Project May-Day 2007 A festival for May
01 July 2006
Announcement
Glasgow User Manual and A festival for May 2007
The new Glasgow User Manual website, was created to collect information and make connections with grass roots, groups, people and events around the city.
What is needed now is content to fill the site. The main purpose of the site is to encourage people in the various communities in the city to participate and share their ideas, history, events, issues, achievements and experiences in any medium, or location they are comfortable with.
The Manual will eventually be published in a book of some description. The content of the web site will shape what form the book will take.
The idea of the project is to encourage the folk who are not particularly knowledgeable about computers or their use, or might not have the confidence to express their thoughts in the mediums that could and are available to them.
I have included some content and listings as an example of how the site could look and be laid out. There are two areas on the map Govan and Maryhill, to show how the city map will be used. Get your area on the map by sending some information. (See info at bottom)
I have set aside some time to develop various workshops for groups or individuals to teach and share the skills that could help in self expression “...so that the teacher of one class might be a pupil in another.”
A Festival for May Day project
To launch the new site, a new project - A Festival for May Day. - In order to give the event some focus and short term goals, here is an outline of an idea to create a five day festival leading up to May Day 2007.
The idea being to create a series of events and workshops of a participatory and non professionalised nature to celebrate and nurture working class history and culture.
The User Manual could be used to collate, collect, present ideas and to create a program of events. A “Benefit Exchange” could be set up to facilitate groups or individual folk who would be happy to work collectively. An ideas bank, a “Labour Exchange” for those who need help with projects and who want to help.
Part of the aims of the Festival is to recognise the social and economic achievements of the working class and labour movement. What better way to celebrate the next May Day - through the participatory economics, of our efforts.
Background:
Over the years we have had “Glasgow City of Culture” of “Architecture”, of “Gardens” Why not a festival bestowed on the city by it’s citizens for and in the interest of it’s citizens. If we start thinking about it now, we could celebrate next years ”May Day” in a more constructive fashion, and conducive to May-Days original intent, of celebration and solidarity
Program
The following are rough ideas to help create a program of happenings and workshops. Finding out about your city can be a valuable experience that can bring it’s own benefits and enjoyment. Organisations, Groups individuals interested: The Glasgow User Manual will serve as an information base for developing and organising these ideas
Ownership
To Present: A Festival that, as well as celebrate working class achievements - could help in coordinating and recording a vision of working peoples aspirations - and to enjoy this occasion in “all” it’s manifestations, from the fight for an 8 hour day, to dancing around beribboned maypole’s with flowers in our hair.
The City
Reclaiming our institutions
To reinvest in our institutions, we have to create enjoyment and fulfillment by our own invention. We need to create the gravitas to work against the noise of the business machine that is distracting folk away from cultural enjoyment, towards meaningless entertainment. We have the most creative force available, the human mind. The same creative mind that gave us the eight hour day and stopped slavery - can be used to fulfill our dreams and alleviate us from the nightmare of endless consumption
Urban development
Who are all these houses for: Here we could take a look at development and what it means for the city and more important for its citizens. Who decides and how are the public perceived by the planers in the shaping of the public estate. Come on a bus tour of your city, act like a tourist. What does it look like to you.
Creating a collective Megaphone
Community radio Local news: Our community megaphones are drowned out by the mega media and the tyranny of television. We need to use local networks to voice our opinions rather than to mimic the trash of the corporate media. We need an independent public station and we need to point all of our small megaphones towards challenging the big ones.
City Walks
Creating a social map
There is a lot to learn from the city architecture. Much of our historical architecture has been wiped out for profit development, especially industrial architecture, which formed a reference to working peoples occupation and a geographical plan of the working environment of the city. Fortunately there are still some landmarks to guide and pique our interests.
Tagging the city
Have you seen a building; place, green space, item, development, situation, that needs highlighted, claimed by the public, or brought to the public attention.
Procedure: Collect some tags, or make your own. Find places to tag. After tagging photograph the place, (if possible) write a short description and E-mail details to: photo@Glasgow User Manual. com
Is the Technology Liberating
Create democratic machines (open technology)
Science and the arts and have created tools that could save us from the drudgery of work. Instead it has accelerated the abundance of useless toil and waste. Technology is being used to control our time towards drudgery rather that liberate our time for Science and technological research that should serve democratic ends, not create mysterious no-go areas. Make the technology work "for us"
Bikes are our Future
Bikes, like our imagination, or with our imagination, can create all manner of possibilities, cheap travel, cheap health care, moving things about, antidepressant, non polluting, quiet, energy giving. Cars are dead pieces of metal that are over used for all the wrong reasons expensive and deadly in more ways than one. Explore the bike and it’s usefulness to society.
History of Mayday
Learning our history actively. May Day is not “just another bank holiday,” in which to shop and spend money. We must enjoy our own things by our own and entertainment. We do not need professionals to make our, or tell us our history. May Day is partly to remind us of that history Help to keep May day a peoples holiday and learn it’s history “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.” Milan Kundera
Guerrilla Gardening
Reap what you sow eco system. The tap roots of social change like the roots of the growing food, should develop in unison for a sustainable future. A garden can be anywhere you want it to be “We must tend our garden” Jean Jacques Rousseau
The River
The river is a conduit of city life. The history of Glasgow’s main river is a vital thread on which the history of the city can be traced. The river gives life to a city but the city needs to put life on the river. The great ships are gone from Govan, but there are boats being built and sailed by people in Govan, which is creating a new vision and ideas for bringing new life to the Clyde. Start to use your river.
What do you think
We (you and me) could be working on the above projects for the next six months or so. With a little effort from each of us, who knows what's possible.
During this time I will be working to attract:
Budding artists, amateur dramatists, cyclists, craftspeople, hobbyists, eloquent speakers, historians, campaigners, walkers, techies, trades folk, folkies’ scientists, ecologists, entertainers, teachers, hard working people, community groups, actors, musicians, artists, builders, joiners, readers, writers, geographers, sailors, typists, parents, weans, young people, older people, visitors, new citizens, and fellow Glaswegians.
The theme for May Festival, will be it’s colourful history through music, drama, the city, landmarks, characters, traditions and public events. The Festival will promote the use of bikes and the versatility of the people machine - Give us your ideas.
Interested:
If you or your group would like to be involved in any capacity or for more information ----------Contact-------------------- Write: Bob Hamilton c/o Pearce institute 840 Govan Road Glasgow G513UU email: info@glasgowusermanual.com Website: www.glasgowusermanual.com Mayday-link; http://www.glasgowusermanual.com/news/280/project-may-day-2007
A list will be published shortly - Please forward this post widely, thanks. B.
Join email list for info: list@glasgowusermanual.com
P.S. The project needs a catchy name.