Theology from Below and the Struggle for the Commons: A Conversation with Peter Linebaugh

This episode’s guest is Peter Linebaugh, author and historian. In this episode, we are in conversation with Peter about his many books, including The Many-Headed Hydra, a widely influential book co-authored with Marcus Rediker that excavates the hidden revolutionary history of transatlantic resistance, rebellion, and solidarity against slavery and the enclosure of land. 

Peter speaks to us about the ongoing history of capitalist exploitation and extraction, the sin of private property, the connection between the prison and the expropriation of land, always seeking to make visible the centrality of how ordinary working people have cooperated together for life, freedom, and love. 

This is an episode about learning to do theology from below, that is, learning to paying attention to the revolutionary actions and possibilities of ordinary people of faith who have refused to comply with forms of social life predicated on death, resisting servitude and enclosure and with courage – and often at tremendous risk – act together to level and dig up the hedges and fences and borders intended to keep people from the land that sustains life.

Peter speaks to us about counter-movements and counter-theologies, the principles of commoning, and the ongoing forms of global resistance to enclosure and dispossession. Peter shares stories "from below" of human cooperation and considers how this is lived out today.

Resources

Red Round Globe Hot Burning

The Many Headed Hydra

The Magna Carta Manifesto

Stop, Thief!

Episode Transcription available here

Host: Ry O. Siggelkow

Producer: Adam Pfuhl

Podcast Engineer: Michael Moua

Music: Kavyesh Kaviraj

Episode Recorded on November 14th, 2022

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