SECOND SCREENING OF BEYOND WALLS DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND

Hosted by THE NEW INTERNATIONAL BOOKSHOP and FLAT OUT

5:30pm for a 6pm start.

Community, we invite you to join us for a community film screening and conversation about Beyond Walls, a collection of short documentaries that examine prison abolition from a wide range of perspectives with the hope of inspiring people to imagine and take action toward a world invested in community and not punitive practices.

Beyond Walls is an organizing initiative that uses documentary films to define and amplify what prison industrial complex (PIC) abolition means, and inspires people to imagine and take action toward a world without policing. Beyond a goal of simply changing hearts and minds, these five short films empower communities with concrete tools and actions they can take to help create a world without police and prisons.

The event is co-hosted by the New International Book Shop (NIBS), one of Melbourne's longest running leftist book shops and community spaces and with Flat Out Inc, a support service for women, trans and gender diverse people 9and their children) who are criminalised by our state.

When: October the 26th, 5:30pm for a 6pm start.

Where: The New International Bookshop, basement of Trades Hall - 54 Victoria Street, Carlton.

Cost: FREE (please RSVP)

Speakers: Flat Out Inc

For those who want to continue building towards a world without prisons and police, there will be resources available on how to get involved and take action in the community, as well as organizations who can answer questions.

Learn more about Beyond Walls: bit.ly/Beyond-Walls

Beyond Walls was curated by Center for Political Education, Critical Resistance, MPD150, and Survived + Punished

Accessibility note: this event will take place in the back room of NIBS, located within the Trades Hall Building. This room is only accessible down a flight of stairs.

Join us at Victoria Trades Hall for a panel discussion of wartime experience on Wednesday July 12th at 6:30pm.

The panel discussion will explore the wartime experiences effect on generations and what wartime experiences mean to us now. This is especially important to discuss in the wake of opposition to the AUKUS military pact.

The major discussions will evolve around Australia's involvement in different wars, The Frontier Wars, The Iranian experience in the Afghanistan War, Nagorno-Karabakh war and the anti-AUKUS movement.

Speakers:

Lidia Thorpe: Lidia Thorpe is a Djab Wurrung Gunnai Gunditjmara woman and Independent Senator. She is a long-time fighter for the black sovereign movement.

Jerome Small : Jerome Small is Socialist Alternative's national industrial organiser. He is a long-time anti-war and anti-racism campaigner.

Diana: Diana is a volunteer at NIBS who is currently studying space science.

Sina: Sina is a volunteer at NIBS, interested in discussing the effects of the Nagarno-Karabakh war.

Hosted by our volunteer Asha.

Tickets:

https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/wartime-experience-what-do-they-mean-to-us-now-tickets-662704265297?aff=oddtdtcreator

Join Dr Terry Leahy for his discussion of 'Degrowth and Marxism'' at NIBS on the 1st of July at 5:30pm.

The discussion will focus on the relationship that the degrowth movement has to eco-socialism and to Marxism more broadly, understanding capitalism's growth as an environmental problem and how degrowth theory and practice is open to be taken up by people with a variety of alternative post capitalist systems in mind - such as gift economy, radical reformism and eco-socialism.

Dr Terry Leahy is a leading voice in Naarm's degrowth movement, and has written extensively about degrowth, system change and permaculture. He is currently the host of the 'System Change Made Simple' podcast. His most recent book is 'The Politics of Permaculture' (2022) published by Pluto Press.

Our Big Red Book Fair is back with more quality books and great discounts!

Saturday June 17th 9am-5pm

Upstairs of Trades Halls and in NIBS (54 Victoria street, Carlton).

Now accepting drop off donations and can arrange pick ups.

The New International Bookshop’s ‘The Big Red Book Fair’ is back with more quality books and great discounts.

A day long radical event filled with comrades not fighting over politics, but instead fighting over that rare Gramsci book. Spend your Saturday browsing books with book lovers.

Come along to meet our beautiful nibs volunteers who are the backbone of the new international bookshop.

We will have:

Upstairs- thousands of second hand books of all genres for a flat rate of $3.

Special marked fiction books flat rate of $2.

Upstairs and in store- bundle deals of journals.

In store- we will have 15% off all new books.

Join us at NIBS as we explore the cultural legacy of the Black Panther Party through a viewing of The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975.

Come along to The New International Bookshop at 6 pm on Thursday June 1st for a screening of Goran Olsson's 2022 documentary The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975.

We will be showing this archival documentary exploring the political and cultural impact of the Black Panthers. The film consists of found footage taken by a Swedish television crew in New York City between 1967 and 1975 and features interviews with the likes of Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael and Huey P Newton. Combined with contemporary commentaries, The Black Power Mixtape explores the longstanding legacy of the party and explores the events leading to its creation.

This film will be part of a series exploring activist histories and organising techniques and we would love to invite anyone with an interest in radical history to come along.

Accessibility note: this event will take place in the back room of NIBS, located within the Trades Hall Building. This room is only accessible down a flight of stairs.

https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/the-black-power-mixtape-1967-1975-screening-tickets-628946264207?aff=ebdsoporgprofile

Join us at The New International Bookshop 

Cohosted by The SEARCH Foundation 

Free drinks and Nibbles: 6pm-6:30pm

Book Talk: 6:30pm-8pm

Speakers include: Kado Muir and more to be announced.

‘Yeelirrie 50 years of resistance’ is a collection of powerful stories and contributions about a community who have fought off three multi national mining companies over five decades under 11 Governments in a fierce effort to protect cultural heritage, the environment and to keep uranium safe in the ground.

