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'''The Small Axe Project''' is an integrated publication undertaking devoted to Caribbean intellectual and artistic work, exercised over fourthree platforms—'''''Small Axe'''''; '''''sx salon'', ''sx visualities'', and '''''sx archipelagosvisualities'''''—each with a different structure, medium, and practice.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/ Small Axe Project] official website. Retrieved 21 July 2017.</ref>
The Project also curates related events, symposia, and exhibitions. The ''Small Axe'' Project is administered by Small Axe Incorporated, a not-for-profit [501(c)3] organization established in New York State in 2002, and is funded by [[The Ford Foundation]], [[The Reed Foundation]], [[Andy Warhol#Warhol Foundation|The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts]], [[The Wolf Kahn and Emily Mason Foundation]], and the [[National Endowment for the Humanities]]. '''David Scott''' is Director, and [[Nijah Cunningham]], Coordinator.
The aim of the Small Axe Project is to promote the expansion and revision of the scope of Caribbean criticism across multiple platforms. The Project aims to rethink the conceptions that guided the formation of Caribbean modernities; namely, race, class, sovereignty, democracy, development, gender, nation and culture. At the same time, the project is concerned with re-conceptualizing the Caribbean as an object of knowledge and study, across its three major linguistic regions—[[anglophone]], [[francophone]] and [[hispanophone]].
The current project statement reads:
{{Quote | The Small Axe Project is a transnational, interdisciplinary, and dialogical space of debate and creative expression from and about the Caribbean region and its diasporas. Such a discursive and aesthetic space, as we imagine it, is necessarily open-ended, propelled by a spirit of adventure and criticism. Our mission is to inspire, build, and sustain such a space of inquiry and articulation.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/#project "Small Axe Project"]. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>}}
==David Scott==
David Scott is the president of Small Axe Inc., the director of the Small Axe Project, and the founding editor of ''Small Axe'' journal. He teaches in the Department of Anthropology at [[Columbia University]]. He is the author of ''Formations of Ritual: Colonial and Anthropological Discourses on the Sinhala Yaktovil'' (1994), ''Refashioning Futures: Criticism After Postcoloniality'' (1999), ''Conscripts of Modernity: The Tragedy of Colonial Enlightenment'' (2004), ''Omens of Adversity: Tragedy, Time, Memory, Justice'' (2014), and ''Stuart Hall’sHall's Voice: Intimations of an Ethics of Receptive Generosity'' (2017). He is also co-editor of ''Powers of the Secular Modern: Talal Asad and his Interlocutors'' (2007), He is currently working on a book project examining the moral imperative of reparations for New World slavery.<ref>[http://anthropology.columbia.edu/people/profile/373 "David Scott"], Department of Anthropology at Columbia University. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>
David Scott was awarded the [[Council of Editors of Learned Journals]] (CELJ) Distinguished Editor prize in 2017 for his work as editor of ''Small Axe: A Journal of Caribbean Criticism''.<ref>[http://icls.columbia.edu/news/david-scott-awarded-distinguished-editor-prize-for-small-axe/ "David Scott Awarded Distinguished Editor Prize for Small Axe"], Institute for Comparative Literature and Society, Columbia University. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref><ref name=prize>[http://smallaxe.net/sxlive/david-scott-receives-distinguished-editor-prize "David Scott receives Distinguished Editor prize"], ''sx live'', 5 January 2017.</ref> Gordon Hutner said, at the Book Review Session arranged by CELJ on 5 January 2017:<ref>[https://apps.mla.org/conv_listings_detail?prog_id=104&year=2017 "Session Details | 104. Book Reviews"], MLA.</ref>
