award, and the Bode-Pearson Prize for Outstanding Contributions to American Studies. Her book Borderlands/La frontera was selected as one of the 100 Best Books of the Century by Hungry Mind Review and the Utne Reader. AnaLouise Keating, Professor of Women's Studies at Texas Woman's University, is the author of Women Reading, Women Writing: Self-Invention in Paula Gunn Allen, Gloria Anzaldúa, and Audre Lorde; editor of Anzaldúa's Interviews/Entrevistas and EntreMundos/AmongWorlds: New Perspectives on Gloria Anzaldúa; and co-editor, with Anzaldúa, of this bridge we call home: radical visions for transformation.

AnaLouise Keating, Professor of Women's Studies at Texas Woman's University, is the author of Women Reading, Women Writing: Self-Invention in Paula Gunn Allen, Gloria Anzaldúa, and Audre Lorde; editor of Anzaldúa's Interviews/Entrevistas and EntreMundos/AmongWorlds: New Perspectives on Gloria Anzaldúa; and co-editor, with Anzaldúa, of this bridge we call home: radical visions for transformation.