“An essential and galvanizing on-the-ground account of how oxygen suddenly and miraculously flooded back into the American brain.”—Jonathan Lethem
“[Occupying Wall Street] runs through OWS’ beginnings and provides a fascinating look at how Zucotti Park functioned, the disagreements and difficulties in running the community, and contains first-hand accounts of some of its most dramatic moments. Part souvenir, part how-to guide, this is a remarkable and unique book.”—The Huffington Post
For two months this fall, Zuccotti Park was the site of an extraordinary political action. Home to the hundreds of anti-capitalist protestors, the park became a communion of sharing and consensus in the heart of a citadel defined by greed and oligarchy.
In the early hours of Tuesday, November 15, the occupiers’ camp was destroyed when police swept suddenly into the square. But if the occupation at Zuccotti was destroyed that night, the movement it spawned across America has only just begun.
Occupying Wall Street draws on extensive interviews with those who took part in the action to bring an inside-the-square history to life. In a vivid narrative, the key events of the occupation are described, and woven throughout are stories of daily life in the square focusing on how the kitchen, library, media center, clean-up, hospital, and General Assembly functioned, all in the words of the people who were there.
Writers for the 99% is a group of writers and researchers active in supporting Occupy Wall Street who came together to create this book.
Click Here For More Information
Tags:Action,America,Changed,Inside,Occupying,Story),Street,Wall
Seamless and Authoritative Narrative I’ve checked out a few of the other OWS books. This stands out because it is a seamless, insiders account, of the most momentous occasions of the initial months of the movement. I highly recommend this fantastic book!
A Wonderful First-Hand Account Filled With Information While there are a lot of books concerned with Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy Movement, this one seems to stand out from most of the others.This is because unlike other books on the subject, which are written by intellectuals or journalists, Occupying Wall Street was written by people who actively participated in the Occupy Movement during the period that the book discusses (from the begging of the protests until the eviction of Zuccotti park). In addition, this book is a long unified narrative, in contrast to other books that are a collection of articles on the subject. And while articles written by intellectuals project their expectations, while those written by journalists often express a specific agenda, the authors of Occupying Wall Street seem to be mostly concerned with describing the first few months of Occupy Wall Street rather than promoting their own believes or agendas.The book discusses subjects which few other books address. The authors discuss among other things, how General Assemblies work, the reaction of labor unions and student unions towards Occupy Wall Street, the People of Color initiative that exists within the movement, the art forms that were created in Zuccotti park during the occupation and the everyday life in the square. Various important moments in the history of Occupy Wall Street, such as the Brooklyn Bridge incident, or the eviction, are also discussed in some detail. The book also includes a map of Zuccotti park as it was set up during the occupation.I strongly suggest this book for those interested in the Occupy Movement or the various protests that are taking place throughout the world. This is a wonderful piece of first-hand account history and will undoubtedly turn out as a useful source for those interested in the subject.
THE STORY OF THE EARLY DAYS OF THE “OCCUPY” MOVEMENT The Introduction to this 2011 book states, “This book is an account of the first months of the Occupy Wall Street movement (OWS). It is the result of a collaborative process that began a month after OWS had its first official action on September 17, 2011… dozens of interviews were conducted with a diverse range of people in and around the occupation. It is on this basis that we call this the ‘inside story’ of the action.”On October 1, 2011, the book records that “as marchers swarmed the roadway, chanting, ‘We are the 99 percent!’ ‘Banks got bailed out! We got sold out!’ and ‘Whose bridge? Our bridge!’ the police quickly regrouped and established a barricade using the increasingly ubiquitous orange mesh fence.” (Pg. 36)They note, “four days earlier, he had suggested to an interviewer from CNN Money that those who criticized the movement for lacking demands were missing the point—OWS was seeking a conversation about the current state of the country, not presenting a finite list of goals. ‘Making a list of three or four demands,’ he asserted, ‘would have ended the conversation before it began.’” (Pg. 81)Once, when police were evicting some protesters, some of them “called on the police to join them: ‘They’re stealing your pensions too!’ some shouted. But within a matter of minutes police had reclaimed Broadway.” (Pg. 182-183)This is an excellent book, that really gives a “feel” for what participation in the original phases of the OWS movement was like.