Jura Books | Keen for Revolution?  @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/system/system.base.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/system/system.menus.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/system/system.messages.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/system/system.theme.css?oa3l5d");   @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/aggregator/aggregator.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/calendar/css/calendar_multiday.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/comment/comment.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/date/date_api/date.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/date/date_popup/themes/datepicker.1.7.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/date/date_repeat_field/date_repeat_field.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/field/theme/field.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/node/node.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/search/search.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/user/user.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/modules/forum/forum.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/views/css/views.css?oa3l5d");   @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/ctools/ctools/css/ctools.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/modules/taxonomy_access/taxonomy_access.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/themes/bealestreet/style.css?oa3l5d"); @import url("http://web.archive.org./web/20160729184930cs_/http://jura.org.au/sites/all/themes/bealestreet/css/red.css?oa3l5d");   #page { width: 95%; } .topBlock, .bottomBlock, .middleWrapper, #loginWrapper { width : 95%; }  #sidebar-left, .region-sidebar-first { width : 210px; }  #sidebar-right, .region-sidebar-second { width : 210px; }  body { font-family : Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; }           Skip to main content     Welcome Visitor: Login/Register                   Search    Search                               About Bookshop Library Blog Images Audio Events Contact Donate Links           Upcoming events        Dangle Manatee, Slyng Shot, Jimmy Mongrel, Jimmy Lynch and Luke Holmes   05/08/2016 - 6:00pm    MAGRUDERGRIND (USA)+White Male Dumbinance+ShacklΣs+ Controlled+Avian Terror+Morte Lenta   07/08/2016 - 5:00pm to 9:00pm    Jura at the Melbourne Anarchist Bookfair   12/08/2016 - 10:00am to 5:00pm      more       Jura blog  Book reviews: Durruti, Utopia, Workers' Control, and The Death Ship  Don't vote your life away!  Book Review: Wages So Low You'll Freak  Sydney Solidarity Network victory in Leichhardt  Provisional Anarchist Federation Australia formed  Reclaim Ignorance Rally April 4th  More    New books        New books this week at Jura   1 week 6 days ago    All sorts of new titles   1 month 3 weeks ago    New hard core anarchist readings at Jura.   2 months 2 weeks ago    New books   2 months 3 weeks ago    Non violence & the pacific road at Jura   3 months 1 week ago    New titles   3 months 2 weeks ago    Shit load of new titles.....   3 months 4 weeks ago    Exciting new books available at Jura   4 months 3 weeks ago    New books at Jura this week.   5 months 3 days ago    New titles from AK at Jura - Don't forget the Book Sale finishes soon.   5 months 1 week ago      more                MAGRUDERGRIND (USA)+White Male Dumbinance+ShacklΣs+ Controlled+Avian Terror+Morte Lenta     Sunday, August 7, 2016 - 5:00pm to 9:00pm

 MAGRUDERGRIND plays a punishing hybrid of grindcore, powerviolence and hardcore punk. Formed in 2002 in DC and currently based in Brooklyn, MAGRUDERGRIND combines visceral lyrics with a relentless sonic aesthetic. Owing much to the close-knit global DIY community, the band has toured Europe, Asia, and North & South America.

 Playing with:

 WHITE MALE DUMBINANCE (Newcastle)

 SHACKLΣS (North coast)

 CONTROLLED (Sydney)

 AVIAN TERROR (Sydney)

 MORTE LENTA (Sydney)

 $15. From 5pm. 

 This one could get a little hectic... Be here!

  

  » Read more about MAGRUDERGRIND (USA)+White Male Dumbinance+ShacklΣs+ Controlled+Avian Terror+Morte Lenta      Dangle Manatee, Slyng Shot, Jimmy Mongrel, Jimmy Lynch and Luke Holmes     Friday, August 5, 2016 - 6:00pm

 Dangle Manatee are are Glasgow's premier anarcho-absurdo-dada-folk-punk band and they're all set to rumble, rasp, gurgle, and gasp through Australia this August sharing tales of friendnship, beans, theft, pain, dinghies, fridge magnets, anarchy, peas (both frozen and fresh), geese, displacement, ennui, waste, love, violence, passion, and bicycle powerted light bulbs. They look forward greatly to making new pals! https://www.facebook.com/Dangle-Manatee-284999318561/ http://danglemanatee.bandcamp.com/ 

 And Slyng Shot will also be bringing their fem folk scream pretty https://www.facebook.com/Slyng-Shot-354806548018060/

 Also playing will be Jimmy Mongrel, Jimmy Lynch and Luke Holmes.

