Cockroaches, particularly those with the rapid reproduction habits of the “German” cockroach, are not subject to legal property demarcations and the properties thereof. They do not obey tenancy laws neither. This reality seemed to have escaped the landlord when I tried to explain to him, via the ever-polite estate agent, that I’d rather he arranged … Continue reading
“I don’t see what I’ve done so wrong that I can’t live like everyone else in the world, live in a house and have a house that I can call home.” – Sam (pseudonym) qtd in Besides one’s self: Homelessness felt and lived, by Catherine Robinson, p.93. Last night I was able to get a … Continue reading
“We have heard of the ‘resignations from the American Dream’[14] that emerged as a part of the Occupy phenomenon, as well as the re-emergence of occupy infrastructures in the form of #OccupySandy in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.[15] Circulating throughout these examples are relations of disaffection and detachment, as well as the making of infrastructures … Continue reading
“Among the institutions that stamp their imprint on the daily life of the population and on the climate of ‘problem’ neighbourhoods, special attention must be afforded to the police. As the ‘frontline’ agency and frowning face of the state directly turned down towards precarious and marginal categories, the police are everywhere confronted with a deep … Continue reading
“… the spin off effects of the back to the land movement on regions where it was focused is both surprising and largely unacknowledged. I have argued that the rural resettlement in the more desirable coastal and high rainfall parts of Australia is a major social and economic force which runs counter to the acelerating … Continue reading
As a suburban child of the eighties in Australia, my first impression of Nimbin was beamed to me from the butt of a joke. It was either The Comedy Company or Full Frontal, and there was a character who would read a poem from the audience. She was a Hippie, and her poem went like … Continue reading
The first was Flat 7, a very similar Flat 7 from the original, in that it was up top in an enormous converted Victorian terrace, and on the same street. It had been cut in half though, with the other half made into a Flat 8. It was a box. A very clean and polished … Continue reading
Greens call for more affordable housing, City News 25 October 2012 High life in a shop top, Northern Star 20 July 2012 see also Continue reading
A friend told me this story a while ago. It’s been part of my thinking about the ethics of occupying marginal space. It’s a few years ago. I’m in town for a festival. I and a few other university types break into the old, seemingly disused post office downtown. We go exploring for about 45 … Continue reading
“Artists … are very special members of the middle class for they stretch its imagination, its desires, even its practices, beyond its norms and conventions. The artistic lifestyle, like the creative art-work, deliberately presses the borders of conventional middle-class life, while at the same time representing its advancing, colonising arm. … [T]his venturing is part … Continue reading
Flat 7 