As a matter of fact, Miriam, it was through finding my name on Bookshare
that Maurice now finds himself now on this list. There is some thing
about volunteering that is a bit discouraging. The Bookshare collection
is so large now that it is kind of hard to find something to add to it
that is not already there or is likely to be added by a publisher. That
means that generally I have to find some pretty obscure books to scan.
Lately the ones I have been working on came from a friends of Library
book sale. A neighbor went to one of those sales and bought a large
number of paperback books in bulk. Altogether they ended up costing less
than a nickel each. I was allowed to sort through them and take what I
wanted. I did that by looking them up on Bookshare and I kept the ones
that Bookshare did not already have. This means that I ended up working
on a lot of books that I was not especially interested in. It is not
just a matter of slapping a book on a scanner and submitting whatever
scans. The way I do it is to scan one page at a time and then read
through each page listening for scanning errors before going on to the
next page and I correct any scanning errors that I come across. Then
every two pages I do a spell check. This is slow and painstaking work.
But then I rarely get any feedback about whether my scans are actually
even being read by anyone. For all I know I could be doing all this work
for nothing. Well, Maurice gave me some unexpected feedback. Since he is
involved in the project to make Pathfinder books accessible he and the
people he is working with did look up Pathfinder books on Bookshare. He
tells me that they did notice very quickly that the bulk of Pathfinder
titles there were contributed by me and he recognized my name. That led
to his looking for a way to contact me and he found me on Goodreads. I
knew Maurice quite a few years ago. One of the problems with
volunteering for Bookshare is acquiring books to scan. A lot of
volunteers scan books from public libraries. I have done that myself,
but the public library is a little difficult for me to get to here. One
of my sources is PaperbackSwap.com. If I order a book from that web site
I have to settle for what happens to be available at the time I am
looking to order, but I did find some Pathfinder books there. That was
the source of the Pathfinder books I scanned for Bookshare. That is, I
look for the cheapest sources. Buying books from the usual sites on the
Internet like Amazon or certain others can get really expensive after a
while. But my worries about the futility of it were there even when I
was scanning the Pathfinder books. I kept asking myself if anyone was
really even bothering to read these books once I get them into the
collection. I still kind of wonder that, but at least Maurice has now
informed me that I have been noticed. In fact, he tells me that my ears
should have been burning because they were talking about me so much.
Anyway, he tells me that the reason Pathfinder does not submit publisher
quality books to Bookshare is that Bookshare requires that the
electronic files be in a certain format and that Pathfinder books are in
another format. Apparently it is not an easy job to just convert them. I
do have an idea, though, that I thought of as I have been typing this,
but since this a reply to you, Miriam, Maurice may not have read this
far. So I will make the suggestion in a separate email. Anyway, Maurice
found me on Goodreads and sent a friend request and we have exchanged a
series of messages on that platform and I invited him to join this list.
So here he is.
___
Carl Sagan
“Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No, no scientist enjoys
it. Every scientist feels a proprietary affection for his or her ideas and
findings. Even so, you don’t reply to critics, Wait a minute; this is a really
good idea; I’m very fond of it; it’s done you no harm; please leave it alone.
Instead, the hard but just rule is that if the ideas don’t work, you must throw
them away.”
― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
On 12/2/2020 12:14 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Maurice,
Are you aware of Bookshare? It provides digital access to books of all kinds to
blind and disabled people. It has arrangements with many publishers who give it
access to books which it then produces in various accessible formats. However,
more specialized books are scanned by blind and disabled volunteers and
uploaded to Bookshare which then makes these books available. Roger, who is
moderator of the Blind Democracy list and is very involved in socialist
movements, is a volunteer for Bookshare. Bookshare is only involved with
books, not with periodicals. But Bookshare is something that you might want to
pursue. I'd suggest that you contact Roger.
rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>,
I wish you luck.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Maurice Peret
Sent: Wednesday, December 2, 2020 9:28 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Growing the arsenal of revolutionary literature.