For more than 50 years, a small but determined community in WA’s Northern Goldfields has fought to protect their home and their heritage from the threat of uranium mining. Now, their story is being immortalised in a new book to be launched in Perth later this month.

This story is a timely reminder that land is sacred, nature is sacrosanct and determination to stand up and fight for culture and environment can triumph against the most insurmountable odds. Be inspired by the power of community action, be educated and share this journey of hope and resistance.

About the book and Yeelirrie:

‘Yeelirrie 50 years of resistance’ is the incredible true story behind Western Australia’s longest and most bitter battle to prevent the mining of uranium in our state. It is the story of how three multinational mining companies tried – and failed – to dig up one of Australia’s largest uranium deposits, 650 km northeast of Perth.

Yeelirrie is a highly significant cultural placefor the Traditional Owners who call the surrounding areas their home. It is part of the Seven Sisters Songline, rich with important cultural sites, many of which are kept secret from outsiders.

“Mining uranium at Yeelirrie, we’re going to stop it. That’s the story for the Seven Sisters... the old people told me that story and I don’t want that mine to go ahead” said Shirley Wonyabong, a Tijwal Elder who grew up at Yeelirrie Station.

The area’s cultural significance is matched only by its environmental significance. Below the surface of the proposed mine site, a 17-kilometre-long aquifer and labyrinth of caves is home to approximately 100 species of subterranean animals known as stygofauna. Many of these tiny creatures don’t occur anywhere else on earth.

Above ground, the dry and dusty red landscape is dotted with spinifex and low-lying plant life, home to vulnerable species like the malleefowl, princess parrot and the greater bilby.

In total, the nine-kilometre open pit required for mining uranium at Yeelirrie threatened to lead to the extinction of between 11 and 15 native species, according to WA’s Environmental Protection Authority.

“We identified 55 species of stygofauna - including amphipods, beetles, syncarids, and copepods - and 45 species of troglofauna - such as spiders, pseudoscorpions, isopods, millipedes, and insects”, said Shae Callan, a subterranean fauna zoologist who was involved in a subterranean fauna survey at Yeelirrie between 2009 and 2011.

“We found only five species were known beyond Yeelirrie: in other words, 95 per cent of Yeelirrie’s subterranean fauna species had been sampled nowhere else in the world.”

While the latest proposal to mine at Yeelirrie – by Canadian company, Cameco – expired in January last year, the threat of uranium mining has not disappeared completely, and the community is wary of where the next threat might come from.

“Yeelirrie is taken from the word yulara which means to weep, like weeping in mourning. It is a place of sadness, of death and mourning. People shouldn’t go there. We were told not to go there.”  Kado Muir.

Book TIX: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/yeelirrie-50-years-of-resistance-book-talk-tickets-616842932817?aff=odeimcmailchimp&mc_eid=04ddb67b9e&mc_cid=a85f017585 

Wednesday 24th May
6:30pm-8pm
NIBS Backroom doco screening


In 2017, with the support of an extraordinary grassroots movement, British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn came close to becoming prime minister. The establishment trembled. Britain stood on the threshold of huge political change. But within three years all, it seemed, was lost.  What happened and why?

Produced by award-winning radical film-maker Platform Films, with contributions from Jackie Walker, Ken Loach, Andrew Murray, Graham Bash and Moshe Machover, and narrated by Alexei Sayle, this feature-length documentary film explores a dark and murky story of political deceit and outrageous antisemitic smears. It also uncovers the critical role played by current Labour leader, Keir Starmer and asks if the movement which backed Corbyn could rise again.

https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/oh-jeremy-corbyn-big-lie-australia-premiere-tickets-618793095807?aff=odeimcmailchimp&mc_cid=a85f017585&mc_eid=04ddb67b9e

A VERY RARE 20th ANNIVERSARY SCREENING OF A HISTORICAL EVENT

This doco has only been screened on two occasions during the 10 year anniversary in 2013 and is not availbe online.

Thursday 20th April 6:30pm-8pm

Speakers: to be announced

Hosted by the New International Bookshop, BOX4 and the SEARCH Foundation.

The doco captures the events leading up to and including the 18th, 19th, 20th and 21st of April 2003, where activists from around Australia converged on the Baxter Detention Centre in the South Australian desert to protest the imprisonment of refugees in harsh and isolated circumstances.

The 2003 action was in the aftermath of the 2002 Woomera refugee detention centre breakout, with activists trying to replicate the action that successfuly undermined the state's treatment of refugees, and was followed by further action in 2005.

Over 500 people camped out and faced police oppression in order to highlight the injustice of imprisoning refugees in such a harsh and isolated conditions in the South Australian desert.

Over three days various activist actions took place which accumulated in an attempt to get close to the refugees which resulted in a number of arrests.

The protest action was successful in gaining national media attention to the plight of the imprisoned refugees in the Howard/Ruddock era.

*Event promo image photographed by John Immig and sourced from State Library SA Archive

Friday 31st March

6:00pm-7:30pm Catalyst Social Centre 144-146 Sydney Road, Coburg 

Cohosted by Melbourne branch of Labour History.

Join authors Evan Smith, Jayne Persian, Vashti Jane Fox and Jeff Sparrow in the launch of ‘Histories of Fascism and Anti-Fascism in Australia’.

