Table of contents:
BOOKS:
- Children’s Literature, Domestication, and Social Foundation: Narratives of Civilization and Wilderness. Routledge, 1st June, 2013.
- Wild Children – Domesticated Dreams: Civilization and the Birth of Education. Fernwood Publishing, May, 2013. Available for order.
NON-FICTION: Anthropology
- Order and the literary rendering of chaos: children’s literature as knowledge, culture and social foundation – doctoral dissertation on the intersection of humanism with anthropogenic destruction of the world that spans ethology, anthropology, epistemology, ontology, and other humanist constructs, 2011.
- The Mythical Predator – a discussion on the nature of human beings, 5th September 2010
- “Beyond the Symbolic and Towards the Collapse” - Introduction to John Zerzan’s series of conferences and workshops in Montreal, May 2008
On childhood, parenthood and learning:
- On Objects, Love, and Objectifications. The Paulinian Compass (refereed scholarly journal), St. Paul University, Manila: Issue #2: June 2009
- Modernism and Education: Revised Perspectives on Meaning, Value and Practice. The Paulinian Compass (refereed scholarly journal), St. Paul University, Manila: Issue #3: November 2009
- Kaleidoscope (creative non-fiction)
On literature and culture:
- Genealogies of Wilderness and Domestication in Children’s Narratives: Understanding Genesis and Genetics in the Untangling of Identity. “The Paulinian Compass” (refereed scholarly journal), St. Paul University, Manila: Vol. 1, No. 4; July 2010
- Response to Critiques of Avatar on Questions of Scientism and Racism - text plus radio talk
Talks, Interviews, and Academic Presentations:
Appearances in media:
Film:
- AnOther Story of Progress – a documentary film on civilisation and resistance by Thomas Toivonen.
Radio, Podcasts, and Print:
- “Domestication, aliénation et civilisation” – entretien en 4 parties par Radio Anticoloniale Dack, Coop Média de Montréal, août – septembre 2012.
- “Interview on education and the student strike in “Quebec”” on Media-Coop. 5th September 2012.
- “Treyvon Martin, Anna Brown, Shaima Alawadi and Civilized Racism” – discussion of the medicalisation of the oppressed and the civilised “othering” by means of constructs of illness and health. Interviewed by Ron from Deep Green Philly, 29th March 2012.
- Anarchy Radio, University of Oregon, Eugene, KWVA. Tue. 7th February 2012. Wylden Freeborne introduces me on the 20th minute mark.
- “The Failure of Civilized Occupy“ – Interview for Deep Green Philly on 8th December 2011 . Excerpt submitted for Occupy Philly Media on 10th December 2011.
- “Primitivism 101“ on Deep Green Resistance Philly, 4th May 2011.
- “Civilize for Food” on BURN, 26th September 2010.
- “Naked Wildness” on BURN, 6th September 2010.
- Anarchy Radio on questions of racism, speciesism, and scientism in critiques of Avatar – 20 minute response on Tuesday 26th January, 2010.
- Interviewed by Andy Lewis for Issue #4 of In the Land of the Living
- Guest on John Zerzan’s “Anarchy Radio“ at KWVA, University of Oregon, Eugene Feb. 2009
- “In Praise of the Wild: Discussion of Jeannette Walls’ “The Glass Castle”: guest speaker at CKUT radio programme: In the Motherhood (mp3 of the programme) plus a response essay.
Guest speaker:
- “First there was the Word, then Came Civilisation: How Fiction Structures the Reality of Predation and Violence” a talk at Shakti Mountain climbing gym, Montreal, Saturday, 29th June, 2013, at 6:30 pm.
- “Qu’est-ce que l’économie civilisée? Recherche sur le principe ontologique de l’effondrement économique et écologique” a paper delivered at HEC, Montreal, Monday, 13th May 2013.
- “How Ivan the Fool Defeats Civilized Pedagogies“, Brown Bag Lunch Seminar series: Community, solidarity, and popular education: Confronting the national security state. Department of Integrated Studies in Education, McGill University, 12:00pm Wednesday, 8th February, 2012.
