Social and Labour History News

by Jörg Arnold

• offers a new interpretation of the place of the miners in late twentieth-century Britain
• Embeds the story of Britain's miners in an innovative methodological framework that shows how understandings of time were themselves historically contingent
• Uses the methodological framework to challenge teleological readings of late twentieth-century British history
• Reinserts the 1970s into the story of the coal industry, showing that the miners were admired and feared long before they came to be patronised and pitied
• Draws on the rich archival holdings of the National Union of Mineworkers' archive, much of it previously inaccessible, as well as a wealth of other primary source material

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-british-miner-in-the-age-of…;

Rueda, María Alicia. (2024). Luis Emilio Recabarren: Educador Marxista de la Clase Obrera Chilena. Izquierdas, 53.  http://dx.doi.org/10.4067/s0718-50492024000100230. 

http://www.izquierdas.cl/images/pdf/2024/53/art20.pdf

Resumen: El presente artículo ofrece una aproximación filosófica e histórica al estudio de Luis Emilio Recabarren y lo reivindica como un educador marxista de la clase obrera chilena del primer cuarto del siglo XX. En primer lugar, el artículo revisa la historiografía chilena centrándose en el debate en torno a Recabarren como pensador marxista. Basándose en un análisis crítico de los ensayos de Recabarren, se identifica el pensamiento marxista que los cruza y, a través de los textos de prensa, la praxis educativa de Recabarren en las organizaciones y prensa obreras.

«Acronia. Studies in the history of anarchism and radical movements»

https://mimesisjournals.com/ojs/index.php/acronia/index

Decolonizing the History of Anarchism and Radical Movements

Deadline for submission of the abstract (not more than 1,000-1,500 words and a short bio of the author): February 15th, 2025.

The ongoing debates and controversies surrounding the cultural and hegemonic legacies of colonization have emphasized the necessity of re-evaluating the history of labor movements from perspectives that challenge the West's centrality. In recent years, a growing body of scholarship - stimulated by the transnational turn and driven by decolonization and Indigenous movements - has begun to critique and revise the Eurocentric paradigm that has long shaped the historical narrative of anarchism. This research has opened new and promising avenues of inquiry, prompting a reconceptualization of anarchism and the broader libertarian movement, traditionally viewed as an intrinsically Western phenomenon rooted in the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. An expanding body of research focusing on the Global South (among the others those by Benedict Anderson, Maia Ramnath, Ciccariello-Maher, Ole Laursen, Lucien van der Walt, Steven J Hirsch) has provided alternative perspectives to the dominant view that anarchism in these regions was simply an "imported" ideology from the West, passively adopted by local populations. In contrast, these recent studies highlight the originality of anarchist movements beyond Europe, while simultaneously exposing some contradictions within the Western anarchist movements, particularly their occasional alignments with colonialist attitudes and hegemonic cultural frameworks in their interactions with native populations.

A decolonial perspective, therefore, holds the potential to challenge established paradigms and offer a fundamental re-interpretation of the history of anarchist and radical movements on a global scale, while simultaneously raising critical theoretical, methodological, and empirical questions.

The editorial board of Acronia: History of Anarchism and Radical Movements is pleased to announce a call for submissions for its upcoming issue on the theme: Decolonizing the History of the Anarchist  and radical movements. Contributions are invited in Italian and/or English and may explore any aspect of decolonizing anarchist and radical movements . Submissions may engage with theoretical debates, historiographical analyses, reconstructions of specific historical experiences, or examinations of cultural productions.

Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• The experiences of anarchist and radical movements in the Global South
• Theoretical reinterpretations of anarchism from a decolonial perspective
• Anarchy and Indigenous movements
• Interactions between European anarchist refugees and local populations
• The role of anarchists within or in relation to national independence and decolonization movements
• Anarchists as carriers of colonizing cultural ideas and practices
• The intersections of anarchism and racial issues
• Anarchism and Orientalis
• Critique and opposition (or complicity?) of Western anarchisms toward the colonialism of their respective countries.

The editorial board welcomes submissions that contribute to broadening and diversifying the understanding of anarchist history through innovative and critical approaches.

Editor
Pietro Di Paola (University of Lincoln, UK)

For any inquiries, please contact the following address: acronia@mimesis-group.com

Abstract: This call for papers from Cahiers d'histoire. Revue d'histoire critique focuses on left-wing activism in Africa, particularly that which can be considered as revolutionary, underpinned by anti-colonialism and anti-imperialism, from the 1960s, with access to independence, to the 1990s, with the implementation of a multi-party system and the imposition of structural adjustment policies. The aim is to shed light on histories that are often overlooked in academic literature, because they were often lived underground, during the long periods when post-colonial states prohibited multipartyism de facto or de jure. Priority will therefore be given to studies that provide new elements or develop an innovative approach to existing knowledge, whether in contemporary African political history or Africanist political science.

Practical details:

a)    Send an abstract ranging from 400 to 600 words by February 15, 2025 (preferably in French), together with a brief CV and a bibliographical selection that will enable you to situate the author's field(s) of specialization. Please send this to both email adresses : martinmourre@hotmail.com and bianchini@gmx.fr

b) The selection of draft articles will take place during the second half of February.

c) Articles must be completed by July 15, for an issue to be published in early 2026.

The review publishes articles in French; English versions are accepted but will be later translated for publication in French.