Contribution short abstract:

In this roundtable I reflect on the practice of gathering in spaces that are not invested in your survival and how this reaching forward nurtures a commons, one found in the undercommons.

Contribution long abstract:

Gathering has always had the capacity to wield the illicit edge of subversion, whether that was gathering in the clearing, in the basement or in the library. Moten and Harney’s ‘Undercommons Fugitive Planning & Black study’ reminds us of the radical practice that gathering is, and the potential it creates for a commons to emerge, one which is neither for or against but recognises that which has been refused and in turn refused by us. Within the field of anthropology, these spaces rarely exist, infrequently have I found myself being gathered, or arrived within a gathering that created the energy to perpetuate change. Yet, within this space we all exist if only we could see each other, if only the institution and its forms and practices didn’t stand in our way clouding our eyes. Therefore, in this roundtable I reflect on the practice of gathering in spaces that are not invested in your survival and how this reaching forward nurtures a commons, one found in the undercommons.