Closed for Construction Work, Monday August 24th & Tuesday August 25th

We will be closed this Monday, August 24th. The DPW is going to be completing the sidewalk construction work & will be paving right in front of our door. As such, we're going to be pretty inaccessible for the day. See you again on Tuesday.

Update: looks like we're going to be closed for most of Tuesday the 25th as well. We may be open later today when the cement dries. Please call ahead before visiting: (413) 253-5432.

Local-washing

The Corporate Co-opt of Local by Stacy Mitchell, author of Big-Box Swindle, is an excellent article concerning the recent attempts by various corporations to appropriate the idea of "buying local".

Corporate local-washing is spreading well beyond food. Barnes & Noble, the world's top seller of books, has launched a video blog site under the banner "All bookselling is local." The site features "local book news" and recommendations from employees of stores in such evocative-sounding locales as Surprise, Ariz., and Wauwatosa, Wis. The vlog seems designed to disguise what Barnes & Noble is—a centralized corporation where decisions about what books to stock and feature are made by a handful of buyers—and to present the chain instead as a collection of independent-minded booksellers.

Across the country, scores of shopping malls, chambers of commerce and economic development agencies are also appropriating the phrase "buy local" to urge consumers to patronize nearby malls and big-box stores. In March, leaders of a campaign in Fresno, Calif., assembled in front of the Fashion Fair Mall for a kickoff press conference. Flanked by storefronts bearing brand names like Anthropologie and The Cheesecake Factory, officials from the Economic Development Corporation serving Fresno County explained that choosing to "buy local" helps the region's economy. For anyone confused by this display, the campaign and its media partners, including Comcast and the McClatchy-owned Fresno Bee, followed the press conference with more than $250,000 worth of radio, TV and print ads that spelled it out: "Just so you know, buying local means any store in your community: mom-and-pop stores, national chains, big-box stores—you name it." . . . read full article

(via metafilter)
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see also: Starbucks Goes Stealth with Unbranded, "Local" Cafes

Farewell Northland Poster Collective!

If you have been to our store you have no doubt seen the colorful posters decorating the walls above our bookshelves. The majority of these came from the vibrant Northland Poster Collective, who have been providing radical and progressive communities with amazing and powerful artworks for the past thirty years. Sadly, they are now closing up shop. While it is easy to identify the failing economy as the direct reason, they also note a larger context that should give one pause:

There's a bigger story that is worth noting that has to do with the way the cultural struggle for a better world is carried out. In short, the right wing is very aware that political power grows out of people's beliefs and hopes and dreams and they support their cultural warriors unstintingly. Our side thinks in terms of "issue campaigns" and leaves its cultural workers to work second jobs or take out mortgages to support their projects. We may wish to rethink this strategy.

There is a lot of painful truth being voiced here.

Food For Thought Books Collective would like to express our deep gratitude and solidarity with the people of Northland Poster Collective. Thank you all so much for all you've given us, for all the creativity you manifested & inspired. We wish you all the best in your future endeavors.

Green Apple Books Videos

The gents at Green Apple Books of San Francisco have been putting out a steady stream of silly yet entertaining "commercials". Check it out:

Save New WORLD Theater!

We at Food For Thought Books Collective would like to strongly voice our support for and solidarity with New WORLD Theater.

As many of you have probably already heard, the University of Massachusetts has suspended all funding for New WORLD Theater and laid off their staff. While it is true that the economy is currently a difficult one, it is no reason to sacrifice what has been one of the most dynamic, diverse, and visionary programs of the whole Fine Arts Center at UMass. Not only that, we also stand to lose such essential youth programs as Project 2050.

How lucky have we all been to have these programs here in the Valley? Where else do we find anything like them? They are critical sites for the creation & production of new ways of knowing, of being and creating. We cannot let them disappear. For three decades they have imagined and struggled and given us all so much. Now is their time of crisis and it is time to stand with them - in gratitude, in respect, and in solidarity.

Please check out the Save New World Theater Facebook page to see how you can help and please offer them your support today.

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• New World Theater's Artistic Director Andrea Assaf's thoughts on the suspension of NWT's funding.
  
  
• Amherst Bulletin: Curtains for novel theater
  
  
• New World Theater certainly helps to bring money into UMass, doesn't it?

Think again chum!

Check out this great new video from The Regulator Bookshop.

Shopping on the web and consider yourself "green"? Think again chum! You may just be breeding an ecological disaster in your own backyard...

Closed for Inventory: July 6th & 7th

We're going to be CLOSED for inventory this upcoming Monday, July 6th and Tuesday, July 7th. We're going to be counting books and counting books and, then, we'll probably do some book counting. And then we'll count the cards, and bumperstickers, and buttons and pretty much every other little thing in the store. It's so much fun we can hardly stand it. That's why we close the store: to keep the fun to ourselves.

As such, what we won't be doing is answering the phone or opening the door. Unless you come with home-baked cookies. Then we will let you in. But only then, ok? Basic chocolate chip are fine with us but feel free to get fancier if you feel the urge. :)

See you again on Wednesday!

Arts for Social Change- A reading with Beverly Naidus

Beverly Naidus is an artist, activist, educator, and writer and has had her work exhibited internationally in venues including the Institute of Contemporary Art in London, the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York City, the Brooklyn Museum, and the Armand Hammer Museum at UCLA. She recently completed her third book, Arts for Social Change, and came to the store this past Wednesday to share her work with us.

It was an inspirational night and it was an honor to have been able to host her here at Food For Thought Books.

