How to Not Build a Nation

Overview

The Forest Curriculum presents an eight-part experimental and research-oriented zine publication as part of its research stream titled ‘How to Not Build a Nation’ (HTNBAN). The series is based on an understanding of the modes in which nation-states (as both conceptual configurations and empirical realities) reproduce and perpetuate colonial and precolonial violences. It also examines the role of non-human agencies, through which these historical and contemporary processes operate as they traverse the histories of empire-making, colonialism and everyday resistances across south and southeast Asia.

The new zine publication consists of eight parts: four new publications emerging from the collaborative artistic research initiatives for the Forest Curriculum's HTNBAN project and four new editions of existing publications developed through the Forest Curriculum’s previous engagements and projects.

The volumes of the zine series include Fugue by Cristian Tablazon, In the Mountain the Only Money is Opium by Pujita Guha, Making a Stand of Trees: Reforesting Disavowal by Huiying Ng, Forest Textuality by Chairat Polmuk, Two Texts for Transness by Tao Lei Goffe and Wong Bing Hao, Heat (Stress) by Kent Chan and Dennis Dizon, Biography of a Fish by Dharmendra Prasad, Omehen by Alfred Marasigan and Karl Castro, Lusia by Cahyo Prayogo and Red Murti and A Pantry of Things by Ezekiel Sales.