Workers Solidarity Movement

This is a recording of Stanley Aronowitz speaking on 'Popular Education in a Time of Struggle' to a Workers Solidarity Movement meeting in the Seomra Spraoi Social centre, Dublin the end of March 2009. Stanley Aronowitz is professor of sociology, cultural studies, and urban education at the CUNY Graduate Center. He is also a veteran political activist and cultural critic and an advocate for organized labor.This was part of an ongoing effort to get a Education Workers Network off the ground and the meeting did attract 30+ people which is pretty good for a Sunday afternoon. What was most interesting for me was both the question and the later discussion (in the pub) about anarchism in the US and the question of anarchist organisation. He's actually quite a hard line 'organisationalist' pretty much saying in the talk that those who weren't in an organisation were more properly described as sympathisers with anarchism rather than anarchists.

The talk is pretty informal and starts with Stanley talking about his experiences before moving on to take questions on specific areas. Topics covered include

Occupation of Brooklyn college over student newspaper ban
Being a steel worker & union organiser
Red baiting in the labor movement
Going to the New School
Paul Avrich on schools outside public education system
Struggles in the public school system for alternative schools
The Brecht forum
Murray Bookchin
Workers Centers & the Taxi workers alliance
Workers Education
The Murphy Institute

Q&A
Teaching Plato to working people
Relationship between Pop Ed and revolutionary change
Working class intellectuals
Gramsci
Paulo Freire's
Knowledge Factory
Overcoming codified jargon
Teaching line by line
Hope & Vision
Class formation
Revolutionary organisation & sympathisers
Does pop ed depend on an existing mass struggle
and more

It was uploaded it to indymedia.ie at the end of last week, you can listen to it there at http://www.indymedia.ie/attachments/apr2009/stanleyaron...m.mp3