Category Archives: events

El Kilombo Speaker Series: Building Autonomy in a Time of Crisis

Speaker Series: Things Unseen: Building Autonomy in a Time of Crisis

PANEL EVENT: GENTRIFICATION AND THE STRUGGLE AGAINST IT
January 23, 2009 (Friday)
7:00pm, at El Kilombo Social Center
324 West Geer Street, Durham NC 27701
(919) 688-8768
Directions

PANELISTS:
**Speaker I: Glen Ford, Executive Editor of Black Agenda Report, the
journal of African American political thought and action
**Speaker II: Kenneth Saltman, Educational Policy Studies and Research at
DePaul University; author of Capitalizing on Disaster: Taking and Breaking
Public Schools
**Speaker III: Daniella Ann Cook, Post-doctoral Research Fellow in the
Network on Racial and Ethnic Inequality at Duke University; Project
Coordinator for The National Coalition for Quality Education in New Orleans
**Speaker IV: El Kilombo Intergaláctico

SERIES DESCRIPTION:
An enormous political crisis is emerging in the United States, involving
the privatization of public goods, the elimination of public space, the
marketization of political representation, the displacement of poor
communities—in short, the privatization of wealth and the socialization
of misery. All evidence seems to suggest that these watershed
transformations resulting from global capitalism are picking up speed. If
one were to listen to prevalent media discourse, however, the global
supremacy of the US, our dysfunctional party-political system, and the
power of neoliberalism will survive the coming crisis unscarred. The
perspective from below is somewhat different. History teaches us, and the
debacle of the current financial crisis bears out, that the brunt impact of
these changes will fall hardest on working class and people of color
communities. Furthermore, it was from below that the “modern world” was
made possible, and it is here (away from the cameras and microphones of
those above) that another world is already under construction. In this
context, the El Kilombo community speaker series provides us with a space
to think strategically about the struggles that must be continually
developed in the face of this gathering storm. We will examine these
transformations through multiple lenses, in conversation with national and
international guest speakers on issues including: the relation of movements
to electoral politics; gentrification, the logic of racialized power, and
the central importance of territorial control; and the inspiration of
global struggles for dignity and autonomy.

This first event in the ongoing series will address Gentrification and the
Struggle Against It. Keynote speakers are GLEN FORD, co-founder and
executive editor of Black Agenda Report, the journal of African American
political thought and action (www.blackagendareport.com), to discuss the
process of gentrification in city development; KENNETH SALTMAN, Associate
Professor of Educational Policy Studies at DePaul University, and author
most recently of Capitalizing on Disaster: Taking and Breaking Public
Schools, to speak on Obama’s appointment of Arne Duncan as Secretary of
Education, and the role that charter schools play in the displacement of
poor communities; and DANIELLA ANN COOK, the current Postdoctoral Research
Fellow in the Network on Racial and Ethnic Inequality at Duke University,
and Project Coordinator for The National Coalition for Quality Education in
New Orleans (www.ncqeno.com), to speak about the relationships between
school reform and gentrification in post-Katrina New Orleans. A member of
El Kilombo will discuss Kilombo‘s effort to build community in the midst of
Durham’s ongoing citywide gentrification process.

Things Unseen, the El Kilombo Speaker Series, will continue through April
and will include:

Part 2: THE ARTIST AND REVOLUTION
February 19th, 2009 (Thursday)
7:00pm, at El Kilombo Social Center
**Speaker I: Fred Moten, Department of English at Duke University; author
of In the Break: The Aesthetics of the Black Radical Tradition
**Speaker II: Robin D. G. Kelley, Department of American Studies and
Ethnicity; author of Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination and
Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original

Part 3: THE END OF AN ERA: THE NEW UNREST AND THE EMERGING COMMONISM
March 3, 2009 (Tuesday)
7:00pm, at El Kilombo Social Center
**Speaker: Gustavo Esteva, “Deprofessionalized intellectual”; founder of
the Universidad de La Tierra in Oaxaca; author of Grassroots
Post-Modernism: Remaking the Soil of Cultures

Part 4: GLOBAL MOVEMENTS FOR AUTONOMY–EUROPE
April 4, 2009 (Saturday)
5:00pm, at El Kilombo Social Center
**Speaker: Angel Luis Lara, Musician and sociologist; Lara conducts
research at the Universidad Complutense in Madrid