The magazine of The Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers LI \ \\ The Round File v/e'd like, to publish an archive o-f documents that might otherwise be discarded. Send us ftSl V i l U' «i I '•tq selected pieces o-f junk mail, Dear Tohn letters, obituaries, pre-nups, religious tracts, doodles, V M x Hi j] drawings, pamphlets, mash notes, maps, etc. ^Vv\ S E /cerpts -from a doucument are -fine, too. Pleased 1 let.us know where and when you -found that piece and give us a -few words-o-f commentary about it. Issue 24 Summer 2002 FEDfest02 Freirian Liberation Strange Baggage Doncaster-Dumfries Pecket Well Publishing New Executive Book Reviews www.thefwwcp.org.uk issn 1330-8598 Federation Magazine No. 24 C o n t e n t s FEDitoral 3 FEDfest02 4 Freirian Liberation, Cultural Transaction and Writing from The Working Class and the Spades' 8 Doncaster-Dumfries Part 1 13 New Executive Committee Elected 15 PecketWell Publishing Project 16 Strange Baggage 19 Book and CD Reviews The Cool Books File 20 Our Lives Our Group 20 Hermit Space 21 Dreamcatcher 10 22 No Smoke 22 The Fire That Never Goes Out (The Carbeth Clearances) 23 Coal Faces Pit Heads 23 My Mother - Elizabeth Casey 24 The Federation of Worker Writers & Community Publishers The FWWCP was formed in 1976, and now -p 0 become a Member of the FWWCP contact has a Membership of sixty-five independently the address below. Membership is for groups only, organised writers' workshops, community individuals can take a valuable role by becoming a publishers and organisations in Britain, and Friend of the Fed, and get involved in all our around the World. It is an umbrella organisation activities. We would like to hear from you. By post: for those who wish to share their skills and work with their communities. The FWWCP aims to further working class writing and community publishing, and the Membership share a belief that writing and publishing should be made accessible to all. The FWWCP publish this magazine and a Broadsheet of writing; we run an annual Festival of Writing; organise training; develop networks; encourage people to express themselves; offer advice, and much more! e The FWWCP, Burslem School of Art, Queen Street, Stoke-on-Trent, UK ST6 3EJ By e-mail: thefwwcp@tiscali.co.uk Federation Magazine No. 24 F I D i t o r a I This issue focuses on the 2002 FedFest and some of the material which was presented in it. We also carry an article by Sandra Courtman on the role groups like the Federation had during the seventies in the development of Black British writing. Perhaps one of the questions this raises is 'how does a specific literature emerge? In my own article on how a group of mental health service users worked with Dumfries and Galloway Survivor Poets there may be some parallels with the experience that Sandra describes. At first there may be a lot of difficulty in overcoming the barriers to getting the words down. People need time to develop confidence in their own power of expression. The group we took to Scotland have not yet started to write for themselves, but are making the first steps later this year in a follow- up course. Around the time this issue goes to press the Workers Education Association are also hosting an event in Liverpool. One of the discussions will centre on the role of the Federation in promoting and developing working class writing, with two speakers who were prominent in the early history of our organisation, Jimmy McGovern and David Evans. An argument to be put forward is that the Federation no longer understands or represents working class culture. We are inviting participants in the discussion to publish their papers in the next issue of Federation. What do you think? Has the Fed lost its way? Does 'working class culture' retain a meaning? Should we reflect a diversity of working class cultures, or does the Fed need to 'firm up' it's definition? You might have other points to make about the Fed's role. Join in the debate. Nick Pollard, Editor FEDfest03 In Sheffield - April 25th to 27th 2003 FEDfest03 will take place at Sorby Hall (pictured right), at The University of Sheffield the weekend after Easter, April 25th to 27th 2003. So start saving now! The weekend will also be starting earlier than ever, with plans for some extra workshops on Friday afternoon (at a small extra fee, sorry!). The basic cost will be £95 including all workshops and accommodation. Full details of costs will be published in December 2002, with the Booking Form, but if you wish to book and start paying towards your weekend, please contact us on 01782 822327. Also new for 2003, Jane Griffiths will be co ordinating bookings and admin., and we have appointed a volunteer worker, gaining valuable experience, organising the workshops. So if you are thinking of coming and wish to convene a workshop, phone Sam Morris on 01782 822327 (she will be at the office most Wednesdays) or e-mail fwwcp@tiscali.co.uk. Sorby Hall is a mile or so outside the city