{{ QuoteBlockquote | With ''Small Axe'', Scott has moved to generate (and increasingly widen) a collective conversation about modernity and the Caribbean's central place in shaping (and being shaped by) it...Scott describes editing as "the cultivation of a capacity for attunement to the work of others, and a responsive ability to shelter and enable perspectives on common and uncommon themes that do not necessarily align with, and indeed, that sometimes wilfully diverge from, one’sone's own." He is also loyal not only to his contributors but to his journal's audiences—who rely on him to sift and assess and encourage excellence. Overall, this journal brings to life an active intellectual and artistic community. Scott’sScott's vision for that community is clear and alive and open-ended: to be aware of the history of what it has meant to think and study the Caribbean and to keep asking, as he says in another excellent introduction to an issue, "What today is Caribbean studies? What can it be?"<ref>Hutner, Gordon. Book Review Session arranged by the Council of Editors of Learned Journals, 5 January 2017. Speech.</ref>}} <!--Better{{better citationsource needed -->|date=January 2022}}▼
DavidAmong Scottothers waspraising awardedScott's thework, [[CouncilRoshini ofKempadoo]], Editorslecturer ofat Learned[[University of JournalsWestminster]], (CELJ)said: Distinguished"Small EditorAxe prizeedited inand 2017published forunder hisScott's workvision ashas editorbecome one of ''most relevant intellectual and creative publications for our current political, social and cultural climate. Small Axe: Acontinues Journalto ofreflect Caribbeanthe Criticism'problem space' of the contemporary global moment."<ref>[http{{cite web|url=https://iclsrepeatingislands.columbia.educom/news2017/01/04/david-scott-awardedreceives-distinguished-editor-prize-for-small-axe/ "|title=David Scott AwardedReceives Distinguished Editor Prize forFor Small Axe"],|website=Repeating InstituteIslands|date=4 forJanuary Comparative Literature and Society, Columbia University. Retrieved 82017|access-date=1 August 2017.2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite nameweb|url=prize>[http https://smallaxewww.netsocialdifference.columbia.edu/news/2017/10/sxlive9/david-scott-receives-distinguished-editor-prize "-for-small-axe-a-caribbean-journal-of-criticism|title=David Scott receivesReceives Distinguished Editor prize"],Prize ''sxFor live''Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism|publisher=Center for the Study of Social Difference, 5Columbia JanuaryUniversity|access-date=1 2017.August 2022}}</ref>
Gordon Hutner said, at the Book Review Session arranged by CELJ on 5 January 2017:<ref>[https://apps.mla.org/conv_listings_detail?prog_id=104&year=2017 "Session Details | 104. Book Reviews"], MLA.</ref>
▲{{Quote | With ''Small Axe'', Scott has moved to generate (and increasingly widen) a collective conversation about modernity and the Caribbean's central place in shaping (and being shaped by) it...Scott describes editing as "the cultivation of a capacity for attunement to the work of others, and a responsive ability to shelter and enable perspectives on common and uncommon themes that do not necessarily align with, and indeed, that sometimes wilfully diverge from, one’s own." He is also loyal not only to his contributors but to his journal's audiences—who rely on him to sift and assess and encourage excellence. Overall, this journal brings to life an active intellectual and artistic community. Scott’s vision for that community is clear and alive and open-ended: to be aware of the history of what it has meant to think and study the Caribbean and to keep asking, as he says in another excellent introduction to an issue, "What today is Caribbean studies? What can it be?"<ref>Hutner, Gordon. Book Review Session arranged by the Council of Editors of Learned Journals, 5 January 2017. Speech.</ref>}}<!--Better citation needed-->
==''Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism''==
According to ''[[The Caribbean Review of Books]]'', ''Small Axe'' has become "the leading intellectual journal published in the anglophone Caribbean, while maintaining a decidedly critical stance towards the region's political and cultural establishment."<ref>[[Nicholas Laughlin|Laughlin, Nicholas]], [http://caribbeanreviewofbooks.com/crb-archive/18-november-2008/%E2%80%9Ccriticism-as-a-question%E2%80%9D/ "Criticism as a Question"], ''The Caribbean Review of Books'', November 2008.</ref>
''Small Axe'' celebrated its 50th anniversary issue in 2016.
