Situationist International Anthology

(Paperback)

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In 1957 a few European avant-garde groups came together to form the Situationist International. Picking up where the dadaists and surrealists had left off, the situationists challenged peoples passive conditioning with carefully calculated scandals and the playful tactic of dtournement. Seeking a more extreme social revolution than was dreamed of by most leftists, they developed an incisive critique of the global spectacle-commodity system and of its Communist pseudo-opposition, and their new methods of agitation helped trigger the May 1968 revolt in France. Since then situationist theories and tactics have continued to inspire radical currents all over the world.

The Situationist International Anthology is the most comprehensive and accurately translated collection of situationist writings in English. It presents a rich variety of articles, leaflets, graffiti, and internal documents, ranging from experiments in psychogeography to lucid analyses of the Watts riot, the Vietnam War, the Prague Spring, the Chinese Cultural Revolution, and other crises and upheavals of the sixties.

For this new edition the translations have all been fine-tuned and over 100 pages of new material have been added.

Author Bio

Ken Knabb has translated numerous works by Guy Debord and the Situationist International, including Debord's The Society of the Spectacle (2014; reissued by PM Press in 2024) and Debord's Complete Cinematic Works (2003; to be reissued by PM Press in 2025). Knabb's own writings, published in Public Secrets: Collected Skirmishes of Ken Knabb (1997) and posted online at his "Bureau of Public Secrets" website, have been translated into more than fifteen languages. He is currently presenting a series of Zoom webinars on The Society of the Spectacle and the Situationist International Anthology. Ken Knabb has translated numerous works by Guy Debord and the Situationist International, including Debord's The Society of the Spectacle (2014; reissued by PM Press in 2024) and Debord's Complete Cinematic Works (2003; to be reissued by PM Press in 2025). Knabb's own writings, published in Public Secrets: Collected Skirmishes of Ken Knabb (1997) and posted online at his "Bureau of Public Secrets" website, have been translated into more than fifteen languages. He is currently presenting a series of Zoom webinars on The Society of the Spectacle and the Situationist International Anthology.