centre, and set in beautiful grounds. There is a Botanical Gardens only a few minutes walk away and some shops nearby. All meeting rooms, workshops, meals, accommodation, and bar are in the same building, so getting about should present little problem. We look forward to seeing you in Sheffield next April, see Page 4 for the reactions to FEDfest02. Cover <©• This 'prompt' was produced for New City Press, one of our members in Philadelphia, by Jae Jung, a student at Tyler School of Art at Temple University. If you want to take part, send your 'throw aways' to the FWWCP, Burslem School of Art, Queen Street, Stoke on Trent ST6 3EJ, and we'll pass them on to August Tarrier at New City Press. Federation Magazine No. 24 FEDfest02 The FedFest is the highlight of the FWWCP year, a weekend of workshops, performances, bookstalls and readings, when people from member groups get together. Although there is an official programme of workshops and meetings, this event is also notable tor the amount of networking - and partying - which also happens. We have collated some of the comments from the feedback sheets and festival diaries compiled by festival attenders. If you read through these comments and feel you missed something, avoid this by booking now for FEDfest03 in Sheffield next year! Friday Friday offered a tour of the Walker Gallery, introductory 'rough guide'to the Fed, and an evening which looked back at the writing produced by Fed groups over the last year. Eric's tour of the (Walker) art gallery was a great way to start the weekend! Hazel Gardner and Sally Jordan, Lockerbie Writers Arrived about 3.40 pm to a lovely greeting. Uni staff and security very helpful. Room comfortable and not too far away from anything. The cup of tea at 5pm was a Godsend. Jim White, Grimsby Writers Arrived to find loop system hadn't been booked. Access generally is poor... another writers' group I know... wouldn't be able to attend an event this inaccessible. Made contact with Grimsby Writers and heard about a local network I'm interested in. great to see so many survivor poets. Despite lack of access to this event, it's obvious the Fed is welcoming to disabled people, and we're very well represented as a group. Ruth Maikin, Bradford Interchange Totally relaxed and loving talking to other group's members. Discussed with Jan (Pecket Well) her Saturday choice of poem. Sue Havercroft, Grimsby Writers Like always Friday night is a very good night to me, because the Chair welcomes everyone to the FED weekend, and it also gives you the chance to meet all the nice people who you met last year as well as new ones. Billy Cryer, Pecket Well The initial reading resulted in selling all my copies of Hard Stuff! Mike Hoy, Heeley Writers Arrived 5.30pm. Registered. Had excellent meal. Enjoyed informal evening of i n t r o d u c t i o n s / r e a d i n g s / socialising. Unfortunately I lapsed into bad habit mode and was the last to get to bed but still got up first next/same morning. I think I was excited. Rob Hanlon, High Peak Writers A short journey to Edge Hill. Great to see faces old and new. A trip to the off licence and then I'm ready to rumble. John Kerr, Prescot Writers Friday evening events: Brilliant - I found it gave me, as a newcomer, a really broad taste of what the Fed is all about. Lucia Birch, Stevenage Survivors ...then on to a party, in the best Fed tradition situated in a corridor and kitchen, where I had a long rambling chat with John Kerr, and met Jeff Hibbert. We discussed his project and I probably talked too much. Nick Pollard, Heeley Writers We just sat about for a while and Federation Magazine No. 24 Celebratory reading: Bunked off in the afternoon, but when I saw what the groups had produced, I regretted it. Evening performance was fun - but long, and I was the last but one! Party afterwards. Ruth Malkin, Bradford Interchange Great atmosphere, wonderful to have such enthusiasm. Pity it didn't start on time (but I guess that is the way of the Fed). John Malcomson, Heeley Writers Unbelievable - so many readers - so smoothly done - fun and games too - not a boring moment. Huge variety and all excellent. Lucia Birch, Stevenage Survivors FedFest does it again! Dave Chambers, Newham Writers Workshop Great songs and a good range of strong, funny writing. A bloody good night's entertainment for anyone's money. Nick Pollard, Heeley Writers It's worth more than money, and to read is what keeps me going from one year to the next. Jan Holliday, Pecket Well Absolutely outstanding! ...Superb quality of the work and performance... Maybe should start earlier to fit everyone in - shame to miss people out. Jim White, Grimsby Writers Never have I experienced three and a half hours in which not one item was boring and in which most were brilliant or nearly so. Roy Birch, Stevenage Survivors A wonderful evening which turned into an equally wonderful morning. Enjoyed all the readings andI was delighted with the response to my work. Robert