This fall, we are starting a new program to follow up the publication of David Graeber’s new collection of essays The Ultimate Hidden Truth of the World…, edited and with an introduction by Nika Dubrovsky and with a foreword by Rebecca Solnit, which will be out in November 2024. We will begin on the 2nd of September, in commemoration of David’s death.

The first event will be facilitated by Dyan Neary, a writer, journalist, academic, and documentary filmmaker whose feature stories and essays appeared in New York Magazine, Elle, The New York Times, the New York Review of Books, Writer’s Digest, The Nation, the Florida Trident, and elsewhere. Dyan is a professor of journalism at West Chester University of Pennsylvania. She was a close friend of David’s for more than 20 years, used to share David’s family apartment in Chelsea alongside her daughter, and knew his mom Ruth Rubinstein. Together, we are going to look at David’s essay I didn’t understand how widespread rape was. Then the penny dropped. 

The first part of the series will focus on the collection’s opening essay, There Never Was a West, with Cory Doctorow, Marcus Rediker, Greg Yudin and Mirko Canevaro facilitating discussion on several aspects of the work. Other guest speakers, who will join the group in 2025, include James Schneider, Steven Bachelor and other speakers. More participants along with details about the upcoming events will be announced shortly.

Each talk, facilitated by a special guest speaker, will occur on the first Thursday of every month (except for Dyan Neary’s inaugural event on September 2nd and David’s birthday on February 12th).

All events are accessible to anyone wishing to discuss David’s essays from the collection with guest speakers. Following the event, video recordings will be publicly available on DGI’s YouTube channel. 

We will also launch a creative social media campaign to support the upcoming program.