Remaking Democracy: How We Make the World We Want is a guidebook for social change. It teaches how to analyze problems, consult desires, and design interventions to grow participation as the undoing of fascism.

Word Up presents authors Danielle Chynoweth and Elizabeth Adams in conversation with veteran organizer and multi-instrumentalist, David Friend, performing pieces by Susan Parenti, Mark Enslin, Larry Polansky, and Elizabeth Adams.

In compliance with Word Up Community Safety guidelines, all attendees are encouraged to stay masked at all time.

Recirculation, a project of Word Up Community Bookshop, is located at 876 Riverside Drive (near 160th St.) in Washington Heights, NYC. You can take the 1 train to 157th St., A/C train to 163rd St., and the M4 and M5 to Broadway and 159/160th.

ABOUT THE BOOK

An accessible and practical resource, Remaking Democracy braids theory, assignments, and stories of successful interventions to teach you how to leverage your expertise into a strategy for making social change in your work, organizing, school, or faith life.

Its theory, the Spiral of Change, recombines ideas from Cybernetics, Black Feminism, the Frankfurt School, and experimental arts practice into a methodology to address the problems that matter to you.

Its examples of successful interventions include Indymedia, Illinois Campaign for Prison Phone Justice, The School for Designing a Society, Cunningham Township Supervisor’s Office, Patch Adams and Gesundheit Institute, and the work of care and healing.

Our participation is our power.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Danielle Chynoweth is a media justice and housing rights leader. She works to end homelessness as an elected official. She was the Organizing Director for Media Justice and co-founded the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center. She teaches at the University of Illinois, School for Designing a Society, and internationally.

Elizabeth Adams, PhD, is a composer, teacher, and caregiver who has worked at the intersection of art, education, and organizing for over twenty years. She produces anti-capitalist music concerts, created pop-up political education spaces with Free University NYC, and won historic rent laws with the Crown Heights Tenant Union. She has taught at Columbia University and the School for Designing a Society.

ABOUT THE INTERLOCUTOR

David Friend is a musician and activist based in Washington Heights. With a primary focus on new and experimental music, he performs regularly in major venues and festivals in NYC, across the country, and abroad. He records regularly with a wide variety of collaborators, and was a featured guest artist on Third Coast Percussion’s Steve Reich album, winning the GRAMMY award for chamber music. A passionate educator and unionist, he serves as co-Vice President of ARTS-MSM, NYSUT Local 6498.