This morning brings confirmation of the inclusion of our gift circle proposal in the upcoming conference ‘Just Do(ing) It, Again: The Politics of DIY and Self-Organised Culture’ which is a ‘day of presentations, workshops, films and discussion about DIY culture and its social, political and economic resonances’ on
Saturday May 11th, 2013 at 1 in 12 Club, Bradford. ()
The context to the event is as follows:
“The first Just Do(ing) It conference happened in May 2011 at S1 Artspace, Sheffield. This second get-together aims to share experiences of, and critically reflect on, alternative, underground and marginal cultural practices with a particular focus on art, music and education. The event will take place at the legendary 1 in 12 Club in Bradford, one of Europe’s longest-running anarchist social centres. Over its three floors there will be a series of presentations, case studies, workshops, discussions and films with themes including ‘DIY, self-organisation and autonomy’. ‘punk and its discontents’, ‘collective case studies’, ‘the gift and poetry as radical gestures’, ‘artistic interventions’, ‘reclaiming labour and artisan production’ and more”
I’m looking forward to working with Ivan and Georgia Mack to run the gift circle for the first time (We’ll be doing it under the identifier of ‘Wur’ which takes our blog collectivity out into the real world, a good feeling) and I think the Symposium will be an interesting audience/group of participants to trial it to, and with. My hope would be for people to experience it at the event and then take it, use it and adapt it within their own communities and networks. The intrinsic simplicity, flexibility and democracy of the gift circle seems to me an ideal means of sharing skills and resources unencumbered by structure or hierarchy and, following some Twitter conversations about creative time banks this morning, has confirmed to me as I walk the dog, that these are our core values that will underpin any gift economy activity that we do, summed up perfectly by Ivan in a follow up comment to his Twitter gift blogost
“An environment (the gift circle) with as simple a structure as possible, means that all parties have to negotiate their own exchanges. They have to make their own judgements of value and discuss those with others. Other systems we have studied to facilitate moneyless exchange seem to have defaulted to hierarchies, structures, and third party brokering, and remain couched in the terminology of financial transactions (eg. timebank). With any systemic change it’s as important to change the semantics and terms of reference as much as it is to try to change the underlying thinking. We also believe that third party brokering of transactions absolves participants of having to relearn the crucial skills of exchange negotiation, doesn’t help to bring people together in communities, and retains the placing of relative values on services or time. The external placing of relative value on exchange is close to a continuation of monetary thinking under a softer guise”
This morning also brings an act of generosity from fellow a-n blogger Marion Michell( www.a-n.co.uk/p/2157883) in the form of a lovely card and beautiful coin cosies. I sent Marion a copy of Issue 1 of my zine Reciprocity () back in December as part of a seasonal give away and Marion has sent me these lovely things in return. I’m so touched, as I love Marion’s work and writing. It’s a good reminder of how supportive and reciprocal the a-n artist talking community is, and what a good thing it has been for me to be part of it.
Finally this morning brings an email bearing good news – my application for an a-n Re;view bursary () been successful.
I am so delighted. This means I have the opportunity to gain formal and structured feedback on these and other projects from experienced practitioners – its going to be so valuable, particularly right now when there is so much going on in the way of projects, conversations, ideas, and collaborations. Thank you a-n!