Brandon, Shorelink Sunday Sunday began with more bookstalls, and was followed o talked, sorted out what workshops to attend for tomorrow. Went to bed quite early as the drive had been 8 hours long Shirley Patricia Cowan, Shorelink Saturday Saturday began with breakfast, and bookstalls, followed by the Annual General Meeting. The afternoon consisted of more workshops, talks from Jeff Hibbert of Temple University and Gudrun Seigel of Werkkreis, a German arts organisation. The evening saw the celebratory reading with some 50 performers, and went on to party into ' the small hours where more people read and sang. Bookstalls, buy? Bought, bought, bought. Grimsby Writers must sort themselves out next year and have a stand. Sue Havercroft, Grimsby Writers Went to the web workshop. Eventually Tim saved the day with his laptop and after that it went well. BUT NO COMPUTERS. Dave Chambers, Newham Writers Workshop The AGM: I think all candidates should declare themselves on the Friday night, certainly the executive ones, maybe not the ordinary members. It's uncomfortable appraising people on the spot for important positions. Sally Jordan, Lockerbie Writers It was great to have opposition in the elections and that people cared enough to debate the constitutional amendment. John Malcomson, Heeley Writers I like going to the AGM because it's one way of finding out what the Federation does Billy Cryer, Pecket Well Federation Magazine No. 24 with a further workshop session. A plenary meeting recorded the progress of the weekend and then people went to dinner, and home: Great breakfast and sold more books. Mike Hoy, Heeley Writers Great breakfast. Impromptu sing song with Roy and friends from Stevenage. Pat Smart's workshop was a treat. Jim White, Grimsby Writers 9.30 in the morning is too early for a serious workshop Roy Birch, Stevenage Survivors In conclusion Some overall responses: Generally people found the staff friendly and helpful, but the bar prices were felt to be extortionate. Some people found that distances around the university accommodation were too far for them and people with disabilities found themselves variously compromised by poor access or else the lack of facilities such as a loop system, (although the planning meetings with the Fed had raised most of the issues and had been given assurances that needs would be met). The talks were very informative. I was struck by the political nature of creativity in Germany and the need to remember worker art in the world's richest nation. Roy Birch, Stevenage Survivors. I was so impressed I cannot begin to put it into words except that I believe it was a spiritual event, so many wonderful souls laid bare. Doreen French, Gatehouse, I am a newcomer to the Fed... I think it is a marvellous organisation Shelagh Aldworth, Shore/ink I enjoyed the venue O l enjoyed the menu Old friends got together Marvellous weather A weekend of pleasure Memories to treasure ...It's like a family reunion without the family hassle... Jim White, Grimsby Writers I'm going away with lots of ideas and a renewed vigour to write. I would like (the festival) to be longer, time to do more workshops and free access to computers. Diana Higgins/Paul Hare, Pecket Well Over the weekend I wrote poetry and climbed a church tower, which I hadn't done before! Chris HadfieId, Gatehouse, Manchester Some FEDfest02 facts and figures • 121 people attended • There were 19 Workshops • 67 People performed at the official Saturday Evening Performance • For the first time there were 3 Individual Performing Spots • Over 70% of people were subidised by their Regional Arts Boards to attend • 5 new members were elected to the Executive Committee • It was Paul King's 5th time hosting the Performance • 2002 was the 25th AGM/ Festival the FWWCP have organised • It was the first one to be held in Liverpool The photographs of the Festival are taken by the participants with 'disposable' cameras, which are shared between all those attending. Thanks go to all the attenders for their comments and for making the weekend, despite problems with the venue, a great success. Federation Magazine No. 24 & i I That Fed Weekend in liverpool Anne I remember my first Fed Weekend... I was so nervous. You are suddenly confronted with all these new faces. What I found remarkable was how welcome I was made to feel. Sally I know what you mean, Anne. A bewilderment of strange faces. I thought of making a run for it, but after dinner (which was remarkably good), I decided to stay. Anne That first time.... I found it hard to strike up conversations with people but it got easier as the weekend went on. Sally Yes! On Friday evening I met some nice people followed by a sensible early night. Anne What did you think of the workshops? My first year I attended Bernard's session on typography. He deals with people with memory problems. I have also found the writing workshops informative; I have been shown how to condense a longish piece of writing so that it still