Histories of Fascism and Anti-Fascism in Australia:

Edited By Evan Smith, Jayne Persian, Vashti Jane Fox

Histories of Fascism and Anti-Fascism in Australia provides a history of fascist movements and anti-fascist resistance in Australia over the past century. In recent years, the far right has become a resurgent force across the globe, resulting in populist parties securing electoral victories, social movements organising on the streets, and acts of right-wing terrorism. Australia has not been immune to this. However, this is not merely a recent phenomenon; it has a long history of fascist and far-right groups and individuals. These groups have attempted to situate themselves within the wider settler colonial political landscape, often portraying themselves as the inheritors of a violent and exclusionary colonial past. Concurrently, these groups have linked into globalised anti-communist and white supremacist networks. At the same time, Australia has often seen resistance to fascism and the far right, from the political centre to the far left. Covering the period from the 1920s to the present day, and featuring insights from historians, sociologists, and political scientists, this book provides the most detailed account of this fascinating and important topic. This book will be of interest to students and activists with an interest in the extreme right and anti-fascism as well as Australian history, politics, and society.

Reviews

"This is an original and timely book with a stellar line-up of scholars. While research on the far right and fascism in Australia has grown over the years, anti-fascism and resistance have remained under explored and this book fills this significant gap magnificently."

Aurelien Mondon, University of Bath, UK

"This collection brings together the leading authorities on fascism and anti-fascism in Australia with a new generation working in the archives. It challenges our inherited understanding of the militant anti-fascism of the 1930s, and the early movements against the White Australia immigration regime. Lively and accessible, it documents the immediate predecessors to the racial populists of our own times, and the generations who resisted them."

David Renton, author of No Free Speech for Fascists

"In a world where right wing extremism continues to flourish, this history of fascism and anti-fascism is both timely and illuminating. There is an impressive depth of empirical research together with insights drawn from global fascism and anti-fascism studies, and it’s all told with clarity and style. The chapters, by both well-established and emerging scholars, explore in depth the shifting relationships between extremist and mainstream political movements. A key theme is the manner in which Australia’s distinctive forms of racism – expressed in Indigenous and immigration policies, public discourse, and popular culture – have shaped its historical experience of fascist ideas and movements. Histories of Fascism and Anti-Fascism in Australia also explores the achievements as well as the limitations and failures of anti-fascist movements in the past, making for a multi-faceted and nuanced work of history with both scholarly and practical value."

Ann Curthoys, Professor Emerita, Australian National University, and co-author with Shino Konishi and Alexandra Ludewig of The Lives and Legacies of a Carceral Island: A Biographical History of Wadjemup/Rottnest Island

Leading up to the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq,​ NIBS will screen a doco of the huge 2003 anti-war protest in Melbourne.

Wednesday 15th March 6:30pm-8pm
NIBS back room 

BOX4 and NIBS present a rare screening of the 20th anniversary of the huge Melbourne rally on Febuary 14th, 2003.

In the lead up to the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq (March 19, 2003)​ NIBS will be screening a rarely seen documentary of Melbourne's biggest ever rally with 150,000 demonstrators: The February 14th, 2003 protest to stop the invasion of Iraq.

The protest focused on​ the Australian resistance​ to joining the American led 'Coalition of​ the​ killing'​, ​the fear of innocent civilians being killed in Iraq​, whether Iraq was even involved in the 9/11 attacks on the US, the question of the existence of WMDs in Iraq, and the possibility of the war escalating into a nuclear conflict.

​Leading figures of the anti-war movement featured in the documentary include:

Bob Brown (senator & Leader, The Australian Greens)

Natasha Stott-Despoja (senator, Australian Democrats)

Leigh Hubbard (Secretary, Victorian Trades Hall Council)

Michelle O’Neill (Victorian Peace Network)

Sharon Burrow (President, Australian Council of Trade Unions)

Damien Lawson (Victorian Peace Network)

Maria Vamakinov (Federal MP, Australian Labor Party)

Rachel Evans (Socialist Alliance)

Hillary Harper (3CR broadcaster)

Starlady, Captain America (on stilts!)

After the screening of the documentary, we'll listen to a few speakers (to be announced) who attended that historic day​. ​

The screening of the film and subsequent talks takes place on Wednesday, March 15th at 6:30pm-8:00pm.

TICKETS https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/doco-screening-20th-anniversary-of-the-huge-iraq-war-protest-in-melbourne-tickets-557578230497

The book exposes the injustices embedded in Australian settlement history, and the culture of denial of so called Australia

Trades Hall Quilt Room

NEW DATE
Tuesday 14th March 6pm-7:30pm
Kate Auty joins us in discussion about the untold story of the Forrest River Massacre
In conversation with Barry Jones
About the Book:
A powerful investigation that reveals the deep injustices inflicted on Aboriginal people in the Kimberley in the 1920s.
In June 1926, a posse of police officers and white civilians murdered at least twenty Oombulgurri people at Forrest River in the Kimberley. After the massacre, a conspiracy of silence descended. Witnesses vanished. Charges against two of the officers were dropped for insufficient evidence.

One of the massacre’s perpetrators was Bernard O’Leary, a former soldier whose land holding was known as ‘the underworld’. At the 1927 Royal Commission into the killings, O’Leary was portrayed by his lawyer as a simple honest backwoodsman who was framed. In this powerful account, Kate Auty argues that O’Leary was in fact ‘vicious, brazen and a bullshitter’, with ‘a propensity for brutality’. Although never charged, he played a leading role in the murders, and his duplicitous testimony thwarted the commission’s work.