 All welcome! By donation. 

  

  » Read more about Dangle Manatee, Slyng Shot, Jimmy Mongrel, Jimmy Lynch and Luke Holmes      Book reviews: Durruti, Utopia, Workers' Control, and The Death Ship   Submitted by sid on Fri, 29/07/2016 - 9:30pm   

  

 The Man Who Killed Durruti, by Pedro de Paz

 Why worry about an man who died in November 1936, or about the man who killed him? Perhaps the more important question is 'who is Durruti and why be concerned about him?'. In this intriguing book both of the questions are addressed in two parts. The first is an investigative historical novel about the death of Buenaventura Durruti, in the form of a detective novel that leads to a conclusion about his killer. This section of the book won the 2003 Spanish Jose Saramago International Short Novel Award. The second part is a more straight historical account of Durruti, his actions and ideas, during the Spanish Revolution, and is by Stuart Christie. This second part covers more about Durruti as a person, a militant anarchist worker, an anarchist militia leader, and, overall, a partisan of the Spanish people with an internationalist vision. His death was a turning point in the Spanish Revolution and one of the events that lead to the defeat of the revolution. Half a million people turned out for his funeral in Barcelona, a tribute to the place he held in people's hearts.

  

 The Anthropology of Utiopia: Essays on Social Ecology and Community Development, by Dan Chodorkoff

 This is an interesting book which is a collection of essays that have been printed in various places over the years. What brings them together is a series of important themes: an exposition of the work and ideas of Murray Bookchin, examples of how some of Bookchin's ideas have already (and can be now and in the future) be put into practice, the importance of action to (re-) build community as part of the long term revolutionary project and a defense of Bookchin against the poorly thought-out ideological assaults of his post-modern/'post-anarchist' attackers. All this is wrapped in a major theme of looking at ourselves anthropologically. The parts that I liked the most were about Chodorkoff's and a participant and activist in the Lower East Side of New York, in helping to build community among poor Puerto Ricans in what was then a desolate part of New York. Also, how an academic can support and be a part of change, although admittedly he did this when in the Institute for Social Ecology - a radical/anarchist institute if ever there was one. So many lessons to learn, both positive and challenging, that I've got notes scribbled all over the copy that I read. Well worth getting into.

  

 Ours to Master and to Own: Workers' Control from the Commune to the Present, Edited by Immanuel Ness and Dario Azzellini

 This book is so inspiring and so annoying in so many ways! The various authors come from widely different backgrounds in terms of work, geographic and  cultural location, and ideology. The best aspect is that many examples of attempts at workers' control are covered, from all over the world, although with a less than needed entries from non-European (and its offshoots) areas. So it's a rollikin' read going from workers' revolt to insurrectionary event to factory takeover, and is enjoyable if you don't look too closely into the ideological limitations and biases of many of the authors. So many are just stuck in the nonsense of marxist apologia, here is one example from a look at Russia, 1917-1920: "Some anarchist called for the takeover of factories, but a Bolshevik delegate replied: "control is not yet socialism, nor even taking of production into our hands....Having taken power into our hands, we should direct capitalism along a path such that it will outlive itself..." But no where, in this chapter, in a book about Workers' Control, is there the obvious critique of this marxist nonsense: if marxism is about 'directing capitalism' then it is not revolutionary, and certainly not about workers' control. One look at Simon Pirani's book The Russian Revolution in Retreat, 1920-1924: Soviet Workers and the new Communist Elite, should dispel the illusions that some of these authors have. So, if a reader can keep the rose coloured glasses off, and look critically at its limitations, then the book is a good read.

  

 The Death Ship, by B. Traven

 Traven, not his real name (which was possibly Ret Marut) was a mystery man who shunned fame and notoriety. He always insisted that his work should stand alone and be judged for what it was worth. This novel, his first after escape from his activities during the post WW1 Bavarian German Revolution of 1919, was probably a part biography of his experiences in the deep and dark holds of cargo ships. While the story itself is a great read, like all his other novels, the politics underlying the narrative is not hidden, but not always explicit. He attacked rampant authoritarianism in the form of the state, the boss, the military, religion, and any other of its manifestations that came across his path, or the paths that developed in his stories. Having read it 30 years ago and again recently, I thoroughly enjoyed his writing style and the pace of the action, while giving cause and pause for thinking of the meanings within. An easy read, but a provocative and stimulating one. Am now looking forward to re-reading The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, which was made into a great film with Humphrey Bogart.