makes sense. Sally My workshop was great fun. It was supposed to be about urban landscapes but we couldn't find a tower block and so climbed a church tower instead. The view from the top was not excessively urban, more suburban...there was a game of cricket in progress and lots of leafy bits. But beyond was the sea and ships. We came back down again windswept and inspired. Anne That first year I sat back and enjoyed the evening performances, but by the end of the night I was wishing that I had got up on stage. The following year I did. My knees knocking mind you, but you feel the audience willing you and supporting you to get up there and enjoy it. By the next year I had added wee bits of action to my reading and I feel that enhanced it. Sally I enjoyed performing but then I come from a family of posers. Fortunately the audience seemed to enjoy it too. Anne Have you ever thought of putting music to words? It was something that I had always wanted to do, so of I trotted off to Lindsay's workshop. It was quite a buzz to hear someone singing my words. Sally I'm afraid I was a little ill on Sunday. This was because Saturday went on until 6am on Sunday and by 10am I had the mother of all headaches. The post performance party was very good. Anne I look forward to the Fed Fest. It is one of the highlights of my year as I make so many new friends and rekindle friendships of old. It's also a welcome respite from the humdrum of everyday life; to travel to new places, face new challenges, try out new skills and be cerebrally challenged with the cross pollination of ideas, writings and readings. Sally My goodness Anne! Just reading that last sentence of yours has left me cerebrally challenged. Anne And are you going again next year then? Sally Absolutely! Anne Lambie and Sally Jordan Dumfries and Galloway Survivors Poetry and Lockerbie Writers Group A New Position Proposed The executive of our Federation Of Worker Writers and Community Publishers Should have another person on their podium An elected and selected member Who will hold in trust and solemn duty The Official Bottle Opener and Cork Screw With the title of Custodian Without these sacred tools the FedFest Would be bereft of cheer and true harmony. It would become a void Where poetry has no voice; Music: a mute tribute to normality. In the land of writers there is a need For continuity of blatant ridiculosity Wherein lies the true creativity, Where the Custodian holds the tools of Office Jan Holliday, Pecket Well College Federation Magazine No. 24 Freirian Liberation, Cultural Transaction and Writing from The Working Class and the Spades' 1 Sandra Courtman explores the writing by African-Carribean people living in Britain during the 1960's to the 1980's 'Old Father' Old Father to England in Winter '59 Cold bite him hard, Make him bawl in his small basement room By the Grove. Every day he cry out: "Man, a tekkin' de nex' boat back home." But come Spring, Old Father still here. Time Passed. Old Father feet begin to shift. His roots have no meaning now. Boy, Old father don't want to know we now, In his white Rover, With his slicked back hair. And them white people saying "He's an example to his people!" 2 Hugh Boatswain's 'Old Father' is one of the poems in a little-known anthology by working- class authors entitled quite simply Writing. In 1978, a predominantly white organisation, collectively they were named The Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers' (FWWCP), published their inaugural collection. In all probability, Boatswain's poem would not have been published without this collective which was founded on the notion of a left-wing grassroots solidarity. By the mid-1970s, it is well documented that racial tensions were severe enough to provoke serious civil unrest. But looking back at the events of 1976, Caryl Phillips tells Maya Jaggi: 'although there were riots in Toxteth, Brixton, Handsworth and Moss Side, our lives were not determined by them.' 3 Phillips reminds us that we might look to alternative forms of resistance from West Indian migrants and their children. Boatswain's work speaks to the conditions of the 70s and engages, in sparse poetic form, in much of the cultural analysis that is pivotal to this paper. Boatswain's poems demonstrate the importance of creativity, cultural transaction and transition in the historicising of West Indian migration and settlement in Britain. 'Old Father' describes a movement towards a black British autonomy, fully formed by the late nineties. Stuart Hall describes the transformation from assimilation to autonomy as follows: There is no sense that Britishness is an ideal to which we might want to subscribe or assimilate. We are fully confident in our own difference, no longer caught in the trap of aspiration which was sprung on so many of us who are older, as part of a colonial legacy described in Fanon's famous phrase Black skin, White mask. Black identity today is autonomous and not tradable. 