===Covers===
''Small Axe'' covers have been designed by graphic artist [[Juliet Ali]] since 2006.<ref>DaCosta, Gabrielle, [http://smallaxe.net/sxlive/caribbean-gallery-art-interview-juliet-ali "A Caribbean Gallery of Art: An Interview with Juliet Ali"], ''sx Live'', 4 April 2017.</ref> The covers have been noted for their striking aesthetic. Some covers have aroused controversy. ''Small Axe'' 6 (1999) was considered controversial for its parodying of [[Edna Manley]]’s sculpture “Negro Aroused” (1937). In March 2000, ''Small Axe'' 7, guest-edited by [[Faith Smith]], was rejected by the press for being pornographic. This controversy eventually led to the journal's departure from [[University of the West Indies Press]].
Each cover figures original work from a Caribbean artist.<ref name=issues>[http://smallaxe.net/sx/issues "Issues"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref> Notable artists featured on the cover of ''Small Axe'' include:
[[Ras Daniel Heartman]] (''Small Axe'' 5, 1999),
[[Wendy Nanan]] (''Small Axe'' 11, 2002),
[[Lubaina Himid]] (''Small Axe'' 23, 2007),
[[Edouard Duval Carrie]] (''Small Axe'' 27, 2008),
[[Ingrid Pollard]] (''Small Axe'' 28, 2009),
[[Sandra Brewster]] (''Small Axe'' 29, 2009),
[[Hew Locke]] (''Small Axe'' 34, 2011),
[[Ebony Patterson]] (''Small Axe'' 35, 2011),
[[Arthur Simms (artist)|Arthur Simms]] (''Small Axe'' 40, 2013),
[[Marlon Griffith]] (''Small Axe'' 41, 2013),
[[Lavar Munroe]] (''Small Axe'' 44, 2014),
[[Nari Ward]] (''Small Axe'' 50, 2016), and
[[Firelei Báez]] (''Small Axe'' 51, 2016).
===Interviews===
Notable interviewees featured in the journal include:<ref name=issues />
[[Stuart Hall (cultural theorist)|Stuart Hall]] (''Small Axe'' 1, 1997),
[[Richard Hart (Jamaican historian and politician)|Richard Hart]] (''Small Axe'' 3, 1998),
[[Ken Post]] (''Small Axe'' 4, 1998),
[[Robert A. Hill (historian)|Robert A. Hill]] (''Small Axe'' 5, 1999),
[[Sylvia Wynter]] (''Small Axe'' 8, 2000),
[[George Lamming]] (''Small Axe'' 9, 2002),
[[Sidney Mintz]] (''Small Axe'' 19, 2006),
[[Rex Nettleford]] (''Small Axe'' 20, 2006),
[[Patrick Chamoiseau]] (''Small Axe'' 30, 2009),
[[Merle Collins]] (''Small Axe'' 31, 2010), and
[[Orlando Patterson]] (''Small Axe'' 40, 2013).
===Notable special sections===
''Small Axe'' frequently features special sections often published in relation to conferences and symposia in which urgent issues pertaining to Caribbean scholarship are discussed.<ref name=issues /> Notable sections include:
:*"On the Archeologies of Black Memory" (''Small Axe'' 26, 2008)
:*"Reconstructing Womanhood: A Future Beyond Empire—A Symposium Honoring" [[Hazel Carby]] (Guest editors, [[Saidiya Hartman]] and [[Tina Campt]]) (''Small Axe'' 28, 2009)
:*"Blackness Unbound" (Guest editor, [[Glynne A. Griffith]]) (''Small Axe'' 29, 2009)
:*"Relating the Francophone Caribbean" (Guest Editors, [[Martin Munro]] and [[Elizabeth Walcott-Hackshaw]]) (''Small Axe'' 30, 2009)
:*"What is Caribbean Studies?" (''Small Axe'' 41, 2013)
:*"The Idea of a Black Radical Tradition" (''Small Axe'' 40, 2013)
:*"The Visual Life of Catastrophic History" (''Small Axe'' 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42)
:*"What is Journal Work?" (''Small Axe'' 50, 2016)
:*"The Idea of Hispanophone Caribbean Studies" (Guest editor, Vanessa Pérez-Rosario, ''Small Axe'' 51, 2016)
:*"The Jamaican 1960s" (Guest editor, [[Donette Francis]], ''Small Axe'' 54, 2017)
==''sx salon: a small axe literary platform''==
'''''sx salon''''' is a tritwi-annual digital forum for critical and creative explorations of Caribbean literature. Since its initiation in 2010, ''sx salon'' has aimed to stimulate and engage aesthetic forms across different literary genres that reflect the changing sensibilities of regional and diasporic realities. sx salon publishes literaryliterature discussions, interviews, reviews, poetry and prose. Issues appear in February, June and October. [[KellyRachel Baker Josephs]]Mordecai, Editor; [[VanessaRonald K. Valdés]]Cummings, Book Review Editor; [[RosamondDanielle S.Legros KingGeorges]], Creative Editor.<ref>[{{cite web | url=http://smallaxe.net/sxsalon/about "SX| Salon"].title=About Retrievedus 8| AugustSmall 2017.Axe Project }}</ref>