In electric prose, Auty depicts O’Leary as a merciless killer, while the apparatus that concealed his crimes is portrayed with great realism and clarity. Driven by both forensic and moral judgement, the book exposes the injustices embedded in Australian settlement history, and the culture of denial that has prevented truth-telling in this country.

‘A major contribution to the study of frontier massacres in Australia’ —Lyndall Ryan

Read Review by Celeste Liddle

See less

Join us at NIBS 5:30pm for drinks and 6pm start

Speakers are Diane Kirkby, Author

Rae Frances, President of ASSLH ( the Austn Society for the Study of Labour History)

and Paddy Crumlin, MUA National Sec. and ITF President.

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/maritime-men-of-the-asia-pacific-book-launch-tickets-467302754117

Key Features of this book launch talk:

• Brings the Asia-Pacific into focus at the forefront of labour internationalism

• Placing Australian Unionism in a context of global activism for maritime labour rights

• Shows the complexities of pursuing internationalism and reaching beyond racist and Cold War Ideologies

• Blends legal, labour and social history within a transnational frame

Maritime workers occupy a central place in global labour history. This new and compelling account from Australia, shows seafaring and waterside unions engaged in a shared history of activism for legally regulated wages and safe liveable conditions for all who go to sea. Maritime Men of the South Pacific provides a corrective to studies which overlook this region’s significance as a provider of the world’s maritime labour force and where unions have a rich history of reaching across their differences to forge connections in solidarity. From the ‘militant young Australian’ Harry Bridges whose progressive unionism transformed the San Francisco waterfront, to Australia’s successful implementation of the Maritime Labour Convention 2006, this is a story of vision and leadership on the international stage. Unionists who saw themselves as internationalists were also operating within a national and imperial framework where conflicting interests and differences of race and ideology had to be overcome. Union activists in India, China and Japan struggled against indentured labour and ‘coolie’ standards. They linked with their fellow-unionists in pursuing an ideal of international labour rights against the power of shipowners and anti-union governments. This is a complex story of endurance, cooperation and conflict and its empowering legacy.

We invite you to an intimate conversation with director of Bendigo Street, Jasmine Barzani, including a short preview screening of the film.

Book tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/bendigo-street-documentary-fundraiser-launch-tickets-441413528747

At a moment of historic housing precarity, this documentary seeks to show the relevance of direct action and the fight for public housing in Melbourne, and beyond, through first-hand accounts of those involved.

WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT

$20,000 in 20 days!

The Bendigo Street documentary film is a peer produced fully independently funded film made my people who were directly invovled in the campaign. Because of grant requirements and red tape, funding opportunities for new filmmakers promoting social justice issues are few and far between. This is why we need your help!

From November 17th to December 6th the creators of the Bendigo Street Documentary are launching a fundraising campaign to raise $20,000 to help fund the feature length film!

Donation link at Documentary Australia:

RSVP preferred as seating is limited.

ABOUT THE EVENT

20min: film plays

30min: Q&A

30min: drinks and mingle

ABOUT THE FILM

Squatters who launched the 2016 Bendigo Street housing occupations expose our current urban landscape as the battleground between the denizens of Naarm and the married forces of capitalism and settler-colonialism.

The 2016 Bendigo Street campaign was a political protest that involved the occupation of over 15 government owned houses that were compulsorily acquired for the defunct East-West Link highway project.

On 31 March 2016 we occupied 16 Bendigo Street and immediately made national headlines, forcing the Andrews state government into an embarrassing confrontation. Soon after its inception, the protest drew the attention of the Wurundjeri and Kulin Nation community who helped us expose the myth of the contemporary housing crisis. For them, housing deprivation and homelessness began with European invasion in 1788.

A 20 minute short version of the film tells the story of of resistance, community, power, autonomy and diversity. A story that demands our attention in times of increasing housing insecurity, political regression and despair. A story that is a testament to the power of saying enough is enough, no more waiting for failing governments to provide our needs– we can take matters into our own hands!

With your help a 60 minute feature film can be completed to tell this inspiring story about Naarms political history! Your funds will help include an interview with uncle Larry Walsh, Izzy brown and Megan Fitzgerald in the final film.

For more information about the film visit: https://www.bendigost.com

Join us at NIBS to hear from John Watts and Simone Marsh discuss "Nine Lives For Our Planet."

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/nine-lives-for-our-planet-tickets-439392182847

About the book:

This book is series of short biographies telling of the lives of nine inspirational women. Of the many others he could have chosen, he has selected these nine because, on the face of it, they have little in common. Seventy-two-year-old, private-school-educated Anne Kennedy could be perceived by those who meet her as being a rather conservative, upper middle-class grazier. What, the reader might ask, could she possibly have in common with someone such as Carly Phillips, who has locked on to trees, fracking equipment, and coal loaders – and been arrested several times in the process. And what could Carly have in common with the devoutly Catholic mother to seven children, Dom Jacobs, or with environmental lawyer and member of the NSW Parliament Sue Higginson.

What the book does is to not just explore the women’s environmental activities, but also delves into their lives and backgrounds so the reader might understand how and why they became so concerned about environmental destruction and were so motivated to act.

The book explains that activism comes in many different forms and that community action is often essential to protect the environment from corporations and governments It may well involve locking on to destructive equipment but, as shown by people like Queensland Public Service whistle-blower Simone Marsh, and OH&S consultant Shay Dougall, it covers a much broader range of activities. Local woman Linda Gill spent many years as a Great Lakes Councillor working within the system for better environmental outcomes while Jo Evans has used her skills as a graphic artist to fight against the rapacious coal seam gas industry.