Dear List Members:
For those of us who are blind or otherwise print disabled, the greatest
obstacle that remains is access to information and infrastructure. Amidst a
rapidly declining capitalist system and worldwide pandemic, our access to
public facilities, transportation, quality education and employment, material
and intellectual resources, and access to print and digital content remain
obstacles that require much of our effort and attention to overcome. I submit
that we are not alone in having been traumatically disconnected and detached
from our rich history and ideals. It is well worth further examination of the
parallel developments of the disability rights movement and the embattled
tradition of revolutionary resistance to state and corporate repression.
In the wake of massive uprisings around the country and indeed around the world
to routinized racist and state sanctioned murderous assaults on working people,
disproportionately of oppressed nationalities, there has been a rigorous
distraction from revolutionary class-conscious politics packaged in
guilt-baiting identity politics in the name of race, politics, history, and
institutionally responsible historical revisionism.
The past several years has inspired me to reconnect with a revolutionary
continuity that is every bit as much a part of our national fabric as anything,
useless or otherwise, not taught to us in academia.
I must credit the early years of my political training for inspiring in me a
passion and commitment to master Braille as my primary medium.
It instilled in me a discipline of study and reading to absorb the lessons of
how progress was achieved in an otherwise repressive society. I will not
expound here upon the mountains of evidence of such repression but instead
focus my energy and hopefully your interest in engaging in a project to make
available revolutionary literature for which there is a growing hunger.
I will begin by describing my motivation to engage in this project.
The Teamster series is a book compilation of four volumes that chronicle the
over-the-road organizing campaign and union strike actions which became
national in scope beginning in 1934. This occurred in a fascinating historic
period in our nation in the depths of a worldwide economic depression, the
recent 1917 victorious Bolshevik revolution in Russia that instilled terror in
the capitalist classes, and enormous class struggle battles in Europe which
gave way to rising fascist movements. The series begins with a book entitled
“Teamster Rebellion,” the second is “Teamster Power,” the third in the series
is called “Teamster Politics,” and finally, the fourth is titled “Teamster
Bureaucracy.” This occurred during a time of powerful working-class
organizations inspired by international revolutionary developments. AT the very
center of these powerful union battles, in fact, was an incredibly strong cadre
of revolutionary socialists who worked, organized, and struggled shoulder to
shoulder with workers in skilled trades and specialized crafts, unskilled
laborers, and even those among the vast army of the unemployed.
It is often said that history is written from the point of view of the victors.
History is not stagnant but dynamic. The Victors in the case of the US
capitalists, their government, and their media have indisputably written many
of the past few chapters but we are by no means at the end of the story, which
brings me to the point.
The Teamsters series is only a small portion of the catalog of international
and multilingual literature that documents the continuity of resistance in the
United States and around the world from the French to the Russian revolution,
to the combined international strength of South African freedom fighters and
their Cuban allies, and to anticolonial and revolutionary struggles from
Vietnam to Burkina Faso in Africa.
Among these powerful books include
Three books to be read as one...
...about building the only kind of party worthy of the name “revolutionary”
in the imperialist epoch.
• A party that’s working class in program, composition, and action.
• A party that recognizes, in word and deed, the most revolutionary fact of
our time:
That working people—those the bosses and privileged layers who serve them fear
as “deplorables,” “criminals,” or just plain “trash”—have the power to create a
different world as we organize and act together to defend our own interests,
not those of the class that grows rich off exploiting our labor. That as we
advance along that revolutionary course, we’ll transform ourselves and awaken
to our capacities—to our own worth.
Three books about building such a party in the US and worldwide.
Distributors of revolutionary books such as these along with a newspaper that
has been in circulation since 1928 called “The Militant; a Socialist newspaper
published in the interest of working people” cannot keep their shelves
adequately stocked. When I was among these revolutionaries years ago, it was a
painstaking effort for me to find ways to get these books recorded but with a
renewed interest and with technology providing the possibility for digital
access to these books, I have re-engaged in the revolutionary workers movement.
I am working with a group of supporters of Pathfinder Press whose main project
is to produce, digitize and keep books like these in circulation. Blind and
otherwise print disabled people should have access to these books, as well. If
there is sufficient interest among us, then collectively we can help by sharing
our knowledge and skills to guide the means to make it available.
Please contact me off list to discuss in more detail at MauricePeret@xxxxxxxxx.
In Solidarity,
--
Maurice Peret
MOBILE/TEXT: 804.928.4015
