Where Many Worlds Fit
intent episodes rojava zapatistas

intent

Where Many Worlds Fit is a podcast covering international movements for radical autonomy. Many of these movements are led by indigenous peoples but consist of a pluralistic society, and grow out of the surprisingly natural union of long-held cultural traditions with more modern libertarian thought. Often these movements emerge amidst devastating civil wars or within the territories of failed nation-states, and while defending themselves from fascists. We are particularly interested in the Kurdish-led Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES, also known as Rojava) and the Maya-led autonomous region of southeast Mexico in the state of Chiapas (the Zapatistas of the Lacondan Jungle), but we will broaden our lens as we learn more, actively and together.

To tell these stories, we incorporate four broad approaches.

black snail shell with red-orange spiral

styles

I. gonzo journalism

A threat to freedom anywhere is a threat to freedom everywhere. Indigenous struggles for autonomy and self-determination are happening right now in many parts of the world, and they could really use our help. This podcast aims to provide some of that help in the form of documentation, education, and advocacy. It grows out of the idea that international solidarity is more effective when it carries both context and intent.

II. sociology

Many of the researchers in the so-called West already documenting these movements do so within the professional academic field of sociology. Yet this podcast (along with many of the aforementioned researchers) is/are very explicit about the many problems with professional academia. So in the spirit of being good accomplices, we aim to democratize the sociological record for our subjects. We especially want to bring to the intellectual commons things that serve the public interest, topics with strong relevance at home such as alternative justice and education systems and jiniology.

III. oral history

Doing this confers many advantages, among the most important of which is to counter state messaging and propaganda. The Turkish and Syrian states have long denied the Kurdish right to exist; the Mexican state denies basic support to Maya and other indigenous peoples across the country; the American and Canadian states are infamous for genocide and slavery. “We” the constructed public are denied an awful lot of this context as part of their violent cultural erasure. Oral histories are not only compatible with many indigenous traditions – they are also a tactic, a kind of Rosetta stone for the rest of us who would stand in solidarity with our indigenous compas.

IV. solarpunk futures

If you’re trying to sprout a better world, you need soil with need an active imagination. What will it look like to realize land back in your neighborhood? How will our notions of justice be influenced by efforts to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change? We occasionally combine speculative fiction with the very real history of radical autonomous movements to help foresee how one could play out in our own backyard, and how we get there.

episode formats

Our podcast aims to be a collaborative project, mixing together a few different perspectives and episode formats. We release on a sporadic schedule, oscillating between a couple times a week and a couple times a season. This is an intentional strategy as it allows us more editorial freedom to cultivate material, and our community of listeners more time and energy to converse with it.

Our more common episode formats are as follows:

scripted articles

These are long-form essays and journalistic articles, offering information, context, and analysis, generally read by the author(s) and 30-90 minutes in length. Each episode’s text is published online.

interviews

Original research is conducted in the form of interviews and released as available. Current interview subjects include internationalist organizers, sociologists, a Kurdish journalist, and a houseless organizer.

short stories

Like the scripted articles, short stories are 30-90 minutes in length, read by the author, and constitute speculative fiction with a solarpunk bent. These stories are meant to help us better imagine and articulate the kind of world we want to create.

field reporting

A rather ambitious goal is to travel to places like Chiapas and northeast Syria to conduct field reporting. This is challenging to pull off but it is something to work towards. There are also places closer to home where Indigenous land stewardship continues, like the Menominee forest in north Wisconsin, and land defenders are active, like the Gidimt’en Checkpoint where the Wet’suwet’en Nation is resisting encroachment by oil pipelines.

music

Yaotl Mictlan are an Aztec folk metal group who support struggles from below and to the left. Their productions, such as Entre Lluvias Fuertes (“between heavy rains”) in episode 1, are used here with consent of the band.

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