4 I hope to demonstrate, in the brief space that this paper allows, that the so-called 'ordinary' and often silent majority of postwar West Indian migrants, and a generation of children born to them in Britain, chose to redefine and reaffirm themselves through the cultural transaction of creative writing. A transaction made possible because of Federation writers' and literacy groups that formed in the British cities. 'Old Father' is dialogic in that it dramatises the world-view of two generations of West Indian people: a 'first wave settler and a British-born poet who berates his elder for 'selling out'. They are both agents in the important cultural, ideological and generational shift that Hall describes above. Ron Ramdin's study, The Making of the Black Working Class in Britain, emphasises the division between black and white, between state and black youth in the consciousness raising years of the 70s. 5 Particular parts of Britain saw black youth running at the sight of a British 'bobby' until they, and their parents, refused to be harassed. Boatswain's poem 'Cut Up Dub' tells of the turning point: "Sorry son going to have to take you in, Lots of crimes in this area, Come on down to the station for questioning." Nex' morning, black boy come from the station, Federation Magazine No. 24 No bookings, no charges, Jus' a heapful a bruises. Man a' goin' bounce up Stokey tonight, But a' h'ain't goin' run in de dark. 6 If the British police force's institutional racism validated such behaviour to young black people in the 70s (and still does according to the Lawrence enquiry) what hope was there for a future equable multiracial citizenship? The emerging 'structure of feeling' is also captured in the Writing anthology in a photograph depicting the 60,000 British citizens demonstrating their political support and solidarity for the victims of racial harassment at an Anti-Fascist rally in Victoria Park in 1978. But where does someone caught in the continual 'fight or flight' scenario of the literal and imaginative 'ghetto', and who has never considered themselves as a writer, and who has never been part of an ethos of writing and publication, find the validity for such an activity? Few scholars of the British Caribbean diaspora know of a safe 'space' created for black youth and their parents by the Federation writers' groups. The writing was cathartic and, in turn, it stimulated reflection, transcendence and growth. The Federation enabled migrant writers, and their children, forging identities in a troubled metropolitan space, to record and reject their disempowerment. The title of the paper quotes from Selvon's 50s masterpiece, The Lonely Londoners, alluding to an earlier West Indian empathy with the white working class. Arriving in a bombed out Britain in the 1950s, West Indians found that the separations and horrors of war had traumatised and bewildered the Motherland: It have a kind of communal feeling with the Working Class and the spades, because when you poor things does level out, it don't have much up and down. A lot of men get kill in war and leave widow behind, and it have bags of these old geezers who does be pottering about the Harrow Road like if they lost, a look in their eye as if the war happen unexpected and they still can't realise what happen to the old Brit'n. 7 Or as Caryl Phillips puts it: British people 'had no idea what the fuck was going on with all these black faces arriving'. 8 Any sense of fraternity would soon prove fickle when, a decade after Selvon's The Lonely Londoners, London Dockers and Smithfield meat-packers openly demonstrated their support for Enoch Powell's anti-immigration lobby. A decade later, by 1976, black people were on the streets communicating very powerfully how little investment they had in a British way of life. However, a challenge to a white, male, middle-class hegemony was to manifest itself (amongst other things) in the origins the Federation. It responded to complex post-war social, cultural and political developments which had increasingly threatened any notion of a cultural consensus. A brief explanation of the ethos of the organisation is necessary in order to understand the conditions under which some of the writing came to be generated. Nine groups of writers formed the initial membership of the FWWCP, orchestrated by Chris Searle and Ken Worpole in 1976; it was sparked by progressive educational, as well as cultural and political, concerns. Searle and Worpole demanded a curriculum for English teaching that would relate to the lives of working- class children and which would validate forms originating from that culture. 9 Inspired by the pedagogy of Paolo Freire which insisted that liberation of the oppressed must involve literacy acquisition, and a move toward reconceptualisation - which begins with the oppressed first speaking then writing his own words. Diverse voices - regional, foreign and ungrammatical - became the subjects of development rather than eradication. The state system had failed an alarming number of adults who were leaving school with poor reading skills. National research into literacy meant, importantly, that the funds became available for the first time for projects specifically targeted at adults. 