Writing, Anarchism, Design Chester Middleton Writing, Anarchism, Design Chester Middleton

design without hierarchy

what could design without hierarchy look like?

But wait, maybe we’re thinking about this wrong? Would an anarchist attempt to create a form of visual design without hierarchy, or is it that hierarchy itself is intrinsic within the eyes of those who perceive art? 

Is visual hierarchy actually the problem in which a young anarchist designer might find themselves at odds with?

Hierarchy, especially that of visual hierarchy, still exists within most work. What an anarchist in the design field might be more interested in working against is the organized structure or hierarchy that is used authoritatively to create power imbalance. Rather than viewing design as a system without hierarchy, perhaps we should view it in which we attempt to make the act of designing a more democratic process for those involved?

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    like?

But wait, maybe we’re thinking about this wrong? Would an anarchist attempt to create a form of visual design without hierarchy, or is it that hierarchy itself is intrinsic within the eyes of those who perceive art? 

Is visual hierarchy actually the problem in which a young anarchist designer might find themselves at odds with?

Hierarchy, especially that of visual hierarchy, still exists within most work. What an anarchist in the design field might be more interested in working against is the organized structure or hierarchy that is used authoritatively to create power imbalance. Rather than viewing design as a system without hierarchy, perhaps we should view it in which we attempt to make the act of designing a more democratic process for those involved?

When I first set out with this question, I remember being asked the question “What would it look like if you designed a book without hierarchy?” At first, I was entertaining the idea of how that could be done. Would said book have the same font size throughout? Maybe it was done in all lowercase? Maybe it played with color to replace traditional hierarchical form?

Yet something was nagging at me, that this question, although a fun thought experiment, wasn’t getting to the bottom of the nature of my thoughts and work in this space. I started to view the question as a fundamental misunderstanding of anarchistic thought and narratives, no doubt due to society’s current lens on the “anarchist” as a violent or subversive force for radical change.

Thomas Pulliam says this about Anarchy’s modern perception in his 2021 article “Anarchy Against Hierarchy”,

Moving forward is impossible unless we learn each other’s language. In spite of all our similarities, all our shared wants and concerns, misunderstanding convinces us we are enemies. Emma Goldman wrote, “Someone has said that it requires less mental effort to condemn than to think. The widespread mental indolence, so prevalent in society, proves this to be only too true.” Words with multiple definitions that change drastically according to context, group, and setting—like anarchy, communism, nihilism, etc.—contribute to this discord. When most people hear “anarchy”, they will often imagine violence and refuse to listen. This hostility frustrates the anarchist, who views it in terms of cooperative, horizontal living.

In saying so, Thomas concludes that the most common agreement that you can find among anarchists is that our theory would generally be more popular if only it wasn’t so tragically misunderstood.(1)

I can’t help but agree with this sentiment as I hear the word Anarchy uttered in reference to chaos, conveniently ignoring the mountains of work created by anarchism and anarchist-adjacent modes of thought that announce a profound form of equality, peace and community not unlike the original configuration of human society.(2)

This isn’t to say that violence is absent in the arsenal of the Anarchist, but instead a challenge of understanding what situations might have caused such violence to have arisen in the first place. For my modern understanding of Anarchist Theory, I find that violence in this sense nearly entirely surfaces as a reactionary attempt to halt some form of oppression or restriction of another’s freedom.

This could take the form of a protest against the unjust killing of a black man, or as a fight against the restriction of rights, and yes, even as the attack on a person spouting hateful and damaging ideology. Yet this form of anarchy which is often misappropriated by media outlets and misconstrued as radical violence or even terrorism.(3)

But, in a world where oppression by the hands of power did not exist, would Anarchists simply disappear?

The answer to that question, of course, is no!

Taking this necessary yet reactionary form of violence within Anarchy away from the modern lens, ironically, would allow Anarchism to be seen and understood as its true form as the advocation of a lifestyle focused on the basis of personal autonomy, equality, freedom, and the flattening of all hierarchy in societal action.