Welcoming Beverly was easy, after all, she was down to earth, socially-conscious, and joyfully invested in doing her share to create a more just and utopic society. She told stories from her heart that called on ancestors and history to affirm the need for art as a tool for social change and healing. Through her storytelling we saw Beverly’s commitment to art for social change as her life-long practice and the high value she places on socially conscious eco-art practices. Having struggled with environmental illnesses in her lifetime, her personal experience serves as a powerful yet vulnerable place from which to educate.

Beverly presented a power point presentation with slides from her book and discussed practices that she’s found critical to the arts for social change movement. Along with slides of her own work Beverly presented artists such as Ana Mendieta, Esther Hernandez, Common Threads Artists, Beth Ferguson, Fred Wilson and images taken from her class’ work. Beverly’s extensive knowledge was intriguing and her storytelling was easy to follow yet reflective and containing depth. The work she does as an educator is creative and joy-filled healing work, yet it challenges her students to be analytic and think critically of oppressive systems and institutions.

During her presentation Beverly cited art practices she’s encouraged her students to explore as they create their own work. One such practice “Culture Jamming”- taking images that we are familiar with in a consumer based society and re-writing or inserting a subversive alternative image- has served as a platform for response from her students to mainstream consumer messages and products. For example, her students creatively used this method to respond to issues such as body image and bottled water.

She discussed her current position at University of Washington, Tacoma, co-creating a program on Arts in Community, with a focus on arts for social change within the Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences Program. Working primarily with non-traditional students she explores the topics that are most interesting to her. Her courses include Eco-Art, Labor Globalization & Art, and Body Image & Art. As she spoke her passion, excitement and the importance of these topics shone through.

“We really need to be doing a lot of education if we want our species to survive… It’s important to look at what is bad but it is also really important for us to vision what we want this world to look like”, she stated with regards to her goal in teaching art for social change. She has found value in her teaching practice as a platform from which she can support her students as they find the stories within them and are inspired to change the world through art. It is apparent that working from a place of hopefulness and joy is critical to Naidus in all of her work and, as a result, her students seem to be thriving in their exploration of art and social justice.

In her closing she read this quote from her book:

I have had a sense of mission in writing this book, a sense that many activists own, what we are running out of time, and, in this time that we have, we have to convert hundred of thousands of other artists to this calling. This has to be a diverse movement of artists if it is going to work and it will have to be sneaky, smart and effective. Artists will have to make work that helps to make their own stories emerge. With each unfolding on a person’s story, a life becomes less alienated; a person becomes more connected to the whole. We have to be persistent and patient, open-hearted and ruthless in our risk-taking. We no longer have the luxury of waiting generations. Our window of opportunity is only open a small crack, and we need to stretch it as far open as possible. And remember that we don’t need to do this work with painful intensity that will scare aware potential joiners. We need to do it with a joyful sway of our hips, with the pleasure of knowing that we have given our all.

Even if you missed the event, I encourage you to come by the store, pick up her book and explore her life work. Check out her website: Arts for Social Change for more resources including links to some of the artists featured in the book and her course syllabus.

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Interested in reading the book? Order it via our website!

Community Donations on Hold for the Summer

For years now, the Food For Thought Books Collective has had an expressed commitment to supporting community efforts through monetary and in-kind donations. Over the course of the past year, our donations program supported many community efforts that work to expand access to social services and promote social justice including the Youth Action Coalition, Sunderland Public Library & PTO, the Prison Birth Project, Prison Book Project, the South Amherst Conservation Association, the Justice for Jason Legal Defense Fund, and Grace House.

Our commitment to supporting social justice organizations that are making a positive impact in our community extends beyond our donations program. This past year, we began organizing events that Celebrate Resistance through music, poetry, and visual art, while raising hundreds of dollars for organizations such as Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) and the Palestine Israeli Education Project. We are also building sustainable collaborative relationships with several social justice organizations in our community such as the Prison Birth Project, Fertile Ground Schools, and the Women of Color Leadership Network—offering them space for meetings and events, and promoting their work in our window, event calendar and website.

The recent recession, however, has not left us unaffected. Like many, we are finding it necessary to tighten our belt a notch or two in the hopes of offsetting the last several months of slow and declining sales. As a result, we have decided to put a hold on all our donations until the end of August, while we assess the state of our finances, evaluate the most effective way to support our community, and begin developing a plan for sustaining Food For Thought Books well into the future.

We appreciate your patience and understanding in this situation. We are confident that we will make it through this rough patch and look forward to working with our community to building a just and sustainable economy that ensures prosperity for all.

Prison Birth Project Benefit

There will be a benefit fundraiser later this month to help support one of our favorite local groups: The Prison Birth Project. Check it out:

Secret Cafe: June 27th 2009 - 6:00pm
Come enjoy a delicious dinner prepared and served by members of The Prison Birth Project. Located in a cozy backyard with outside seating, candles, music and drinks!
Seating at 6pm and 8pm.

What better way to spend a summer night? Hope to see you there!

For tickets & more information: The Prison Birth Project - Secret Cafe

Food For Thought Books Reunion Today

We're having a reunion today at the store of all the folks who have worked here at Food For Thought over the past 33 years. See the recent post Erika made just below for more info.

We'll be closed for regular business hours but will be open at 7:30pm tonight for a party open to all. There'll be good food, good conversation & good music. Please come! We'd love to see you there.

Summer hours at Food For Thought Books

We'll be switching to a reduced schedule for the summer (June to mid-August). Hours will be 11:00am to 6:00pm, daily.