  

  » Read more about Book reviews: Durruti, Utopia, Workers' Control, and The Death Ship sid's blog      Don't vote your life away!   Submitted by Stuart on Fri, 29/07/2016 - 9:02pm   The electoral commission's been sending me letters for a while now, demanding I pay a $160 fine for not voting. They've cancelled my driver's licence and sicced their debt collectors Dun & Bradstreet onto me, threatened to steal money from my bank account, or steal my belongings and sell them to pay their debt. Still I haven't given in to this criminal gang, these terrorists known as 'the government.'

 I've lost count of how many letters I've received, threatening me, trying to intimidate me, but I've ignored them all, as I've done for more than 20 years. I stopped voting in the early '90s after I realised that it's pointless. How will they actually get the money out of me?

 It seems the State's repressive apparatus isn't really all that efficient. If they steal the money from my bank account I won't be able to stop them. But my friend said they'll have to get a court order to do that.

 They keep reminding us that voting's compulsory. A lot of people say they vote, or at least get their name ticked off at the polling booth so that they don't get fined. But how well do they actually enforce this law?

 Past generations fought for the right to vote. But not for the State's right to compel us to vote! Voting was made compulsory in Australia in 1924 because of falling voter turnouts. That's nearly a century ago now. Logically the right to vote implies the right not to vote. So it's no longer a right but a duty.

 I suspect there are thousands upon thousands of people in Australia who don't vote, many of whom aren't even on the electoral roll, even though both these things are compulsory. The number's probably rising too, as more and more get pissed off with the system.

 The media tries to whip up enthusiasm for the election by broadcasting the words of politicians. They try to make it seem exciting. Your vote counts! Isn't democracy wonderful? Anything could happen on the day! The most important election since World War II! (Did they say that one again this time?) We have so much freedom! Aren't we grateful to our masters for giving us the right to vote?

 We all know that the promises and words of politicians are worthless. Because unless we're rich enough to give them big donations, we can't hold them accountable. Before the election they pretend to be interested in community issues, but afterwards they don't want to know you.

 Some say to get off the electoral roll. But how do you do that? I've moved 3 or 4 times but they always manage to track me down. Others say to tell them you have a religious objection to voting. But why should I lie? I haven't done anything wrong.

 Each time I voted I felt like a mug after. For getting sucked in to the bullshit. "Come on, you've got to support our friend so-and-so! She's standing for the Greens and you know they do a lot of good work! They're not anarchist but it's a step in the right direction!" Yeah right. Candidates I voted for didn't win, and even if they had, they wouldn't have been able to achieve anything worthwhile.

 Recently the Australian Electoral Commission sent me a warning letter, saying that I may be prosecuted if I don't vote in the 2 July election, and fined up to $180. Well, again I didn't vote in your election on Saturday, 2 July, so suck shit, you pathetic authoritarian bastards!

 I went past Petersham TAFE college on the way to the Jura monthly collective meeting and there seemed to be a polling booth there. I was accosted outside on the footpath by party workers trying to give me their how-to-vote cards. I declined them all and asked whether there was a sausage sizzle. (I'm a vegetarian most of the time but when it comes to sausage sizzles I'm afraid I can't help myself!) Some polling booths have sausage sizzles but, no, this one apparently didn't.

 Seems a polling booth up the road had one. Too bad! Nope, they missed their chance at seducing me with a sausage sizzle. Glad I didn't get sucked into supporting the stupid system of selecting slavedrivers.

 I look forward to a new series of intimidating letters from the AEC.

  

  

  » Read more about Don't vote your life away! Stuart's blog      Book Review: Wages So Low You'll Freak   Submitted by Guest contributor on Sun, 19/06/2016 - 8:54pm   Wages So Low You'll Freak, by Mike Pudd'nhead

 Book Review by Chris

 

 I gave this book to a friend as a late Christmas present. “Just read the first chapter,” I said, “then see if you can stop.” By 3am the next day he’d read the whole thing cover to cover in one marathon all-night session.

 Wages So Low You’ll Freak deserves to be a small classic. It’s one of the best books I’ve read in ages. It covers radical politics and workplace organising in a way that’s honest, often extremely funny, and is totally relatable for young, early 21st century workers bouncing from one precarious, poorly paid job to the next.

