On Wednesday 25th February 2026, from 7.30-9.30pm, Stroud Radical Reading Group will host a discussion of In Pursuit of Revolutionary Love: Precarity, Power, Communities by Dr Joy James. In a month when many people will be thinking of romantic love for Valentines Day, we will be reading a book that looks at “Showing up and learning how to live by and with others, learning how to reinvent ourselves in th[e] increasing wasteland” that surrounds us, where “Violence is arrayed against us because we’re Black, or female, or queer, or undocumented” and “. “There is no rescue team coming for us.” Dr Joy James argues “there’s a beauty to facing the reality of our lives”.

Below in our resources section you can find a link to buy the book at a discount, and free text, audio and visual resources. There is also more information about the book and Stroud Radical Reading Group events.

We will meet at Redz Youth Hub, 6 Threadneedle St, GL5 1AF. Entry is free and anyone interested in the book is welcome – you don’t need to have read it to join us. See below for more information.

Entry to the reading group session is free and everyone is welcome – you do not need to have attended previous sessions, and we do our best to make the sessions welcoming to people who have not been to reading groups or similar settings like university seminars before. We encourage people to read as much of the book as possible, but you are welcome to attend to listen to the discussion without reading any of it.

About Revolutionary Love

“Violence is arrayed against us because we’re Black, or female, or queer, or undocumented. There is no rescue team coming for us. With that knowledge, we need a different operational base to recreate the world. It is not going to be a celebrity savior. Never was, never will be. If you’re in a religious tradition that is millennia-old, consider how the last savior went out. It was always going to be bloody. It was always going to be traumatic. But there’s a beauty to facing the reality of our lives. Not our lives as they’re broken apart, written about, and then sold back to us in academic or celebrity discourse. But our lives as we understand them. The most important thing is showing up. Showing up and learning how to live by and with others, learning how to reinvent ourselves in this increasing wasteland. That’s the good life.”

About Joy James

Joy James is a political philosopher, academic and author. She is the author of numerous books including Resisting State Violence (University of Minnesota Press, 1996), Transcending the Talented Tenth (Routledge, 1997), Seeking the Beloved Community (SUNY Press, 2013), and New Bones Abolition: Captive Maternal Agency and the Afterlife of Erica Garner (Common Notions, 2023). She has also edited collections includingThe Angela Y. Davis Reader (Blackwell, 1998), and The New Abolitionists (SUNY Press, 2005). She teaches at Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts.

Resources

• Buy In Pursuit of Revolutionary Love from The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop – £12.79 with discount (RRP £15.99, saving £3.20). To get the discount: Look at your “basket”, and enter the “couponcode” 26stroudradical. Pick up your book from their Nailsworth, Tetbury or Chalford shops, or get books delivered to your door for £3.50 postage.
• Read “The Alchemy of Abolitionisms” – an interview between Dr Joy James and Kalonji Change explore how, “When academics are read more than incarcerated thinkers, it becomes possible to forget the movement’s radical roots”
• Listen to Joy James discusssing revolutionary love, care under racial capitalism and the captive maternal in a 70 minute Red Medicine podcast episode
• Watch Dr. Joy James interviewed by Kalonji Changa, discussing “In Pursuit of Revolutionary Love” on the Black Liberation Media YouTube channel (embedded below)

About our events

Stroud Radical Reading Group events are free to attend, though we will make a collection to cover venue hire costs – please bring some cash if you can afford it (a few pounds would be great).

We try to create a comfortable discussion space for everyone, including people who have not been part of a reading group or been to university. We do not want the sessions to feel like school – the idea is that everyone has something to contribute, even if primarily through finding the discussion texts difficult and having questions with other attendees can attempt to answer.

To ensure marginalised people feel welcome, we encourage care and thoughtful contributions that respect people’s identities and lives. We are an LGBTQ+ inclusive and anti-racist space.

Anyone is welcome to listen to the discussion, though we encourage contributions only from those who have read at least some of the book we are discussing.

About the venue

The venue for this session is Redz Youth Hub, a hub for organising, creativity, and community building. It’s a free space for young people to host their own events, workshops, and meetups. They’ve been hosting sessions by Mutiny: Stroud’s Youth Assembly and The RYSE – the Radical Youth Space for Educations.

Redz is in central Stroud, close to the train station and bus station, with nearby stands to lock bikes, and parking for cars nearby at Fawkes Place or Church St car park. There is step-free access to the ground floor where we will meet. There is a toilet, and some comfortable seating as well as basic folding chairs. Please get in touch if you’d like to get more of an idea of what the sessions are like or if you have any accessibility needs.

There is an opportunity for more informal discussion after the session in the Ale House pub (around the corner) for anyone who wants to continue chatting after 9.30pm.