Yet it seems that this form of “anarchist design” is absent within the lexicon of both the canon of design and of design history. Relegated to being simply considered a subset or part of the punk aesthetic, or represented by splotchy paint and the symbolic letter “A” hurriedly sprayed along the underpass of an American highway.(Fig. 1, pictured left)

Where are the Anarchist designers at? Surely there must be more representation than posters from the Spanish Civil War era?(Fig. 2, pictured below)

This emptiness is particularly felt within the academic space, where I commonly find the same classic misunderstandings among fellow designers I am in community with. The negative connotations associated with the term Anarchism alone has caused some to even suggest attempting to find new rhetoric or identifiers to replace the usage of “Anarchy.”

To replace and censor in this sense would, in my opinion, go against the very idea of the subversive nature of my goal as an anarchist within this design space.

This is why we’ve arrived at the first volume of “Unsolicited Design”, and in this section we will inspect anarchy from differing perspectives to answer the question;

Where are the anarchist designers?

The Elephant In The Room

Addressing uncomfortable truths;

I think it’s important to note in this conversation that due to the nature of the design field in its current state, that is, a highly consumerized and commodified field centered around brands and advertising, that the prominent presence of graphic designers with active knowledge of anarchic theory is unfortunately uncommon.

It’s hard to imagine that many of the artists within this bubble would willingly choose to participate in the field of art which is essentially the most close to capitalism in its modern usage.

This is not an admittance of defeat, however, as I choose to believe that Graphic Designers may exist without the need of markets and profit margin. This is simply a thought that crosses my mind when wondering aloud, “Where are the Anarchist Designers?”

This is reflective even in myself as well, as I gathered and bolstered my political senses and theory, I slowly shifted away from traditional work in the graphic design field. I became uninterested in work for clients and corporations, lost my passion for the design field, and then had to regain that passion once I allowed myself to view design from an entirely different angle.

That led me to the pursuit of education as a means of allowing myself the freedom to both work within the field I’ve dedicated myself to, but simultaneously hoping that my perspective brought to the classroom could change (and hopefully heal) some of the ailments I see so commonly in young, disillusioned designers leaving their undergraduate programs.

This is also reflective of the anarchists focus on individual communities and contributions to small organizations across the world. The collective action of anarchists focusing on contributing art to their causes happens often away from the public eye of the media. This could be for many reasons, a social algorithm that represses anarchistic values, a government keen on keeping collective action hidden, or the grassroots nature of the cause itself, to name just a few.

Fig. 3 Issue of Anarchy magazine from July 1968, this issue is focussed on the events of May 1968 in Paris.

libcom.org/article/anarchy-089

When searching for modern anarchist graphic designers, typically the results appear very dry. Searching the term “Anarchist Graphic Designers” or any variation will usually yield the following few names repeated; Rufus Segar(Fig. 3), Dennis Gould, Jamie Reid(Fig. 4), Aleksai Gan, Clifford Harper.

Many of these artists have direct ties to what we see as anarchist related design now, ranging from 60s era traditional magazine creation to the album covers of the Sex Pistols. When looking at the body of work created by these artists in their times, it’s easy to see a guiding light which moves from the original roots of constructivism and revolutionary art all the way to the development of modern punk aesthetics.

It’s also impossible not to note Anarchism’s influence on some of the most famous artists discussed today, such as Pablo Picasso, Camille Pissarro, Georges Seurat, Man Ray, Robert Henri, Wassily Kandinsky, Rockwell Kent, Frans Masereel, and even Mark Rothko.(4)

Many artists who’ve had this connection to anarchist levels of thought or influence have typically had their anarchistic roots whitewashed for the sake of the narrative being told. Even today we can see the political nature of figures such as Einstein, Orwell, or Martin Luther King Jr. be conveniently changed or left out to teach a more government favored version of our history.(5)

Fig. 4 Gould designed this poster, based on several of his own poems, during the anti-nuclear protests of the early 1980s. Published by the Freedom Editorial Collective and typeset and printed by Aldgate Press in Whitechapel, 1983.

www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/the-creative-anarchist

However, in this association of Anarchism with these artists, we may find ourselves slowly attempting to categorize these artists into the idea of what anarchist art and design might look like. David Graeber says in his Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology;

…if one compares the historical schools of Marxism, and anarchism, one can see we are dealing with a fundamentally different sort of project. Marxist schools have authors. Just as Marxism sprang from the mind of Marx, so we have Leninists, Maoists, Trotskyites, Gramscians, Althusserians...