All nine women have been prepared to talk openly and frankly about the most intimate details of their lives, including sharing some very personal incidents and events. Many of the women’s stories touch on other important social issues such as suicide, sexual molestation, drug taking, mental illness, religious and child fostering, and Judi Summers discusses how she and her husband extracted themselves from a closed sect.

This info was sourced from https://manningcommunitynews.com/2022/07/nine-lives-for-our-planet/

Reviews:

A deeply moving account of courage, integrity, and compassion – from the stories of nine remarkable women. Be inspired, enraged, moved to tears and astonished by their life experiences. Women who have fought against injustice and corruption on many levels.

Having worked alongside some of these brave, dedicated friends, and colleagues, they have survived the gravity and intensity of their campaigns, keeping a strong and determined focus against all odds. It comes at a cost. This book is for women who continue to stand up all over the world. Thank you for your care, commitment, and love. Together, we are a powerful voice.

Julie Lyford OAM – Chair Women’s Environmental Leadership Australia

One of the important aspects of this book is that the author has not concentrated on the rich and famous – but on those who genuinely contribute to our collective life.

As I read the book, I became more and more interested in the absolutely fascinating early histories of these women who have all been very open about the problems in their younger lives; their sometimes-torturous family relations and their difficult economic conditions.

It’s fascinating to read about their lives as they pick up the various skills and passions they need for their later environmental activity. With their differing talents, they have variously worked behind the scenes, or acted as whistleblowers, or as frontline soldiers.

Meredith Burgmann AM – Former President of the NSW Legislative Council, author, and activist

Book launch in Meeting Room 1, Trades Hall, Melbourne plus live stream.

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/book-launch-the-new-theatre-edited-by-lisa-milner-in-person-event-tickets-428204690757?aff=ebdssbdestsearch&keep_tld=1

Speakers: Lisa Milner, Cathy Brigden

Singer: Bruce Watson

Yarns from the New Theatre with Margret Roadknight and others

The event is free but registration is essential. Hybrid in person and online event. This is the in person registration page.

The book will be available at a discount price of $35 (RRP $40).

For the first time, this unique collection of essays brings the stories of New Theatre branches around Australia, filling a vital space in Australian cultural history. Radical left-wing theatre history tales, told by theatre practitioners, historians, academics and political ratbags, reveal a rich vein of Australia’s hidden cultural heritage. New Theatre advocated for freedom and democracy, aiming to activate audiences politically, and create authentic, non-commercial Australian drama by telling the hidden stories about the real lives of working-class people.

"The New Theatre played an important role in the struggle to provide socially engaged theatre and to legitimise radical thought, satire and dissent on the Australian stage. This comprehensive analysis covers the colourful ways they brought theatre to working-class audiences, the important role of women and the methods employed by government, ASIO and others to suppress dissent. After 90 frequently controversial years, it seems that New Theatre is respectable at last!"

Rosean McNamara, President Sydney New Theatre

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT info@interventions.org.au

Join us online for an American and Australian discussion of 'Art and Activism: Reimagining An Alternative World'.

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/art-and-activism-reimagining-an-alternative-world-tickets-439411289997

Ben Juers and Stephanie McMillan will be in discussion about how art and activism can forge an alternative society and prompt discussions within our communities. The two artist will delve into the questions surrounding the importance and ability of art and activism.

This will be an online zoom event with Stephanie McMillan's selected books and prints available for a sale price on the night (lasting one wee). Join the online zoom event to receive the promo codes or come to NIBS that week to purchase for the sale price.

The event will be recorded and posted on YouTube. If you are unable to attend, you can email Maddie your questions at nibscoordinator@gmail.com and she will direct these to Stephanie and Ben to answer on the night.

AUS 9:30 PM

USA 6:30 AM

Zoom link will be sent one week prior or after you have registered via Eventbrite.

About Stephanie:

Love the Living; Fight the Machine!

"I make art about two main topics:

1. Social transformation away from class divisions and toward a truly sustainable future

2. Adorable funny plants and creatures, inspired by encounters where I live in Fort Lauderdale, Florida (traditionally Tequesta territory)

In both cases, my art is about connecting with one another in our common desire for a world without exploitation, oppression, extraction, objectification of living beings, and ecocide (which is omnicide, more accurately)."

About Ben:

Ben Juers is a cartoonist based in naarm/melbourne. He co-runs Glom Press and is a member of Workers Art Collective.

NIBS volunteer Sam will be interviewing Kath on her new book "Staging a Revolution" in the back room of NIBS.

Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/staging-a-revolution-in-conversation-with-kath-kenny-tickets-433228868207

In her latest "Staging a Revolution", Kath Kenny paints a vibrant picture of cultural life in the 1960s and 70s through a scholarly analysis of Melbourne's revolutionary theatre group 'The Pram Factory'. Set against the backdrop of moratorium marches, inner-city cafes and share houses, and the rising tide of sexual liberation and countercultural movements, Kath Kenny recreates a vital moment in Australia's political and cultural life, and questions why the great cultural renaissance of women's liberation has been largely forgotten.

Kath Kenny is an essayist, arts reviewer and researcher. Her book Staging a Revolution will be published by Upswell Publishing in 2022. Her writing has appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald, ABC, Meanjin, The Monthly, The Saturday Paper, The Guardian, and numerous other publications, and she recently contributed the lead chapters to the anthologies #MeToo: Stories from the Australian Movement and Fashion: New Feminist Essays.

Join Anitra Nelson in conversation with Lucy Myers about their new book Beyond Money: A Postcapitalist Strategy.