- “Radical Sustainability, Beyond Green Capitalism: Anarcho-Primitivism, Feminism and Christianity in a Conversation for an Endangered World“, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque 1-2 April 2011.
- “Tell these Stories to your children” – presented at the conference “In the beginning: Anarchism, Christianity, and the roots of resistance“, Jesus Radicals Conference, Portland, OR 6th August 2010.
- Proposed an Open Forum discussion, titled: “Anarchy for All: Expanding the Horizons of Practice Beyond Privilege” shared with Nekeisha Alexis-Baker, John Zerzan, and partly with Wes Howard-Brook “In the beginning: Anarchism, Christianity, and the roots of resistance” conference, Portland, OR 7th August 2010.
- Respondent to “Race, Racism, and the Nation-State: A Christian-Anarchist Perspective” presentation by Nekeisha Alexis-Baker, Jesus Radicals Conference, Portland, OR; 6th August 2010.
- A Lullaby for the Planet: Undressing Ourselves for a Viable Parenthood. New Heaven, New Earth conference; Memphis, TN. 15th August 2009
For a review, see issue 4 of In the Land of the Living by Andy Lewis
- Open Forum: Layla AbdelRahim and John Zerzan respond (total time: 1hour and 51 minutes).
FICTION:
- Kaleidoscope (creative non-fiction)
READING LIST:
Books definitely worth reading
HAUT TRICO:
TRAVEL PUBLISHED ITEMS
Hola Layla,
We were happy to get to know you a little in Albuquerque.
I am particularly interested in the northward movement of growing regions due to climate change. My NY sustainable hardwood forestry/ edible forest project on 120 acres is using climate contingency ecological design approaches to restoration and pre-planting of the forest in preparation for all conceivable rapid change scenarios. I have also been checking out the area around southern Hudson Bay and the shift of hardwood forest types northward. If you happen upon any interesting practical work or publications on that, please let me know.
We hope to meet up again one day. I do my forest work in NY for two weeks every spring and autumn, although not when the baby arrives this coming autumn. All the best, Patrik
[...] Click here to visit Layla’s website [...]
Hi Layla,
I am a big fan of your work and ideas. I am curious about a study you referenced in your Deep Green Philly interview. You mentioned a Finnish economist that looked into the economics of technology etc. It sounded really cool and it is something I’ve thought about looking into myself.
Could you send me the information for the study?
Thanks!
Luke Byrnes
Thank you for your comment, Luke.
The referenced study/life/auto-ethnographer is Lasse Nordlund: http://www.ymparistojakehitys.fi/susopapers/Lasse_Nordlund_Foundations_of_Our_Life.pdf
If you are interested for an indepth discussion of his work, I contextualise and discuss it at length in my research, entitled: “Order and the Literary Rendering of Chaos: Children’s Literature as Knowledge, Culture, and Social Foundation” available in PDF at the library of the University of Montreal (you can find a link to it here: http://layla.miltsov.org/summary/ ).
All the best,
L.
Layla,
I am listening to an interview of yours on anarchy radio. Thank you for passing that article along to me. It was very helpful, very enlightening. Perhaps you can relate to this, but when I read these kinds of texts, a sort of calm comes over me, and I feel like everything is okay, I guess because it confirms in a simple way everything I feel. But then, I go back, and I have to go to work etc. Anyway, it is hard to transition between these ideas, between the wild and civilized epistemology, and I am not sure what to do.
I listened to Ron’s most recent interview with you on Deep Green Philly, and I was so moved. I haven’t stopped thinking about that story about the fat man from the west, and the starving African, and the water… You said, “It was so parasitic.” Maybe for the first time, when I heard you say that, I began to face my parasitism, and how ingrained it is in my behavior and the means of my existence.
I just wanted to write you back and say thank you. You have helped me in the decolonization process. What you are doing is important to me. I hope you keep it up.
Deep Green Resistance is organizing widespread blockades of civilized infrastructure in the U.S. What do you think of that? Can any of the civilized REALLY prepare to go back? Can we give up our cake? I don’t see it, but what else can we do. We have to try to stop it for the sake of the wild, even if most people’s minds have been domesticated. I am curious as to what you think the transformation/revolution/reformation etc. should begin to look like.
Luke