10 Federation groups funded as Adult Literacy projects - ironically, in order to standardise written English - were to provide West Indians with opportunities for expression, including some first attempts at writing in Creole. The 'writing from the working class and the spades' in the title refers more specifically to an alliance of activists and creative writers. Formed in Liverpool, one of the founding member groups of the Federation was the highly politicised 'Scottie Road group' (which included such talent as the young Jimmy McGovern). In 1970, this group of white working-class writers, Liverpool's Irish immigrants of 150 years before, founded a workshop to include Caribbeans and an exiled South African writer.The workshop was situated in a staunchly white catholic area of Liverpool - Scotland Road. The group gave Federation Magazine No. 24 readings, taking black writers and performers into pubs where they would almost certainly not have felt comfortable. 11 After hotly debating its purpose - the Arts Council funded the Federation's first full-time paid national coordinator (the Arts Council insisted on calling the post 'Literature Development Officer') and its first anthology, Writing, in 1978. 12 The member groups went on to publish short stories and poems in small-scale community anthologies and poetry journals. Founded originally on the premise of a unifying left-wing solidarity, this was to change when a supposed working-class alliance fragmented on political, gender and race issues. So that, by the 1980s there were separatist anthologies funded by Race Equality Units. The initial orthodoxy of early Federation membership demanded that members should be working-class and groups applying to join were 'vetted', but because West Indians from diverse cultural and social backgrounds were de-classed, homogenised as 'immigrants', they were welcomed regardless of their societal position back home. The groups operated democratically, with no regard for commercial considerations or for received notions of what constituted 'poetry' or 'fiction'. As Rebecca O'Rourke put it they 'put two fingers up to the establishment'. 13 Consequently some of the written forms are difficult to categorise but they nevertheless constitute an important impetus toward written expression for first and second wave West Indian migrants, many of whom it is often asserted are exclusively wedded to oral expression. There is little doubt that a desperate sense of homesickness is the key to the release of much of the writing produced by migrants in Federation groups. The practicalities of living in a foreign country stimulated the need to acquire standard English, but as part of a group, they would also find comfort in the sharing of their feelings with other Caribbeans in a similar position. 14 But for many West Indians in Britain, homesickness - the actual severance from loved ones, familiar objects and rituals - was a very real problem that might be eased by the company of the writers'group.The differences between British and Caribbean food and the difficulties of obtaining simple ingredients, such as long-grain rice, would often serve as a focus for their alienation. 15 Ironically, it was under the auspices of an 'English class', which nevertheless ^ insisted on maintaining the authenticity of West Indian language and expression, that Captain Blackboard's Beef Creole and other Caribbean Recipes came to be published. The introduction explains: 'As far as possible we have written Captain Blackbeard as we spoke it, each recipe in the voice of its author'. 16 And those authors, all thirty-four women and six men, are named. The book is ostensibly a recipe collection, but it also includes stories of events attached to certain meals, poems, songs and illustrations, and as such it represents a particular response to change brought about by migration and the reconstitution of rituals and identities under threat. The publication affirms the importance of knowledge and skills which would have previously been passed on as an everyday part of an oral culture and includes techniques which may well be traced back to survival strategies developed by an enslaved society taken from Africa.They may possibly have been written down for the first time in order to ensure their absolute survival on the 'third passage' from the Caribbean to England. The recipes, and the instructions concerned with social occasions, carry with them the coded messages of a 'people without history', people who are left out of 'official' literature. 