About this event

Join Anitra Nelson in conversation with NIBS volunteer Lucy about their new book Beyond Money: A Postcapitalist Strategy. Nelson’s book is a truly radical engagement with the ways in which money shapes our lives and maintains its grip on our theorisings of a better future in all its anti-racist, feminist and anti-capitalist forms, and how necessary it is to conceive of a world beyond money in order to conceive of a truly better future. Anitra is a powerhouse in thinking about degrowth and about Marx, this is due to a truly thought-provoking and interesting evening.

Book tickets via Eventbrite here.

Join us at NIBS for a drink at 5pm, with the conversation starting at 5:30pm and allocated time for discussion. Copies will be available to purchase on the night.

If you can’t make it in-person, you can join us via Zoom, link to be added closer to the event.

Watch Anitra’s short film 'Yenomon', based on the book here!

The NIBS book club recently read Beyond Money in their meetings, if you’re interested in seeing what books the club reads and more information, have a look here.

Read more about the book here:

What would a world without money look like? This book offers a lively thought experiment of a world without money. Nelson shoes how money drives political power, environmental destruction and social inequality and argues for it to be abolished, rather than repurposed, to achieve a postcapitalist future. Grounded in historical debates about money, Nelson draws on a spectrum of political and economic thought and activism, including feminism, ecoanarchism, degrowth, autonomism, Marxism and ecosocialism. Looking to indigenous rights activism and a defence and advance of commoning, an international network of activists engaged in a fight for a money-free society emerges. Beyond Money shows that, by organising around post-money versions of the future, activists have a hope of creating a world that embodies radical values and visions.

Book Launch Refugee Week:

Acts of Cruelty: Australia’s immigration laws and experiences of people seeking protection after arriving by plane

by Aileen Crowe (Palaver 2022).

Date: Tuesday June 21st   

Time: 6 – 8pm

 Upstairs of Vic Trades Hall Meeting Room 1 (54 Victoria street, Carlton)

Acts of Cruelty will be launched by Nyadol Nyuon

Aileen Crowe will be in-conversation with Ms Nyuon, a lawyer and human rights advocate, Maria O’Sullivan, Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law and Deputy Director, Castan Centre for Human Rights Law, Monash University, and Pamela Curr, refugee advocate.

Conversation chaired by Suresh Sundram (Professor of Psychiatry, Monash University).

RSVP here: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/acts-of-cruelty-book-talk-tickets-345142880647

About the book:

Acts of Cruelty: Australian Immigration Law and Experiences of People Seeking Protection After Arriving by Planedocuments the complex, drawn out and harsh legal procedures and historically racist and toxic immigration culture that await people arriving by plane and subsequently seeking refugee status in Australia. This story has hitherto been under-represented because of the more notorious offshore detention policies of successive Australian governments for people arriving by boat. In this book, research by Dr Aileen Crowe, a Franciscan nun and refugee advocate, provides both detailed insight into the lived experiences of such would-be migrants and the tortuous tangle of often harsh, punitive immigration processes and laws which they must navigate at their peril. The author’s support and advocacy role brings her close to individuals and families attempting to escape numerous forms of persecution in their own countries as they confront further trauma in seeking Australia's protection. The book is an important and challenging document for potential migrants and asylum seekers, politicians, lawyers, students of international relations, and the general public internationally.

Big Red Book Fair 
 

Artwork by our lovely volunteer Munro 

Saturday June 18th 9am-5pm 

Upstairs of Trades Halls and in NIBS (54 Victoria street, Carlton). 

The New International Bookshop’s ‘The Big Red Book Fair’ is back with more quality books and great discounts. 

A day long radical event filled with comrades not fighting over politics, but instead fighting over that rare Gramsci book. Spend your Saturday browsing books and drinking radical coffee with book lovers. 

Come along to meet our beautiful nibs volunteers and amazing radical coffee baristas who are the backbone of the new international bookshop. 

We will have:

Upstairs- thousands of second hand books of all genres for a flat rate of $3. 

Upstairs- radical media (poster, prints, etc) for sale. 

Upstairs and in store- bundle deals of journals. 

In store- we will have 15% off all new books. 

$2 raffle tickets (or 3 for $5): Prize is a new nibs radical shirt of your choice and NIBS $30 gift voucher. 

Radical Coffee will be serving food and coffee all day. 

We will be accepting book and radical media donations until the 17th June. If you would like to donate books, please email maddie at nibscoordinator@gmail.com

A new abridgement of Marx and Engels’s 1846 reckoning with the philosophical tradition, edited and with an introduction by philosopher Tom Whyman.

join us via zoom for a conversation between Tom Whyman and Lucy Myers.

Book will be available on the night for delivery or pick up in store.

About the book:

Edited and with an introduction by philosopher Tom Whyman, this new abridged version The German Ideology sheds new light on one of the most difficult, disputed texts in Marx’s oeuvre.

Written in 1846 and subsequently abandoned by Marx and Engels, only to be rescued in the 1930s by researchers in the USSR, The German Ideology is the high point of Marx’s philosophical thought: a brilliantly insightful, still thrillingly radical work of materialist philosophical therapy. Yet there remains no wholly satisfactory stand-alone version in English, with only a heavily abridged 1970 edition edited by C.J. Arthur, or a facsimile edition taken from Vol. 5 of the Marx-Engels Collected Works, which does not include satisfactory scholarly notes, currently available.