Now consider the different schools of anarchism. There are Anarcho-Syndicalists, AnarchoCommunists, Insurrectionists, Cooperativists, Individualists, Platformists... None are named after some Great Thinker; instead, they are invariably named either after some kind of practice, or most often, organizational principle. (Significantly, those Marxist tendencies which are not named after individuals, like Autonomism or Council Communism, are also the ones closest to anarchism.) Anarchists like to distinguish themselves by what they do, and how they organize themselves to go about doing it. And indeed this has always been what anarchists have spent most of their time thinking and arguing about. Anarchists have never been much interested in the kinds of broad strategic or philosophical questions that have historically preoccupied Marxists.(6)

Graeber is speaking here on why there might be more Marxist based thinkers present in the academy rather than anarchist thinkers. Although this writing is not particularly to compare Marxist thought with that of anarchist, I see a value in bringing this up when speaking on what an anarchist designer who is present in the academy(other than myself) might be thinking.

The Neoliberal Punk

So do Anarchists even have a “style?” 

Immediately you may be drifting off to The Clash’s London Calling album cover (Fig. 5), diving into cut out text, gritty pattern work, handmade illustration, and poppy colors. When we think of the stereotypical idea of the traditional school punk, a rebel in leather who does graffiti and hates authority, is it correct to call them an anarchist?

Fig. 5 Clash (Musical group). London Calling. New York, NY

Epic Records, 1979.

This is especially present now, where media literacy is at an all time low. A teen within the city may spraypaint the anarchist A on a wall. Then, putting on their store bought pre-patched leather jacket(an example of anarchist patches found across the internet) and studded jeans, they will go to a party and tout their punk and anarchy. Meanwhile, said person may have absolutely no idea why the punk movement even started in the first place, or the historical significance of the circled A they drew earlier. Have they ever visited the Anarchist Library and read theory? Likely not, yet it does not stop them from calling themselves Anarchists.

So no, the school punk isn’t any more anarchist than the average school student if they lack the knowledge and theory of what makes anarchism work. What I’m describing here is the illiterate use of symbols, or essentially, a neoliberal understanding of Anarchism. The chasing of “punk” and “anarchy” as an aesthetic over an actual political theory.

We, as designers in the trendy hustle culture of consumerism are no different. When a modern design student logs on to Pinterest in interest of looking for “visual influence”, they may come across a grunge or punk poster design and think “wow, cool.” Next day, they arrive at the critique with a poster highly reminiscent of James Reid’s punk style (Fig. 7), but they have no idea why the poster was made to look that way in the first place.

They have taken an aesthetic shortcut, arriving from point A to C without the process of point B, which is the knowledge and understanding of the history and process behind the design. This part is extremely crucial, yet in my experience almost entirely absent due to the nature of how we work in the digital age.

Unfortunately for us as educators, modern design students want those shortcuts. They want to copy the trends and “good” designs imprinted on them by their professors, make it through college, and get a decent job. To win capitalism.

I’ve talked a lot in the past about the nature of the classroom driven by personal aesthetics, which can be found on my blog, but why am I bringing this up?

Fig. 7 The artwork for the Sex Pistols’ single God Save The Queen, designed by Jamie Reid. It was designed in 1977, during the height of the punk music scene and in the year of the Queen’s silver jubilee, making it a very topical and controversial piece.

All of these contribute to the cultural understanding of what makes an anarchist. When the teen punk touts themself an anarchist, they are directly associating themselves with Anarchism and, by extension, creating a cultural image of what an anarchist is. When they make a mistake or commit a crime in their youth such as vandalism (through graffiti, the smashing of windows, or any of said nature) that same image is projected onto all anarchists as violent or vandals, yet most would not even consider the teen an anarchist at all. News and media grapple onto these small stories and blow them up to paint the anarchist as violent. Parents watch the news, teach their children as such, the cultural cycle continues.

The internet reinforces the same ideas, as it can be a space where you can find and interact with real anarchist thought and theory, yet most will find themselves at the surface level, never diving deeper and simply seeing anarchism from the lens of google results and twitter posts.

