My new book, Extinction: A Radical History, is available for pre-order from O/R Books. Here are some endorsements of the book:
“Dawson’s searing report on species loss will sober up anyone who has drunk the Kool Aid of green capitalism. For a bonus, readers will learn a lot from his far-sighted, prehistoric survey of extinction.” —Andrew Ross, author of Creditocracy and the Case for Debt Refusal
“Dawson has summed up the threat to our fellow species on Earth with clarity, urgency and the finest reasoning available within the environmental justice literature. He explains how capital’s appropriation of nature cannot be ‘offset,’ nor solutions found in financialization. Fusing social and ecological challenges to power is the only way forward, and here is a long-awaited, elegant and comprehensive expression of why the time is right to make these links.”
—Patrick Bond, Professor of Political Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and author of Politics of Climate Justice: Paralysis Above, Movement Below
Mongrel Nation surveys the history of the United Kingdom’s African, Asian, and Caribbean populations from 1948 to the present, working at the juncture of cultural studies, literary criticism, and postcolonial theory. Ashley Dawson argues that during the past fifty years Asian and black intellectuals from Sam Selvon to Zadie Smith have continually challenged the United Kingdom’s exclusionary definitions of citizenship, using innovative forms of cultural expression to reconfigure definitions of belonging in the postcolonial age. By examining popular culture and exploring topics such as the nexus of race and gender, the growth of transnational politics, and the clash between first- and second-generation immigrants, Dawson broadens and enlivens the field of postcolonial studies.
Mongrel Nation gives readers a broad landscape from which to view the shifting currents of politics, literature, and culture in postcolonial Britain. At a time when the contradictions of expansionist braggadocio again dominate the world stage, Mongrel Nation usefully illuminates the legacy of imperialism and suggests that creative voices of resistance can never be silenced.
“Elegant, eloquent, and full of imaginative insight, Mongrel Nation is a refreshing, engaged, and informative addition to post-colonial and diasporic literary scholarship.”
—Hazel V. Carby, Yale University
“Eloquent and strong, insightful and historically precise, lively and engaging, Mongrel Nation is an expansive history of twentieth-century internationalist encounters that provides a broader landscape from which to understand currents, shifts, and historical junctures that shaped the international postcolonial imagination.”
—May Joseph, Pratt Institute
Focusing on the complicity of Israeli universities in maintaining the occupation of Palestine, and on the repression of academic and political freedom for Palestinians, Against Apartheid powerfully explains why scholars and students throughout the world should refuse to do business with Israeli institutions. This rich collection of essays is a handbook for scholars and activists.
Contributors include Kristian Davis Bailey, Omar Barghouti, Tithi Bhattacharya, Vincente M. Diaz, Haidar Eid, Noura Erakat, Diane Feeley, David Finkel, Sami Hermez, Rima Kapitan, David Lloyd, Sunaina Maira, Joseph Massad, Nerdeen Mohsen, Nadine Naber, Rima Najjar-Merriman, David Palumbo-Liu, Ilan Pappé, Andrew Ross, Steven Salaita, Malini Schueller, Sarah Schulman, Joan Scott, Magid Shihade, Mayssun Sukarieh, Lisa Taraki, Salim Vally.
Through various examinations of past and current threats to academic freedom, Dangerous Professors investigates the status of such freedom in the aftermath of 9/11. Bringing together scholars in literature, law, and American Studies, the collection of essays seeks to understand academic freedom in historical perspective by focusing on the key documents that have defined its current meaning, and then to analyze the ways in which this concept protects but also limits critical voices on campus. Including essays from academics (Ward Churchill and Robert Jensen) who have been directly involved in recent controversies about academic freedom, Dangerous Professors provides a timely and critical look at the battle over educational curricula and institutions today.
“Dangerous Professors is pertinent, well-executed, and apt to introduce new and helpful perspectives regarding the present meaning and value of academic freedom in the U.S. university system and, by extension, U.S. public and civil society generally.”
—Adam Green, University of Chicago
Democracy, States, and the Struggle for Social Justice draws on the fields of geography, political theory, and cultural studies to analyze experiments with novel forms of democracy, highlighting the critical issue of the changing nature of the state and citizenship in the contemporary political landscape as they are buffeted by countervailing forces of corporate globalization and participatory politics.
Using interesting case studies, the book explores these 3 main themes:
- the meaning of radical democracy in light of recent developments in democratic theory
- new spatial arrangements or scales of democracy – from local to global, from streets protests to the development of transnational networks
- the character and role of states in the development of new forms of democracy
The book asks and answers: are participatory models of democracy viable alternatives in their own right or are they best understood as supplemental to traditional representative democracy? What are the conditions that give rise to the development of such models and are they equally effective at every scale; i.e., do they only realize their radical potential in particular, local places?
In The Routledge Concise History of Twentieth-Century British Literature Ashley Dawson identifies the key British writers and texts, shaped by era-defining cultural and historical events and movements from the period. He provides:
- Analysis of works by a diverse range of influential authors
- Examination of the cultural and literary impact of crucial historical, social, political and cultural events
- Discussion of Britain’s imperial status in the century and the diversification of the nation through Black and Asian British Literature
Readers are also provided with a comprehensive timeline, a glossary of terms, further reading and explanatory text boxes featuring further information on key figures and events.