17 People who are seldom recorded in 'official' historical documents are honoured in the names of the recipes: 'George's Pumpkin and Chocho Soup with Dumplings'; 'Vilma's Roast Chicken' and 'Eualia's Okra, Shrimps and Saltfish'. A written record is unnecessary in a closely-knit community with a shared heritage and culture. In a sense, the Peckham group of Caribbean writers, separated from that community, represent the need to find new ways of recording material that would not normally be written down: that is the rituals, processes and cooking implements that feature in Captain Blackbeard. The anthropological nature of the information given reveals aspects of life that may well have remained part of an important but 'silent legacy'. An example here is the recipe for'Simon's Strong Rum Punch', which is set alongside the following information on how to obtain the main ingredient: The Rum Factor/ I know these men who work at the sugar cane factory They make rum there The men usually take rum home by soaking their coat in the rum in the vat Federation Magazine No. 24 when they get there in the morning. When they are ready to come home in the evening they take their coat out and put it in a plastic bag and take it home with them. When they get home they wring the coat out, and leave the rum to settle. Then they put it in a bottle and keep it for drink and give their friend some. This was the strong rum. You can't buy it in the bar. 18 We may surmise that this (illegal and dangerous) practice dates in some form from the earliest sugar plantations and their refineries. Indeed, much of the writing, which is set out visually in the quasi-poetic format demonstrated above, is intent on giving detailed instructions to the novice on quite specialised skills - such as 'killing a Chicken', 'Salting, Smoking and Pickling' - all of which might be supposed to be redundant in urban Peckham but which reaffirm a quite distinct Caribbean identity. To be fully understood, such material needs to be studied from within the community that continues to cascade it. Although the very existence of Federation 'community' publications (by definition) reflects their supposed significance and validity for their immediate constituents (in this case Peckham), as they become written down to ensure their survival, their wider availability poses a problem of interpretation which needs to be addressed. Of course as you can tell from Boatswain's work, writing produced by Federation black writers was not all to do with recipes and reminiscence, neither did it existed solely to combat homesickness and to record traditional Caribbean rituals and practices. It is clear from the archives that Caribbean poets joined the Federation because they were highly politicised and their writing spoke to the conditions of the 70s that had also inspired Linton Kwesi Johnson, the Race Today Collective and Stuart Hall. This poem was published in a 1987 anthology, Not All Roses: 9 'Watch It!', by a Federation woman poetThandiwe Benjamin, relates the 'sus' law to a history of migration in the context of its various stages: of the failed assimilation of the 1960s and the disassociation and resistance of the '70s. In so doing, it anticipates the reactions that would provoke the riots of the '80s: 'YOU BETTER WATCH IT. We build up de street And we clean up de street, A drive a bus in de street But you won't leave us in peace. Now we a go a rioting in de street. Me seh fe watch it Black people a go mash it. When blood a running Know that we're not funnin'. No bother hide cos We a go get you You better watch it! 20 Benjamin's work is a barometer of the changed consciousness of a second-generation of Caribbeans who would have no experience of the gentle agrarian lifestyle recorded in Captain Blackbeard. However, both types of poetry - the reminiscence work and the politicised commentary - were made possible because of important shifts: by the late 1970s, events in Britain which had stimulated the formation of the Federation were to provide a unique set of conditions for poets whose work had never 'fitted' European models and whose opportunities for expression had been hitherto denied. To conclude, then, the unique context provided for by the politicised workshops provided a safe cultural space for disaffected Caribbean adolescents who, by the 1970s, had been failed by a British education system. Ken Worpole recalled that Vivian Usherwood, Sandra Agard and Hugh Boatswain were part of a group of 'very talented young black writers around Centreprise' in the mid-1970s. 21 Additionally, it becomes clear that many of their parents, so called 'ordinary' migrants were developing their literacy, their political analysis and their creative writing. To be fair, some of the material reflects the fledgling status of its writing but, equally, much of it is rich, compelling and uniquely informative. However, it is pointless to attempt, as the Arts Council's funding committee did, to judge its merits by Eurocentric literary standards. The real achievement of the Federation was its ability to create the conditions to release denied expression: setting up projects to