In this new Repeater Classics edition, Tom Whyman seeks to remedy this. By expanding on generally-available abridgements to include the bulk of the section on Max Stirner, as well as amending the translation, adding notes and providing a new critical introduction, this new edition of The German Ideology will allow non-specialists to engage with this critical work for the first time.

At a time when interest in Marx's work is increasing, as people look for an alternative to our currently failing political system, this new edition of The German Ideology will bring Marx's most substantial vision of what communism might actually be like to a whole new audienceMaddie NIBS is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: The German Ideology

Time: May 17, 2022 06:00 PM Australia/Melbourne

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86133315723?pwd=MGFvR2ZUUy9EU0t4dTVFZC9VbTFZdz09

Meeting ID: 861 3331 5723

Passcode: 791522

Thursday 24th March

5:30 pm – 7:00 pm
 

Rowan Cahill and Jeff Sparrow in conversation about “The Barber Who Read History”.

Rowan Cahill and Jeff Sparrow discuss the new book “The Barber Who Read History” and the issues that arise in the book.

Join us at NIBS for a drink at 5pm.

Book available here: https://nibs.org.au/onlinebooks/pre-order-the-barber-who-read-history
Or on the night
About the book:
Essays in Radical History:

Sometimes people read history and are overwhelmed.

They discover a nightmare past of conspiracies and duplicities

Only the doings of powerful people are recorded.

They conclude that history has no room for people like them.

In these essays, Rowan Cahill and Terry Irving show that a knowledge of history can make people want to act in order to make history.

The authors criticise mainstream history for its top-down certainties. Instead, they see history from the bottom-up, acknowledging the productivity and creativity of working people.

They argue for a radical history that reveals uncertainties and challenges, leaving everything, including the future, open.
 

Wednesday 9 March

5:30 pm – 7:00 pm
 

NIBS volunteer Alex Nylén-White in conversation with Maame Blue about Blue’s book “Bad Love”. Blue will also be doing a reading of her book. 

Join us for a drink at 5pm.

Book available for pre order here: https://nibs.org.au/onlinebooks/twnlm9hnp4l8ro6y0wx9g0hmfl5gxq 

Or on the night. 

Maame Blue is published by award-winning independent Jacaranda Books. Jacaranda is committed to publishing ground-breaking writing with a dedication to creating space on the bookshelf for diverse ideas and writers. jacarandabooksartmusic.co.uk. 

About the book: 

A young woman living in London, Ekuah loves deeply and loves hard, yet with each romantic encounter she is left feeling increasingly unmoored and adrift. She struggles in her love for Dee Emeka, a gifted musician, who is both passionate and distant in the way he loves her back. Confirming her worst fears about the unstable foundation of their relationship, he suddenly disappears from her life. Heartbroken, she is left to pick up the pieces, while searching for new validations and preoccupations from others.

But when, against a backdrop of enigmatic, poetic, nights in London, Venice, Accra and Paris, she finds an unexpected new love in the form of Jay Stanley, Ekuah re-focuses on her journey to meaningful love. She is determined to feel deeply again, but can she handle the vulnerability and forgiveness that comes with falling in love?

Hosted by NIBS volunteer Sophie
Terry Leahy in conversation with Lucy Myers
Thursday Feb 17th 5:30pm - 7pm

Nibs is hosting Terry Leahy for the Politics of Permaculture Book Talk.

Join us at 5PM for a drink. Book available on the night. 

About the book:

'Inspiring. [...] Crammed with lively interviews and grounded examples' Ashish Kothari, founder of Kalpavriksh

Permaculture is an environmental movement that makes us reevaluate what it means to be sustainable. Through innovative agriculture and settlement design, the movement creates new communities that are harmonious with nature. It has grown from humble origins on a farm in 1970s Australia and flourished into a worldwide movement that confronts industrial capitalism.

The Politics of Permaculture is one of the first books to unpack the theory and practice of this social movement that looks to challenge the status quo. Drawing upon the rich seam of publications and online communities from the movement as well as extensive interviews with permaculture practitioners and organisations from around the world, Leahy explains the ways permaculture is understood and practiced in different contexts.

In the face of extreme environmental degradation and catastrophic climate change, we urgently need a new way of living.

NIBS Turns 25 

Book Ticket Here https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/quarter-century-of-nibs-in-conversation-with-jeff-sparrow-tickets-217288986207

Must be fully vaccinated to attend this event.

15th December 6pm-730pm Meeting Room 1 Trades Hall
Upstairs from NIBS

Naarm's / Melbourne's radical left bookshop turns 25. Jeff Sparrow discusses his new book "Crimes Against Nature" with former NIBS coordinator Seb Prowse. 

Join us to celebrate NIBS turning 25 this December.
Former NIBS coordinator Seb Prowse will be in conversation with Jeff Sparrow about his new book "Crimes Against Nature: Capitalism and Global Heating." This book will be available at the event.
Celebrate the NIBS volunteers, the community at NIBS and of course the radical left ideas. We hope to see you all there.

Jim Crosthwaite will also speak to the history of NIBS. Current volunteers will speak about their experience at NIBS. 
Drinks, nibbles and books available for the night.
More info to come closer to the date.

About the book:
Crimes Against Nature uses fresh material to offer a very different take on the most important issue of our times. It takes the familiar narrative about global warming - the one in which we are all to blame - and inverts it, to show how, again and again, pollution and ecological devastation have been imposed on the population without our consent and (often) against our will. From histories of destruction, it distils stories of hope, highlighting the repeated yearning for a more sustainable world.

