Above This Ain't The Rosedale Library

Christopher Smith, Clare-Estelle Daitch, Paul Smith, Andrej Ristec, Christian Whitehall, Erik Stewart, Amish Morrell, Luis Jacob (facilitating) Dwayne Shaw, Amelia Potter, Tamara Berger, Mohammed, Alan O'Connor (minutes) Hugh Thomas, Rob Teixeira.

Agenda: Introductions Overview of how we work Reports for each class New courses Toronto Anarchist Bookfair table Note from Sam about Cecil Street Community Centre

(1) Everyone briefly introduced themselves.

(2) Brief overview of the Anarchist U structure. Decisions are taken at general meetings. (Luis)

(3) Brief reports from each class. Alan raised the issue of written work. Chris discussed issue of people who want structure in courses vs. people who are happy without structure. Andrej said people need some guidelines. Chris in hindsight, might have been more structured. Rob's course has 12 people on average. People are very engaged. Rob's course (available on the website) is quite structured. One article on S/M was added following discussion at the first meeting. Readings may be too long or difficult. Maybe one reading a week is enough. Rob is mainly asking questions to move the discussion along-not lecturing. Politics and Media (Sam could not be here today) is more a discussion group based on Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent. Average 10 people. Luis said his group is taking the initiative in such matters as loking for a larger meeting space and photo-copying articles.

(4) Course proposals for Jan 2004. Luis explained the process we use for adopting courses and the basics of taking decisions by consensus.

MODERN HISTORY WORKSHOP: REVOLUTION 1968 (Alan O'Connor)

Accepted. Course summary will drop mention of Russian Revolution course and also explain what happened in 1968.

DADA AND SURREALIST LITERATURE (Christopher Smith)

Accepted in principle for bookfair flyer. Chris will bring a revised outline to the next meeting. In general the outline and summary needs more focus and organization. Less overlap with Chris's current course would be good. The discussion focused mainly about this apparently being a repeat of Chris's current course. It might be good for Chris to select 3-5 books (giving students a choice of 3) and construct a course around these books.

INTRODUCTION TO CHAOS THEORY (Andrej Ristic)

Andrej presented a course which has 5 or 6 weeks of math and the remainder looks at social analysis of chaos. The math is available online at http://www.hypertextbook.com/chaos It requires grade 10 math. The social uses of chaos theory would use the book Howard Bloom, Lucifer Principle.

There was a very lively discussion about the math, about teaching math in a participatory way (is this possible?), and differences in levels of math among those taking the course. Andrej defended the need to have a math component. More time was needed for discussion and Andrej will prepare an outline for next meeting.

IDEAS OF THE SELF and IDEAS OF COMMUNITY (Amelia Potter)

Amelia discussed general ideas for these courses. A more detailed proposal will be circulated at the next meeting.

SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND CULTURAL PRODUCTION (Amish)

Course accepted.

Amish presented a detailed course outline of a relatively theoretical course. Each week there would be discussion of the reading. There might be presentations by participants of difficult readings, but taking some ideas from a difficult text is fine. The course is based on reading and discussion-no writing is expected. (There is a film series at OISE that is relevant.) There was some discussion of the level of difficulty of the texts. Also the usefulness of case studies of actual movements. Amish felt participants could bring this to the course themselves. Perhaps the course outline might signal that some readings are difficult and this may be an advanced course.

QUEER HISTORY (Dwayne Shaw)

List in bookfair flyer. Dwayne to bring an outline (perhaps list of guest speakers) to next meeting.

This is a participatory workshop course on queer history, mainly in Toronto. Topics may include The Body Politc, Stonewall, controversy about public sex, issues of policing, etc.

THEORIES OF SEXUALITY (Rob Teixeira)

Approved. This is essentially a repeat of Rob's current course, which has 10 people on a waiting list for whom there were no space. There may be some changes, perhaps with other people co-facilitating.

(5) We need to organize our table for the Anarchist Bookfair on Sat 25 October (9am). Luis to ask Will Munro about a logo to use for buttons. Luis will design a flyer with January 2004 courses. Erik, Rob, Dwayne and Mohammed volunteered to staff the Anarchist U table on Saturday October 25th from 9 to 4pm.

NEXT MEETING: Sunday 19 Oct at 2:30 pm (Chris to ask This Ain't for use of space again).