This extends to the designer who is looking to create something for a project. When searching online for inspiration, they come across an aesthetic that uses blacked out lettering and prints made with older techniques. They like the style, they make the style, they sell the style. Is the style anarchist?

Are they now an anarchist designer?

Who even is an Anarchist Designer?

Okay, but seriously, who even is an Anarchist Designer?

Am I even an Anarchist Designer?

Well, I know Anarchist theory,

I call myself an Anarchist, and I make designs,

so I guess there’s no question right?

Does that make subverting hierarchy in design a necessity? 

Or would it be more naturally anarchic to simply make whatever I feel like making?

I think the answer lies in that last line. Anarchy is a theory in which every person who identifies with it will come to a slightly different conclusion, something that makes the idea of anarchist communities so beautiful in the first place. Can we really attempt to categorize and bundle anarchist artists together by visual style, or should we instead attempt to focus on bundling them by their belief in anarchism in the first place. As David Graeber says, we are dealing with a fundamentally different form of project.7

Fig. 7 Issue of Anarchy magazine from July 1968, this issue is focused on the events of May 1968 in Paris.

libcom.org/article/anarchy-089

For myself, there is this weirdness in between. I am in love with the visual style of the post-modern punk, the maximalism and grunge aesthetics are like candy for my eyes. Yet, I also love the minimalist look of modern design, the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright (Fig. 8), and even the Swiss style that I learned to use throughout my undergraduate degree. (Fig. 9, 10)

What if I reject those labels, what if I design with hierarchy but against hierarchy? Would it be metamodern?8 Would it be hypocritical? Would I not be practicing the ideals I preach?

Design Against Hierarchy, With Hierarchy

Wrapping around from the very beginning, what if you design without hierarchy? Although it is most certainly possible to do so, and I see that there may be room for the usage of such tactics in the future, I choose to remain designing with visual hierarchy. I don’t believe this makes me less of an Anarchist at all, in fact, to simply make what I feel like making is the highest reflection of freedom I could give myself.

I choose, out of my own freedom and autonomy, to use hierarchy as the pendulum between the modern and postmodern as my design swings back and forth. It is not a case of the master’s tools.9 I say this because I reject the idea that the master in this case may own our art or design at all in the first place. Designers may be lost in the complex web of capital, but we will break free of these chains one day. 

I believe that, eventually, something beautiful is going to happen.

1 - Thomas Pulliam, “Anarchy Against Hierarchy” 2022

2 - “We are usually told that democracy originated in ancient Athens—like science, or philosophy, it was a Greek invention. It’s never entirely clear what this is supposed to mean. Are we supposed to believe that before the Athenians, it never really occurred to anyone, anywhere, to gather all the members of their community in order to make joint decisions in a way that gave everyone equal say?”
- David Graeber, “Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology”

3 - US Government Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene introduced a bill in 2023 which would deem the organization “ANTIFA” a domestic terrorist organization and would permit “the use of all available tools to combat the spread of such terrorism (done by) antifa.” This, of course, is an attempt at silencing the voice of the anarchist-based organization and its outreach as a form of government control. (https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-resolution/202)

4 - Josh MacPhee and Erik Reuland, Realizing the Impossible: Art against Authority
(Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2007). Page 4.

5 - “They attempt to silence his cries for a more monetarily equitable society. They deliberately obscure the final few years of his life. This sanitized, “white-washed” version of King, presented in everything from children’s textbooks to internet memes, purges the intense radicalism of the strike-leading preacher.” 50 Voices for 50 Years Series, Poverty, Racism, and the Legacy of King’s Poor People’s Campaign.
By Keri Leigh Merritt

6 - David Graeber, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology
(Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2006), Pages 4-5.

7 - David Graeber, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology
(Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2006), Pages 4-5.

8 - The “metamodern” is a form of design that I have done research on before. It is the consideration of what comes after postmodernism, where designers are now finding an intersection between the postmodern and the modern. By oscillating between these two like a pendulum, the metamodern takes advantage of irony and authenticity, fragility and cynicism. This creates a new form of design synthesized out of all of these concepts, one based on empathy and connection.

