5 Caledonian Road
Wed 14 Oct · 19:00 · £163
Taj Ali and Kojo Koram are two of the most truly radical thinkers working in Britain today. They both have great experience as front line organisers but also, on the theoretical level, advance a rigorous and materialist anti-racism, rooted in a Marxist understanding of power and exploitation; that works towards a praxis based on class solidarity. So we are absolutely delighted to welcome them to Housmans, to engage in a conversation around their recent books: Taj’s Come what may, we’re here to stay: The story of South Asian resistance in Britain (Manchester University Press) and Kojo’s The Next Fix:The Winners and Losers in the Future of Drugs (Verso). Come what may, we’re here to stay: The story of South Asian resistance in Britain tells the inspirational story of how the South-Asian community in Britain organised against racism in the past and how it continues to fight in the present. British South Asians have a long tradition of radical political activism. The 1970s and 1980s saw the community grappling with prejudice in the workplace and violence in the streets. But this history is deeper than you might think, from students agitating for independence at the heart of the British Empire to seafarers organising global strikes on the eve of the Second World War. In Come what may Taj reveals how successive generations fought for rights, dignity and a sense of belonging while actively shaping the country they now call home. He shows that British South Asian political life has often been defined less by religious difference than by shared commitments to anti-imperialism and anti-racism. In pursuit of these goals, alliances have been forged with other movements, from Irish republicanism to Black Power. As racism rears its ugly head again, Come what may, we’re here to stay asks: are we doomed to repeat the past or will we learn from our mistakes and build a better world together? From America’s plantation-turned-prison known as Angola in Louisiana to the psychedelic boom of Silicon Valley, Kojo Koram‘s The Next Fix tracks a seismic shift in global drug policy. Kojo —legal scholar and acclaimed author of Uncommon Wealth—travels across five continents to examine how criminalized substances are being rebranded as commodities in a new billion-dollar industry. Legal cannabis dispensaries now trade in what once led to life sentences. Psychedelics have become fertile ground for biotech. But for all these developments, prisons still swell with underprivileged users and addicts, and enforcement falls hardest along lines of race and class. This is not a polemic for or against legalization. It is a powerful, clear-eyed reckoning with how we got here—and what kind of future is taking shape in a world addicted to economic “fixes” every bit as much as it is troubled by drugs. Combining reportage, political analysis and vivid personal testimony, The Next Fix tells the untold story of drugs, capitalism and inequality in the twenty-first century. This is a truly exciting opportunity to see two incredible thinkers in conversation. Please book ahead to avoid disappointment. As always, tickets are priced on a sliding scale. If you are unable to pay for a ticket please do not hesitate to contact us at [email protected], and a free ticket will be made available. If you choose ‘book + entry’ your copies of the book will be available to collect on the evening. If you would like to collect it earlier, or arrange for delivery, please contact us (postage is £2.95). Telephone 020 7837 4473 or email [email protected]. Doors Open at 6:45pm, Event Starts 7:00
Not the same tradition as the lineage above — a genuinely different thread to pull, if you want one.