Announcement and Call for Submissions! Oak: A Journal Against Civilization

A call to participate in a new anarchist journal, entitled, Oak, from an anti-civilization perspective.

There is no food that means more to me than the acorn, for the acorn fulfills both a promise and a fantasy: that the forest will provide for me.

– Samuel Thayer

Issue 1: Perpetual Apocalypse – Spring 2020

Few things are as breathtaking as a forest of oak and its many expressions. The incredible symphony of falling acorns — a harbinger of bounty and community. For millennia the acorn has provided food for humanity and countless other species. The promise and resilience of the oak stands as a reminder of possibility. It’s likely that for thousands of years fires were set, not just to create areas for game, but to preferentially seed oak trees. It seems fitting that we should show homage to the ubiquitous oak by celebrating it in our title.

Since I can remember there’s been unceasing division within the anarchist and anti-civilization milieus, both at large and in my immediate experience. It seems we’re always knives first, taking aim at the comfortable targets a few degrees away from us. While I’m all for good sparring practice, I believe the connections must remain if we are to survive and thrive.

The possibility of maintaining an intimate and dynamic meshwork of communication is real. In the wake of civilized life, finding someone — anyone — who also chooses to reject the dominant paradigm of perpetual nightmare should be exhilarating. There will always be lines to draw, many of them are already drawn for us by the active overlords and domesticators. But many other lines are blurry at best and, given our context, meaningless at worst. Too many disagreements in the digital age end in snarky division articulated via electronic communication, a pathetic reality not worthy of our once-wild selves.

So here, in Oak, we will attempt to let those divisions fizzle in the ether of the internet. We may still draw lines and gnash teeth in these pages, but it will be in the realm of action — the realm of articulated living — that we will brandish our weapons, both literal and figurative.

The battles ahead are more meaningful than suffixes and prefixes added for personal identification; words will be spoken out loud that make the clattering disagreements coming through keyboards and illuminated screens seem less than petty. The world is literally dying. Some form of it will always exist; the wild, the uncontrollable will always prevail. But until that time when we are dust and bones, I hope we can tie our meshwork of personalities and ideas together, spar as needed, and realize some semblance of a world (perhaps many different worlds) without civilization.

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We are looking for all relevant works to the anti-civilization and anarcho-primitivist discourse. All submissions will be reviewed with care and with the intent to publish as many as possible, working directly with authors over any editorial concerns.

Oak will be magazine format, hopefully with available funds for at least a color cover. The exact format will be determined based on the scope and content of submissions, as well as available funds. Oak will operate with the goal of being interesting to the passerby and attractive to the inquisitive. Currently Oak is scheduled as a bi-annual.

In addition to print, each issue will be produced as an audiozine. We are looking forward to curating interviews, readings, music and much more in a multi-episode production of each issue.

Please submit any work by November 30^th, 2019 or get in touch by November 15^th if you need more time on a longer piece.  Submission guidelines are being developed, until then we ask for endnotes rather than footnotes and consistent document formatting in each submission.

We are looking specifically for pieces that look at some of the following (don’t consider this list exhaustive):

• Pipeline blockades and diversity of tactics, including perspectives from the front-lines
• Forest defense updates
• Resistance dynamics amidst rising state fascism and exponential climate change
• Subsistence journals, wild experiences, lessons learned from living with and through the land
• Anti-civilization praxis, challenges and ideas

Some brief words on this issue’s theme of Perpetual Apocalypse: Worlds have been and are being destroyed. In each instance of devastation, from the perspective of life within each area, each multiplicity of connectivity, the apocalypse was and is real. The death of the planetary world as a singular event is not within the capacity of the human experience, thus apocalypse is both perpetual and unending in civilized life — we merely see each apocalypse from a voyeur’s perspective. How much longer do the spectators have before the fire is no longer just illuminated pixels?

The theme is nothing more than possible inspiration, though pieces that are inspired by it are of course appreciated. We are aiming for a vibrant, diverse and engaging magazine of anti-civilization thought, practice and, above all, life.

– Steve Kirk for Oak Journal

All recipients are encouraged to forward this announcement to relevant parties and not the cops. Please reach out with ideas, inspirations, criticisms, etc: [email protected]