9 - “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house” is a quote by Audre Lorde, a Black lesbian feminist writer and activist. Lorde said this in 1979 at a feminist conference in New York.

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Writing, Prose Poem, Anarchism Chester Middleton Writing, Prose Poem, Anarchism Chester Middleton

the failed anarchist

I don't think I have the ability to change the world. 

None of us do, In the end it's all about surviving.

The dull, monochromatic delivery of words,

so many times repeated. 

The fire of hope and determination,

Once burned in ashy eyes now dead and black. 

Snuffed out like cold charcoal in abandoned fireplaces.

How many times have we heard this? 

That change is impossible, 

That the world is too far gone, 

That all we have left to do is wait for our turn,

To die on a cold, spinning rock we call earth?

I

I don't think I have the ability to change the world. 

None of us do, In the end it's all about surviving.

The dull, monochromatic delivery of words,

so many times repeated. 

The fire of hope and determination,

Once burned in ashy eyes now dead and black. 

Snuffed out like cold charcoal in abandoned fireplaces.

How many times have we heard this? 

That change is impossible, 

That the world is too far gone, 

That all we have left to do is wait for our turn,

To die on a cold, spinning rock we call earth?

II

For this is what the failed anarchist said to me,

As he drank himself away in an old stuffy bar.

This old anarchist past his prime parading,

Streets in black jackets, sits now in bitterness.

For those who feel this way, 

life is better lived disconnected from the world outside. 

News feeds filled with dystopian levels of warnings 

Flooded by continuous waves of scrolling.

His flame burned brightly with new rage,

But lacked the flicker of introspection,

As his old anger towards systems directs outwards,

A flame all but died out, drenched in brandy.

III

And what could I say to him?

Hope was burning bright in our younger selves.

We have yet to have given up,

Yet do we see our own future in him?

“No!” I scream, I reject this idea,

I will not become chained to nostalgia.

Viewing the past with rosy glasses,

Refusing to acknowledge the changes we’ve made.

A black jacket and molotov is not an ethos.

Did he wear the colors, spew the language,

But lack any understanding of his ideals?

For was he even an anarchist at all?

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VCFA, Book Review, Anarchism Chester Middleton VCFA, Book Review, Anarchism Chester Middleton

anarchist pedagogies

This is a review of the book Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflections on Education edited by Robert H. Haworth.

I think Anarchist Pedagogies created a revolution within my head.

Wait, let me explain. Essentially, I’ve been locked inside my own head. As I’ve grappled with what it means to be a masters candidate in design, I’ve found myself paralyzed when it came to making work for myself.

How do others perceive my work?

Asking questions such as “Is this worthy of a masters program?”

“What would David want me to do with this idea?”

“How should I make this from an academic perspective?”

These questions, as with the many others swirling within a spiral of how to be an “Ideal Student,” stunted my active growth and demonstrated my lack of autonomy within the creative space. I have grown dependent on the institutionalized mechanisms of education that have removed my ability to work for myself, waiting to be told what to do next or where to go.

This is a review of the book Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflections on Education edited by Robert H. Haworth.

I think Anarchist Pedagogies created a revolution within my head.

Wait, let me explain. Essentially, I’ve been locked inside my own head. As I’ve grappled with what it means to be a masters candidate in design, I’ve found myself paralyzed when it came to making work for myself.

How do others perceive my work?

Asking questions such as “Is this worthy of a masters program?”

“What would David want me to do with this idea?”

“How should I make this from an academic perspective?”

These questions, as with the many others swirling within a spiral of how to be an “Ideal Student,” stunted my active growth and demonstrated my lack of autonomy within the creative space. I have grown dependent on the institutionalized mechanisms of education that have removed my ability to work for myself, waiting to be told what to do next or where to go.

It is this book that helped me to finally understand and unlock this mindset, and allowed me to create this packet and work for myself. Thus, as it is so fitting with the style of this packet and my new perspective, I will talk first about my thoughts on pedagogy, anarchy, the education system, and where I belong within the mechanisms controlling our lives.

The schooling system, especially within the United States of America, has systematically used its authority and power to create and foster not an education of critical thinking. Instead, the education is found most commonly as a tool at the disposal of the government, intended not to enrich an individual, but force them into complicity in their system. Placed in evenly spaced seats in a small room, students are forced to fit a mold made for everyone, with no regard for their individual learning abilities or preferences.