 The book is a sprawling, four-year-long, first-person narrative of Mike Wilklow’s attempts to organise a union at Jimmy John’s – a chain sandwich store with about 1,000 outlets throughout the US. At 22, fresh out of college and a recent signup to the Industrial Workers of the World, Wilklow joins his best friend in getting a minimum wage job at Jimmy John’s and sets to work.

 Unlike most conventional unions, the Industrial Workers of the World preaches an ethic of “solidarity unionism.” Rather than aiming exclusively for formal membership and legal bargaining rights, the IWW emphasises collective direct action on the shop floor to build workers’ confidence and win small, concrete improvements, followed by progressively larger actions over more ambitious goals. 

 Thus within a few months, despite representing only a miniscule fraction of the workforce, Wilklow and his co-workers are already taking action. When someone is arbitrarily fired for phoning in sick, dozens of IWW members call up the store to complain, jamming its phone lines and causing chaos while a handful of workers confront the boss together. When a new store manager takes over and begins sexually harassing staff, workers start a petition and get him fired. And when a supervisor in one shop punches out a union supporter for cutting a sandwich diagonally rather than straight across, every single person in the store stops work and gets that supervisor fired as well. Between 2007-2010, the battle on the shop floor rages back and forth until each of the ten Jimmy John’s stores in Minneapolis – where Wilklow is living and working – have a large number of union supporters in them ready to publicly declare their IWW membership and take on the company on a much larger scale.

 There’s so much that I liked about Wages So Low You’ll Freak. For one thing, it’s just a great story. While the emphasis is on Wilklow’s attempts to organise a union, it also reads as something of an autobiography of four years of his life, bouncing around between demeaning minimum wage work, basement punk gigs, hook-ups, breakups, protests, parties, binge drinking, gambling and bike culture. The writing is really sharp and accessible, and the book is consistently entertaining and funny.Wilklow is also pretty honest about himself and his own flaws. The book opens with a bizarre piece called “Why Happiness?” which he wrote as a 23-year-old, and each chapter includes a short entry from the diary he kept during the campaign. He also does a good job of depicting himself as an inexperienced, often immature early-twentysomething: he stuffs up repeatedly, says the wrong things, does the wrong things, can’t hold relationships together, is stubborn, talks too much, and is constantly hung over. But he has no trouble admitting all of this and is relentlessly self-deprecating. 

 Probably the most valuable thing about this book, though, is that it’s one of the only accounts of a union organising campaign that I know of which has been written not by an academic or a labour scholar or a paid union organiser, but by an actual participant who was there every day on the shopfloor. Union membership in Australia has plummeted from 56% of the workforce in the mid-1970s to less than 15% today, and the experience and cultural memory of rank-and-file workplace organisation has been almost totally lost. For that reason alone, Wages So Low You’ll Freak is incredibly useful and important: you can learn a lot about how to organise your own workplace just from reading it, not mention gain a lot of confidence about what it’s possible to achieve.  In this light, the book’s setting in the unorganised, minimum wage service industry is pretty perfect, and the author solidly emphasises workplace organising that is under the control of workers themselves, without the interference of paid union organisers or bureaucrats.

 For all these reasons I think Wages So Low You’ll Freak is a really enjoyable and valuable read. You can order it online from Microcosm Press and copies are also sold here at Jura Books in Sydney.

  

  » Read more about Book Review: Wages So Low You'll Freak Guest contributor's blog            Opening hours      Thurs: 2-7pmFri: 2-7pmSat: 12-5pmSun: 12-5pm

 

 Where is Jura Books?

  

 Keep in touch

 Our monthly email newsletter has upcoming events, news and more: Subscribe | Archive

 Follow us: Facebook | Twitter

  

  

 

 Jura is solar powered!

  

 Jura Books is on the land of the Wangal people of the Eora Nation. The Jura Collective acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the Land and pays our respect to Elders past and present. We support the ongoing struggle of Aboriginal people for land rights, self-determination, and justice.

  

 A note on accessibility: The lower level of Jura (the bookshop area) is accessible for people using wheelchairs or with other mobility impairments. However the library and toilets are up steep flights of stairs. We can move most meetings and events downstairs upon request.

                          Address: 440 Parramatta Rd, Petersham, Sydney, Australia. | Phone: 9550 9931 | Email: Jura[at]Jura.org.au