===''sx visualitieslive''===
''sx live'' is a blog that features notable and upcoming events in the field of Caribbean studies, as well as brief interviews and reviews by or concerning people associated with the Small Axe Project.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxlive "sx archipelagos"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref> ▼Launched in 2016, '''''sx visualities''''' is a digital platform showcasing and debating Caribbean visual practice. Individual and collaborative projects are published annually. [[Roshini Kempadoo]] and [[Daniela Fifi]], Managing Editors.
The project statement reads:
{{Quote | ''sx visualities'' is a venue for visual practice. It aims to host educational and curatorial projects annually, presenting visual culture across a range of genres and forms: from photography to the moving image, from performance to architecture, from soundscapes to painting and sculpture. Encapsulating this living terrain of creativity, we consider the visual language as part of a wider practice of world-making.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxvisualities "sx visualities"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>}}
===Caribbean Queer Visualities===
Curated by David Scott, Erica Moiah James, and Nijah Cunningham, in 2015, Caribbean Queer Visualities (CQV) explores the role of "queerness" in Caribbean visual art. CQV has hosted symposia as well as curated exhibitions.
'''<big>''Past Projects''</big>'''
A 2016 press release for the symposium reads:
{{Quote | One of the most remarkable developments in the Caribbean and its diaspora over the past two decades or so is the emergence of a generation of young visual artists working in various media (paint, film, performance) who have been transforming Caribbean visual practice, perhaps even Caribbean visual culture. Importantly these younger artists did not grow up in the “aftermaths of sovereignty” so much as in the aftermaths of sovereignty’s aftermaths. They grow up in a context in which the great narratives of sovereignty, once oppositional, once open to the adventure of a future-to-come, have congealed and ossified, and in doing so disclose more and more their own modes of exclusion, marginalization, repression, and intolerance. And as the old anti-systemic movements for social and political change became installed in power in the new states of the region they stultified into new modes of orthodoxy, into their own terrified normativities, anxiously policing the boundaries of identity and community, the expressions of personhood and belonging, of sex and pleasure. These are precisely themes that preoccupy this younger generation, and that provoke and illuminate the do main we call Caribbean queer visuality.<ref>Scott, David. [http://outburstarts.com/small-axe-caribbean-queer-visualities/ "small axe: Caribbean Queer Visualities"], [[Outburst Queer Arts Festival]], 2016.</ref>}}
=='' '<big>sx archipelagos: a small axe platform for digital practice </big>''' ==▼In partnership with the [[British Council]], the CQV has been exhibited at [[The Golden Thread Gallery]] in [[Belfast]], [[Northern Ireland]], and the [[Transmission Gallery]] in [[Glasgow]], [[Scotland]], featuring the works of [[Ewan Atkinson]] ([[Barbados]]), [[Jean-Ulrick Désert]] ([[Haiti]]/[[Germany]]), [[Richard Fung]] ([[Trinidad]]/[[Canada]]), [[Andil Gosine]] ([[Trinidad]]/[[Canada]]), [[Nadia Huggins]] ([[St. Vincent & the Grenadines]]), [[Leasho Johnson]] ([[Jamaica]]), [[Charl Landvreugd]] ([[Suriname]]/[[Netherlands]]), [[Kareem Mortimer]] ([[Bahamas]]), [[Ebony G. Patterson]] ([[Jamaica]]), [[Jorge Pineda]] ([[Dominican Republic]]).<ref>[https://nireland.britishcouncil.org/programmes/outburst-queer-arts-festival/small-axe-caribbean-queer-visualities "small axe: Caribbean Queer Visualities"], British Council Northern Ireland. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>