Teachers enforce rules such as raising your hand to use the bathroom, and not leaving your seat for any reason during class time. The right to speak is granted only by the authority, you may not chat with a classmate or even discuss a relevant class topic without permission. The curriculum is set by the state, ensuring students are taught a perspective that aligns with the thinking of their ruling classes.

The reasoning for this is quite clear; The American public is educated in this way to create a subservient and docile working class. Silent and unquestioning, the average student is taught from day one that the system in which they live and operate is the only true and correct way of being. Any other form of government or societal rule is below the American people, instilling the idea of American Exceptionalism, Individualism, and Nationalism.

The book Anarchist Pedagogies shares multiple essays from critical thinkers in the anarchist community attempting to introduce and provide insight onto the shortcomings of this system of education, as well as demonstrate alternatives educational models that could foster a more free and whole education while emphasizing the role of the educator and the student. However, something you may be wondering is how that really has anything to do with something as radical as “creating a revolution in my head.” To illustrate this, let’s unpack various quotes and ideas presented in the book that have helped me incredibly escape my creative rut.

If you find it hard to believe my claims on the intention of the schooling system to be used as a system of obedience, maybe it would help to see for yourself the words directly from Benjamin Rush. As a signer of the declaration of independence in the founding of our country, and considered the father of American Psychiatry, he would say this in his 1786 document “Thoughts upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic.” It reads as follows;

“In order more effectually to secure to our youth the advantages of a religious education, it is necessary to impose upon them the doctrines and discipline of a particular church.

Man is naturally an ungovernable animal, and observations on particular societies and countries will teach us that when we add the restraints of ecclesiastical to those of domestic and civil government, we produce in him
the highest degrees of order and virtue...

Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught at the same time that he must forsake and even forget them when the welfare of his country requires it...

In the education of youth, let the authority of our masters be as absolute as possible. The government of schools like the government of private families should be arbitrary, that it may not be severe. By this mode of education, we prepare our youth for the subordination of laws and thereby qualify them for becoming good citizens of the republic.

I am satisfied that the most useful citizens have been formed from those youth who have never known or felt their own wills till they were one and twenty years of age, and I have often thought that society owes a great deal of its order and happiness to the deficiencies of parental government being supplied by those habits of obedience and subordination which are contracted at schools...

From the observations that have been made it is plain that I consider it as possible to convert men into republican machines. This must be done if we expect them to perform their parts properly in the great machine of the government of the state. That republic is sophisticated with monarchy or aristocracy that does not revolve upon the wills of the people, and these must be fitted to each other by means of education before they can be made to produce regularity and unison in government...”
— Benjamin Rush, Thoughts upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic. (1786)

Although spoken 200 years ago, these fundamental ideas have never left the school systems and government. The advent of technology and the industrial revolution has even more so created a necessity of this system, as the internet allows more freedom to educate oneself and realized the problems hidden within the core of the education system.

Where does this everything connect?

Coming to the realization that this is the system in which I was raised gave me a whole bunch of questions in need of answering. Over time I found many answers to my existential crisis on my own education within the book, answers which brought me to recontextualizing the entire idea of my undergraduate education. In my undergrad, we were taught the highly capitalistic and economic version of what it means to fulfill the role of the graphic designer.

Classes focused on technical skills and client relationships, projects based themselves around corporate identity and visual communication. This is not to say that these are not important topics to learn, as after all, we still live inside a highly capitalistic system of economy and must find a way to commodify our skills and provides services deemed of monetary value. However as I reflect back on my education, I wonder what, if any, time I had to dedicate to myself or my own mission as an artist.

Personal “styles” meant nothing in the broad scheme, as corporations would look for flexible designer able to replicate what brand or style they already operated within as a conglomerate. What I felt was all to absent at the classroom setting was discussion on the theory and concept behind our ideas. Why did we spend so much time enforcing archaic design rules established and canonized by old white men that claimed that their form of design is “objectified” or “correct”?

