Today, May 10, marks the 87th anniversary of the so-called burning of Opernplatz. During that night in 1933, around 20,000 books were burned in the well-known square in an act organized by the National Socialist League of German Students, which brought together around 70,000 people. It was the first (and possibly the most remembered) in a series of burns that […]
It doesn’t take too much research to find information about some of the darkest chapters in the history of the written word, which are, unfortunately, many (and some of them, very recent). The burning of books perpetrated by the Spanish Inquisition, the Nazi regime, or the Latin American dictatorships; the prohibition, censorship or confiscation of titles considered dangerous by certain […]
After 13 weeks of proposals, this series of 13 books that changed history comes to an end with a controversial text (like many of those already proposed), transgressive, disruptive, challenging, and lots, lots of fun: Steal This Book, by Abbie Hoffman. Steal This Book (1970) is a polyhedral work: a manual of life; a generational reference; a statement of intent; […]
The penultimate proposal in this series of 13 Books that changed history can take on a new meaning in this current context in which the concept of community work is especially valid (and is especially relevant). Today, something that for the most critical and mobilized sectors of society was always a basic certainty is, for many people, more evident than […]
The eleventh proposal in this list of 13 Books that changed history is as valid today as it was at the time of its publication, since the reality of globalization did not lose, in the course of these nearly 20 years, not one iota of its destructive capacity: The Lugano Report, by Susan George. The Lugano Report (1999) imagines an […]
Approaching the end of our list of 13 Books that changed history, today we propose a referential work (the tenth one) of critical thinking, a text that helps us understand the legitimate freedom to put our own principles above the arbitrary norms imposed from power as a civic gesture, a way of being citizens, and not the unwarranted rebellious outburst […]
In the current context of massive spread of fake news, hoaxes (malicious or not), interested narratives and unpunished disinformation, the ninth installment of the series 13 Books that changed history aims to call into question the hegemony of mass media as unique transmitters of truth: Manufacturing Consent, by Noam Chomsky and Edward S. Herman. The eternal debate on the real […]
We are aware that this context of seclusion in which we find ourselves may be a good time to make a leisurely reading not only of some good pages, but also of our history as a civilization. For this, the eighth proposal in the series 13 Books that changed history combines critical review with literary excellence, as is the norm […]
For the ecuator of this list of 13 Books that changed history, we want to recommend a text that was undoubtedly (and continues to be) an intellectual reference, but also a reliable testimony to the struggles for the liberation of the black community: We Want Freedom: A Life In The Black Panther Party, by Mumia Abu-Jamal. This is a work […]
For the sixth proposal of the series 13 Books that changed history, we recovered an essential title of anticolonialism, understood in a much broader sense than mere independence: Les Damnés de la terre (in English, The Wretched of the Earth), by Frantz Fanon, proposes a concept of anticolonialism based on the necessary process of self-emancipation and identity claim of a […]