A digital platform launched in 2016 that focuses on the digital humanities and its implications for Caribbean scholarship. In the wake of the "digital turn" in the humanities, '''''sx archipelagos''''' seeks to promote creative exploration, debate, and critical thinking about and through digital practices in contemporary scholarly and artistic work in and on the Caribbean. ''Sx archipelagos'' engages with scholarly essays; digital scholarship projects; and digital project reviews. [[Alex Gil (scholar) |Alex Gil]] and [[Kaiama L. Glover]], Editors . Since March 2020 sx archipelagos continues independently as archipelagos.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxarchipelagos/ "sx archipelagos"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref> ▼▲==''sx archipelagos: a small axe platform for digital practice''==
▲A digital platform launched in 2016 that focuses on the digital humanities and its implications for Caribbean scholarship. In the wake of the "digital turn" in the humanities, '''''sx archipelagos''''' seeks to promote creative exploration, debate, and critical thinking about and through digital practices in contemporary scholarly and artistic work in and on the Caribbean. ''Sx archipelagos'' engages with scholarly essays; digital scholarship projects; and digital project reviews. [[Alex Gil (scholar)]] and [[Kaiama L. Glover]], Editors.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxarchipelagos/ "sx archipelagos"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>
==Recent and ongoing projects==
===Literary competition===
The literary competition, launched in 2009, serves as a venue for hearing the voices of emerging Caribbean writers of short fiction and poetry, writing in English, Spanish and French. The competition offers prizes for first and second places in each category. Competition winners are published in ''Small Axe'' the following year. [[Martin Munro]] and [[Vanessa Pérez-Rosario]], Coordinators.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/literarycompetition "submissions + eligibility"], Literary Competition, ''Small Axe''. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>
In 2017, the ''Small Axe'' Literary Competition entered a new phase, accepting entries in Spanish, English, and French, on a three-year rotation for submissions in these language. The schedule for entries is as follows:
:*(2017) Spanish
:*(2018) English
:*(2019) French
===''sx live''===
▲''sx live'' is a blog that features notable and upcoming events in the field of Caribbean studies, as well as brief interviews and reviews by or concerning people associated with the Small Axe Project.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxlive "sx archipelagos"], ''Small Axe'' website. Retrieved 8 August 2017.</ref>
===The Caribbean Digital===
Since 2014, the Caribbean Digital has hosted conferences and symposia related to the practice and history of the digital in relation to changing social and geo-political contours in the Caribbean and its diasporas. The conference is convened and organized by Kaiama Glover, [[Alex Gil (scholar)|Alex Gil]], and Kelly Baker Josephs.<ref>[http://smallaxe.net/sxlive/thinking-and-through-digital-turn-caribbean-studies-caribbean-digital-iii "Thinking in and through the digital turn in Caribbean studies: The Caribbean Digital III"], ''sx live'', 21 December 2016.</ref>
==Abstracting and indexing==
*[http://muse.jhu.edu/journal/185 ''Small Axe''] at [[Project MUSE]].
[[Category:PublicationsCulture establishedof inthe 1997Caribbean]]
[[Category:English-language journals]] ▼[[Category:Duke University Press academic journals]]
▲[[Category:English-language journals]]
[[Category:Literary magazines published in the United States]]
[[Category:Academic journals established in 1997]]
[[Category:Triannual journals]]
[[Category:Caribbean culture]]
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