In the era of climate strikes, viral outbreaks, and Extinction Rebellion, Crimes Against Nature moves from ancient Australia to the 'corpse economy' of Georgian Britain to the 'Kitchen Debate' of the Cold War, to present an unexpected and optimistic environmental history - one that identifies ordinary people not as a collective problem but as a powerful force for change.

About the Author

Jeff Sparrow is a writer, editor, broadcaster, and Walkley award-winning journalist. He is a columnist for The Guardian Australia, a former Breakfaster at Melbourne's 3RRR, and a past editor of Overland literary journal. His most recent books are Fascists Among Us- online hate and the Christchurch massacre; Trigger Warnings- political correctness and the rise of the right; and No Way But This- in search of Paul Robeson. He lectures at the Centre for Advancing Journalism at the University of Melbourne.

NIBS, Interventions and the SEARCH Foundation launch Wayne Murdoch‘s book “Mystery of the Handsome Man” The Double Life of John Lempriere Irvin as part of the Queer Oz Folk collection.

This is an online only event. Zoom link to be provided after registration.

Join Wayne Murdoch and Christos Tsiolkas in conversation

Register here: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/mystery-of-the-handsome-man-tickets-168044225803

About the book

Ranging from the convict settlement of Port Arthur, to the social heights of colonial Tasmanian Society, the goldrush towns of Ballarat and Bendigo, and the ballrooms of Marvellous Melbourne in the 1880s, this stranger-than-fiction book recounts the strange-but-true story of JL Irvine (1847-?). Banker, sporting champion, bon vivant, clubman, committee member, and friend to the colonial elites of Tasmania and Victoria, he was also a man with a secret; a secret that would occasionally lead him into the half-light of the Victorian underworld, and a secret that would ultimately lead to his downfall, disgrace, and disappearance.

Meticulously researched, written in a lively and engaging manner and lavishly illustrated, this is the story of colonial Australian society, both its glittering heights and its shadowy depths.

This event is ONLINE

Thursday August 19th 6:30pm 

Register in advance for this meeting:

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMtcO6przkrGdB_8yjroy8uNCrc15TcfL8B

Speakers: David Brophy - Author, and University of Sydney Academic

Chris Breen - Solidarity

Chair - Alex - NIBS volunteer

Coordinator Maddie will be selling books at the event. 

Co-hosted by Solidarity and the New International Book Shop

University of Sydney Academic, David Brophy's new book argues that Australia is in the grip of a 'China Panic'. This has been driven from the top levels of Australian society, with new 'foreign interference laws', Home Affairs Department boss Mike Pezzullo telling staff “the drums of war” were beating louder, and Defence Minister Peter Dutton warning a war against China over Taiwan should “not be discounted”. The China Panic has led to a wave of anti-Asian racism.

Brophy argues that Australia's ‘get tough on China’ rhetoric can only be understood in the context of Australia's role in the region and its strategic alliance with the US, and is 'a prescription for a sharp rightward turn in Australian politics.'

This meeting will discuss the tensions with China, the imperial conflict that produces them and what we can do to oppose them.

Call Geraldine on 0458 039 596 for more info

The launch of 'The Crime of Not Knowing Your Crime. Ric Throssell Against ASIO.'

NIBS (nibs.org.au), Interventions (www.interventions.org.au) and SEARCH Foundation (www.search.org.au) event.

Written by Karen Throssell with contextual essay by Phil Deery.

This book will be launched by Jeff Sparrow.

29th July 6pm-8pm

ONLINE ONLY. See below for link

Registration required.

About the book:

'My grandmother was one of Australia’s greatest novelists, my grandfather won the Victoria Cross for gallantry and my father was hounded all his life as a spy.

This is a three generational story. It’s about my life; it’s about my father, Ric; it’s about my grandparents, the writer Katharine Susannah Prichard and the war hero Hugo Throssell. It’s a study of the psychology of spies and those obsess about them, a narrative of guilt and innocence told through poetry, prose and historical documents. It’s a tale from another time – but one with obvious relevance, given how regularly governments rely on fear and scapegoating today.

Let me tell you what was done to my family. '

Endorsement

“Through entwined poetry and prose, Karen Throssell illuminates ASIO’s persecution of her extraordinary family. In the post 9/11 era, too many Australians have forgotten what happened in the Cold War. That’s why this story matters”.

-Jeff Sparrow, writer and broadcaster

About the Author:

Karen Throssell

Karen Throssell is an award-winning writer and poet, with five poetry collections and a book of creative non-fiction The Pursuit Of Happiness (1988). She has also published in journals and anthologies including Overland, Westerly, Meanjin, Quadrant, Hecate and Artstreams. Karen was shortlisted for the 2017 Book of the Year Award – Poetry (Society of Australian Women Writers) and an earlier version of The Crime of not knowing your Crime was shortlisted in 2017 for the Dorothy Hewett award for works of creative non-fiction. Her work reflects her commitment to radical politics, literature and feminism.

Phil Deery

Phillip Deery is a Cold War historian. His books include Red Apple: Communism and McCarthyism in Cold War New York (2014), The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History with Documents (2017) and Sparrows and Spies: ASIO and the Cold War in Australia, 1949-1975 (2022). He is an Emeritus Professor of History at Victoria University.

Maddie NIBS is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: The Crime of not knowing your crime

Time: Jul 29, 2021 06:00 PM Australia/Melbourne

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84794031977?pwd=MEVjdVRVYkxUZHBHb1Yxd0lRakY5Zz09

Meeting ID: 847 9403 1977

Passcode: 433712

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