Maia Ramnath
Personal Information
Description
Maia Ramnath is a teacher, writer, activist, and dancer/aerialist living in New York City. She is the author of The Haj to Utopia: How the Ghadar Movement Charted Global Radicalism and Attempted to Overthrow the British Empire—in many ways a companion volume to this one. She is currently a member of the Institute for Anarchist Studies board and Historians against War steering committee.
Books
Decolonizing Anarchism
Decolonizing Anarchism examines the history of South Asian struggles against colonialism and neocolonialism, highlighting lesser-known dissidents as well as iconic figures. What emerges is an alternate narrative of decolonization, in which liberation is not defined by the achievement of a nation-state. Author Maia Ramnath suggests that the anarchist vision of an alternate society closely echoes the concept of total decolonization on the political, economic, social, cultural, and psychological planes. Decolonizing Anarchism facilitates more than a reinterpretation of the history of anticolonialism; it also supplies insight into the meaning of anarchism itself. (Source: [AK Press](
Haj to Utopia
"In The Haj to Utopia, Maia Ramnath tells the dramatic story of Ghadar, the Indian anticolonial movement that attempted overthrow of the British Empire. Founded by South Asian immigrants in California, Ghadar--which is translated as "mutiny"--quickly became a global presence in East Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and East Africa. Ramnath brings this epic struggle to life as she traces Ghadar's origins to the Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, its establishment of headquarters in Berkeley, California, and its fostering by anarchists in London, Paris, and Berlin. Linking Britain's declaration of war on Germany in 1914 to Ghadar's declaration of war on Britain, Ramnath vividly recounts how 8,000 rebels were deployed from around the world to take up the battle in Hindustan. The Haj to Utopia demonstrates how far-flung freedom fighters managed to articulate a radical new world order out of seemingly contradictory ideas."-- Publisher description.