I once had an idea of calling a band 'The Madagascar Option' - it's got that exotic, Lemurian feel to it (I like Lemurs and fabled antediluvian civilisations).
Didn't happen in the end though. These little snippets of fascinating revolutionary history and the creative ways in which humans find to reject statism and recover their liberty make me think reviving that name for a band would be even cooler, what with the added anarchist references.
It would be sort of girly post-punk with a generous infusion of Hawkwind methinks. Perhaps with a weird dash of Alien Sex Fiend perhaps.
As for the possibilities of ethnogenesis in this day and age in which the powers-that-shouldn't-be are obsessed with controlling the entire world, and do in fact have the technological means of doing so, It's debatable whether we could break away and establish our own autonomous society without a fight. Even if we didn't want to physically confront the regime. The problem for the regime is that our example would inspire others, until eventually, the domino effect would lead to the collapse of globalism itself. This is, naturally, why American foreign policy has been for so long centred around the destruction of alternate systems of society, socialism in particular...
Still, once the evil empire does collapse, I can absolutely see a lovely new age emerging populated by a wonderfully diverse range of new cultures. So the important thing for us today is to lay down that groundwork, the principles of a new society, and ensure that writing survives - yes, as an intergenerational project which, sadly, we ourselves may not live long enough to see.
But, the knowledge that one will be honoured by one's descendants - that's priceless and beautiful.
Our bodies may not survive, but our souls surely will...
On the other paw, having a small-scale commune in a rural area may well be possible, as that wouldn't really be seen as a threat to the Establishment. We, for example, live in a small rural village in deep France with fewer than 250 inhabitants. There's loads of empty houses and no major conurbations for a radius of around 50km. So if we had loads of money we'd invite like-minded people (anarchists, essentially) to come and populate the village. We'd be pretty much self-sufficient, and anything we did need to import we could exchange for exporting artisan-type products, if those with the skills came to live here. We've sort of dreamed about being able to do that kind of thing, but being totally poor doesn't help. Also, we found out after the 2022 French presidential elections that some 40% of the village voted Macron, and another 40% voted le Pen! Meaning we are somewhat surrounded by fascists.
They didn't tell us that when we moved here...
But yeah, I think there are still spaces for small-scale rejection of the state. It's not exactly ethnogenesis, but it's a seed of it, perhaps...
A fascinating article. Thanks. As an avid reader and quote-er of Pierre Clastres, let's not forget that his book Society Against the State said it all: those hunter gatherer (and even more complex) tribes were organized in such a way as to frustrate any power grab by their chiefs, who owed their position to their ability to resolve disputes, etc. In other words, they were facilitators of group unity. Any chief smelling power for its own sake was either cut down to size or abandoned in the jungle to die. Would that we could put into practice such a thorough understanding of human nature.
I'm ashamed to admit I haven't read Society Against the State yet... but nevertheless I've been very influenced by Peter Lamborn Wilson's idea of "the Clastrian machine"... one of the clearest blueprints for creating an egalitarian society. Brilliant!
p.s. I'm sorry about that formatting problem. That was wrong of me. I feel like I owe an apology. I was being lazy, then procrastinated in fixing the problem...
Thanks for this about the formatting problem. I haven't checked to see if the poem formatting was fixed. I assume it has been. When the time is right I'll send you another poem! And please do read Society Against the State. Peter Lamborn Wilson and I were friends, for both of us this book was so important. For one thing, to my knowledge Clastres was the first to bring Etienne de la Boetie to notice in recent times. A quote about de la Boetie from Wikipedia: "His early political treatise Discourse on Voluntary Servitude was posthumously adopted by the Huguenot movement and is sometimes seen as an early influence on modern anti-statist, utopian and civil disobedience thought."
Well I do not know if the Mayans were anarchists or not, but here is some information on something I do know about their culture which I would suggest is worth consciously integrating into our modern day process of Ethnogenesis.
The post above shares a recipe from my book and some information about the Mayan Milpa crop rotation system, their forest gardens and other soil regeneration techniques developed by indigenous peoples.
I think we have a lot to learn from long term food cultivation systems that align with knowledge of the succession of forest ecosystems and work with fire as a regenerative force of nature.
The Mayan Milpa crop rotation system could be adapted to help accelerate the succession of presently degenerated landscapes and bring them into full level food forest production here in Canada where we have millions of acres of monoculture farmed land that is barely producing now due to the stupidity and arrogance of modern agriculture methods.
Cheers my friend, thanks to your introducing me to the concept of Ethnogenesis I am exploring ancient pathways of cultural divergence/emergence which are being elucidated by paleoethnobotanical studies. This has inspired me to begin envisioning pathways for individuals all over to consciously involve themselves with an ethnogenesis process defined by regenerative ethnoecology.
I once had an idea of calling a band 'The Madagascar Option' - it's got that exotic, Lemurian feel to it (I like Lemurs and fabled antediluvian civilisations).
Didn't happen in the end though. These little snippets of fascinating revolutionary history and the creative ways in which humans find to reject statism and recover their liberty make me think reviving that name for a band would be even cooler, what with the added anarchist references.
It would be sort of girly post-punk with a generous infusion of Hawkwind methinks. Perhaps with a weird dash of Alien Sex Fiend perhaps.