Why did we not discuss the greater reasoning behind a decision, the reason behind our choices on a broader level. How do we feel about a specific idea or topic, and how does that affect our design practice? Often we see students falling within the camp of making whatever is “trendy” within the design space, or claims of a love for minimalism and clean aesthetics paired with overconsumption of online design through sites like Pinterest create a homogenous class design style. 20 portfolios walk out of the classroom with the same projects, same style, essentially the same work.

Breaking away from this idea can lead to punishment for experimentation, as what is not considered “good” design can be immediately rejected, students dogpile on the outcast of the class or the student who experimented receives a lower grade for their work(which in itself is a strong argument for the philosophy of ungrading). This creates a tension within the community of the classroom where students find themselves requiring to submit to “authority.” In the words of Joel Spring, a professor and activist writer;

“By attempting to teach automobile driving, sex education, dressing, adjustment to personality problems and a host of related topics, the school also teaches that there is an expert and correct way of doing all of these things and that one should depend on the expertise of others. Students in the school ask for freedom and what they receive is the lesson that freedom is only conferred by authorities and must be used “expertly.” This dependency creates a form of alienation which destroys peoples ability to act. Activity no longer belongs to the individual, but the the expert and the institution.”
— (Spring, 1998, pp. 26-27)

This moment, upon reading this exact quote, is when the entirety of my realization had set in.

Throughout my time and experience in education, I had constantly been taught that I must conform and fit within the acknowledgement of authority, be that the literal definition of authority in the form of a hierarchy between student and teacher, or a metaphorical, hidden authority that requires you to create art for the sake of others rather than yourself.

Students are removed of free will and autonomy through this process, nothing is created without the intention of proving worth or receiving validation from some sort of authoritarian figure. The teacher in this situation is not a gentle guide or helping hand to assist the process of learning, but instead the floor manager of a factory, ensuring that quotas are met and the workers(students) are kept in line.

That is exactly where I found myself caught up, as I transitioned to the world of VCFA, a school very similar in pedagogical process to the free schools I’ve been reading about, I had to venture outside of this authoritarian comfort zone in which I had not been required to think for myself.

My decisions were guided not by a pursuit of personal gain and enlightenment, but on whether or not it would be good to include in a packet, and whether my advisor (the authority) would view me as worthy and having met my quota. This line of thinking lead to personal stunted growth and a lack of understanding of how to create beyond the boundary lines. Every project and idea must be “valid” and “worthy”, and the projects must be large and perfectly researched and executed.

Enlightenment and the classroom.
(or, “Where the #$*! do we go from here?”)

Of course, no problem can be solved without the creation of another problem. In the tumultuous time we live in, and with the recent protests and encampments happening across the world at university campuses, we see a rise in dissent and confliction with the narrative told by the US governments.

However, even with the flak the university system is taking for it’s support of openly genocidal regimes and actively being fought against on that front, I still wonder how much ground we can clear in the fight for a more free and desirable educational system at a lesser cost. As someone who will be throwing myself into the fire of teaching at a University eventually, I worry that my research and line of thinking, as well as the pedagogy I am developing, will be seen as dangerous to the overall mission of the public schooling system of America.

Alternatively, I wonder what breakthroughs can be made to implement more of anarchistic and free schooling levels of thinking into a classroom as someone acting within the machine we are fighting against. The definition of Anarchism and the school of thought is so misunderstood within culture and media, viewed as violent and rowdy embodiments of teenage angst and punk ethos. I myself used to believe that as I leaned more towards other schools of thought in my lack of understanding.

What I’ve encountered instead is a truly welcoming community of critical thinkers dedicated to providing freedom and liberation from all forms of oppression. Communities of interesting and caring people who want desperately to make change in the world and recognize the system of oppression and suffering inherent within the capitalist structure of living.

My personal pedagogy as such grows and sides towards these lines of thought as I learn and flesh out what it means to teach in the modern age. Empathy and compassion, as well as understanding and mutualism are essential within the classroom to create an environment where every person is capable of growth and learning.

The act of teaching is also an act of learning, as every new student will present a new challenge or personality you will encounter, but what comes of developing a standoff-ish persona that pushes the students away? Mutual respect in the classroom must go both ways, as the role of the teacher will never stop continuing to be the role of the student as well.

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