The Rabble's Lifecraft: Institutional Tinkering as a Practice of Freedom

In her talk, Valeria Graziano will present ongoing work on phenomena of popular illegalism (Foucault) understood as practices of freedom (Freire) characterized by techniques of institutional tinkering: finding workarounds, adaptations and tools to enhance one's and other's capacity to act from within in a dysfunctional settings and from within unequal power dynamics. Those who are living at the edges of social systems that fail them are often forced to develop tools and strategies that are considered unacceptable at the heart of these systems. Sometimes lying, cheating and stealing are born out of urgency, in order to exercise self-defence and self-care, to obtain a right to vital services; other times, they are creative acts devised to reclaim access to pleasure. Such acts of defiance are widespread, evidenced by their varied expressions across different cultures and eras, particularly in regions problematically labeled as the Global "South" and "East". Valeria Graziano will share a number of examples from real life and artistic practices which allow us to approach of the political import of this topic, not from a moral standpoint, but through ethical and poetic means, with the aim is not to indiscriminately celebrate personal gain through illicit behavior, but to acknowledge the ingenuity that comes in finding a way out of an impossible situation.

Dr. Valeria Graziano is DAAD Visiting Lecturer at the Institute for Applied Theatre Studies, Justus Liebig University Giessen, and an Associate Researcher of the Centre for Advanced Studies Southeast Europe, University of Rijeka. Over the years, she has been involved in a number of participatory action research initiatives across social movements and the cultural sector. In her work, she has contributed to theories of militant conviviality, the refusal of work, politics of recreation, and collective repair. Graziano is one of the initiators of the Micropolitcs Research Group and of the Pirate Care Syllabus project, with a publication forthcoming in 2024 with Pluto Press. She serves as coordinator of the Working Group "Analysis, Theory and Politics of Care", within the COST Action Toolkit for Care (CA21102) and is one of the lead researchers for the EU project 'Figure it Out: The Art of Living Through System Failures' (CREA-CULT-2022-COOP-1). Her latest essay, "Vom Praktizieren der Kongruenz in der Wissensproduktion" appears in Technopolitiken der Sorge, edited by Christoph Brunner, Grit Marti Lange, nate wessalowski (Transversal texts, 2023).