As for the possibilities of ethnogenesis in this day and age in which the powers-that-shouldn't-be are obsessed with controlling the entire world, and do in fact have the technological means of doing so, It's debatable whether we could break away and establish our own autonomous society without a fight. Even if we didn't want to physically confront the regime. The problem for the regime is that our example would inspire others, until eventually, the domino effect would lead to the collapse of globalism itself. This is, naturally, why American foreign policy has been for so long centred around the destruction of alternate systems of society, socialism in particular...
Still, once the evil empire does collapse, I can absolutely see a lovely new age emerging populated by a wonderfully diverse range of new cultures. So the important thing for us today is to lay down that groundwork, the principles of a new society, and ensure that writing survives - yes, as an intergenerational project which, sadly, we ourselves may not live long enough to see.
But, the knowledge that one will be honoured by one's descendants - that's priceless and beautiful.
Our bodies may not survive, but our souls surely will...
On the other paw, having a small-scale commune in a rural area may well be possible, as that wouldn't really be seen as a threat to the Establishment. We, for example, live in a small rural village in deep France with fewer than 250 inhabitants. There's loads of empty houses and no major conurbations for a radius of around 50km. So if we had loads of money we'd invite like-minded people (anarchists, essentially) to come and populate the village. We'd be pretty much self-sufficient, and anything we did need to import we could exchange for exporting artisan-type products, if those with the skills came to live here. We've sort of dreamed about being able to do that kind of thing, but being totally poor doesn't help. Also, we found out after the 2022 French presidential elections that some 40% of the village voted Macron, and another 40% voted le Pen! Meaning we are somewhat surrounded by fascists.
They didn't tell us that when we moved here...
But yeah, I think there are still spaces for small-scale rejection of the state. It's not exactly ethnogenesis, but it's a seed of it, perhaps...
A fascinating article. Thanks. As an avid reader and quote-er of Pierre Clastres, let's not forget that his book Society Against the State said it all: those hunter gatherer (and even more complex) tribes were organized in such a way as to frustrate any power grab by their chiefs, who owed their position to their ability to resolve disputes, etc. In other words, they were facilitators of group unity. Any chief smelling power for its own sake was either cut down to size or abandoned in the jungle to die. Would that we could put into practice such a thorough understanding of human nature.
If you like Clastres, you'll love The Shamanic Trace!
https://open.substack.com/pub/nevermoremedia/p/what-is-the-shamanic-trace-my-mind?r=1dwjsk&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
I'm ashamed to admit I haven't read Society Against the State yet... but nevertheless I've been very influenced by Peter Lamborn Wilson's idea of "the Clastrian machine"... one of the clearest blueprints for creating an egalitarian society. Brilliant!
p.s. I'm sorry about that formatting problem. That was wrong of me. I feel like I owe an apology. I was being lazy, then procrastinated in fixing the problem...
Thanks for this about the formatting problem. I haven't checked to see if the poem formatting was fixed. I assume it has been. When the time is right I'll send you another poem! And please do read Society Against the State. Peter Lamborn Wilson and I were friends, for both of us this book was so important. For one thing, to my knowledge Clastres was the first to bring Etienne de la Boetie to notice in recent times. A quote about de la Boetie from Wikipedia: "His early political treatise Discourse on Voluntary Servitude was posthumously adopted by the Huguenot movement and is sometimes seen as an early influence on modern anti-statist, utopian and civil disobedience thought."
Well I do not know if the Mayans were anarchists or not, but here is some information on something I do know about their culture which I would suggest is worth consciously integrating into our modern day process of Ethnogenesis.
https://gavinmounsey.substack.com/p/sopa-de-lima-yucatan-style-lime-tortilla
The post above shares a recipe from my book and some information about the Mayan Milpa crop rotation system, their forest gardens and other soil regeneration techniques developed by indigenous peoples.
I think we have a lot to learn from long term food cultivation systems that align with knowledge of the succession of forest ecosystems and work with fire as a regenerative force of nature.
The Mayan Milpa crop rotation system could be adapted to help accelerate the succession of presently degenerated landscapes and bring them into full level food forest production here in Canada where we have millions of acres of monoculture farmed land that is barely producing now due to the stupidity and arrogance of modern agriculture methods.
Thanks so much for sharing and for giving me permission to repost.
Here's the link: https://nevermoremedia.substack.com/p/did-the-ancient-maya-practice-permaculture
a few threads I am currently researching which may be of interest to you:
- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27881142/
- https://ethnobiomed.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13002-016-0127-6
- https://www.academia.edu/36536935/Ethnoagroforestry_integration_of_biocultural_diversity_for_food_sovereignty_in_Mexico
- https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/26395916.2022.2160823
- https://agroforestry.org/the-overstory/187-overstory-76-ethnoforestry
- https://www.jstor.org/stable/43956801
- https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Justin-Nolan/publication/259486537_Ethnoecology/links/550846080cf27e990e09ccae/Ethnoecology.pdf
- https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.2993/0278-0771-36.1.215
Cheers my friend, thanks to your introducing me to the concept of Ethnogenesis I am exploring ancient pathways of cultural divergence/emergence which are being elucidated by paleoethnobotanical studies. This has inspired me to begin envisioning pathways for individuals all over to consciously involve themselves with an ethnogenesis process defined by regenerative ethnoecology.