enable adults to acquire literacy, promoting oral history projects from groups marginalised by society (for example - immigrants and travellers); and o Federation Magazine No. 24 by validating the idea of working-class creativity and agency. By facilitating the publication of the outcomes, the Federation circulated a lived experience of 'difference', and provided an environment for writers to explore that difference. The success of this movement led Stuart Hall to express his 'amazement'to Anne Walmsley in an interview: Europe has shunted culture off to one side. It's the higher arts. I think, [what] has certainly amazed me [is] the notion of black school kids writing about their experience in poetry and so on. 22 As one of the most grounded and influential 'blacks in an ivory tower', Hall recognises the significance of a working-class writing movement, and its accomplice community publishing, as part of a new type of ownership of a different, non- European, notion of culture. Lola Young recently observed (on a Radio 4 debate on constructions of 'Englishness'), that the people in the poorest parts of Britain are much less easily defined along race lines than in the American ghetto. But what is clear from the Federation publications, is that people in some of the most deprived areas of London, Liverpool and elsewhere engage in their own cultural analysis. It is not clear whether Hugh Boatswain read Frantz Fanon before he wrote his poem, but 'Old Father' communicates the idea of 'Black Skins and White Masks' in a way that his immediate constituency can respond to, demonstrating that people written about by cultural theorists, sociologists and ethnographers will write about themselves, for themselves, and for each other. Sandra Courtman With thanks to those people who gave generously of their time in interviews and who supplied textual materials to enable this research. You can contact Sandra by e-mail on s.e.courtman@staffs.ac.uk Notes 1. The quotation in the title of the paper is from Samuel Selvon, The Lonely Londoners (London, Longman, 1985; first published Allen Wingate, 1956) p.75. 2. Hugh Boatswain, 'Old Father", in Writing, Federation of Worker Writers and Community Publishers (London: Centreprise, 1978), p. 45. 3. Maya Jaggi, The Final Passage: An interview with Writer Caryl Phillips', in Kwesi Owusu, ed. Black British Culture and Society, (London: Routledge, 2000), p.159. 4. Stuart Hall,' Frontlines and Backyards: The Terms of Change', in Owesu, p. 127. O 5. Ron Ramdin, The Making of the Black Working Class in Britain (Aldershot: Wildwood, 1987). 6. Hugh Boatswain, 'Cut Up Dub', in Writing, pp.46-47. 7. Selvon, ibid, p. 75. 8. Caryl Phillips, opcit, p. 161. 9. In 1971, Chris Searle was dismissed from his teaching job as a result of a dispute concerning his publication of school- children's writing. Searle had not gained official permission to publish Stepney Words (London: Centreprise, 1973; First published in two editions by Reality Press in 1971). The back cover blurb validates the project: '15,000 copies of these poems have been printed and sold, giving these young working-class children a readership far larger than many established poets.' 10. 'A grant of £1 million for the financial year 1975-76, [became available] to help local authorities and others meet the expected initial increase in demand for adult literacy...*. A.H. Charnley and H.A. Jones, The Concept of Success in Adult Literacy, 3rd. edn (London: Adult Literacy and Basic Skills Unit, 1986; first published, Huntinton, 1979), p. 2. 11. Author's interview with Barbara Blanche and Barbara Shane, founding members of 'Scottie Road' writers' group. Liverpool 8, 28.6.2000. 12. See Jim McGuigan, The State and Serious Writing: Arts Council Intervention in the English Literary Field', unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Leicester, 1984. 13. Author's interview with Rebecca O'Rourke, Middlesborough, 17.7.95 14. See Louise Bennett's poem 'Homesickness' in Stewart Brown and Ian McDonald, eds., The Heinemann Book of Caribbean Poetry ( London: Heinemann, 1992), pp. 11-12. 15. First-wave migrants from the Caribbean tell how they were forced to use a type of pudding rice in their recipes. This would transform one of their staple recipes, rice and peas, into a mush. 16. Written and collected by a group of Caribbean writers attending a 'Peckham Bookplace' English class, Captain Blackbeard's Beef Creole and other Caribbean Recipes (London: Peckham Publishing Project, 1981), pp. 64-65. 17. See Laura Esquivel, Like Water For Chocolate: A Novel in Monthly Instalments with Recipes, Romances and Home Remedies (London: Black Swan, 1993). 1 8. Captain Blackbeard, pp. 64-65. 19. 'According to a report published in 1978,44% of the "sus" arrests in London in 1977 were black youths; but black youths made up only 2.8% of the total population', in 'Racism and the Law', Racism in the Workplace and Community ( Milton Keynes: The Open University, 1984), p. 3