Lots of stuff is happening, both in the punctual forms that you have to consult a clock to coincide with (see below) and also the more ongoing events that you might hit even if you tend to comport yourself in a more relaxed and vague manner. Maíz y Mycelium. East Bay Print sale. Bookworms for Gaza. King Tides. Go see a movie at the Parkway, go learn about fire at OMCA, see what’s even going on at Nomadic, maybe even stop by EBB and buy a book for a kid. Or don’t; an option available, always to you, when it gets cold, is to stay home and just not. You could even read a book, I bet you have one or two.
Oh, and put our holiday party on your calendar! Or at least swing by next week, we're having a super informal happy hour, on the 11th, from around 5-7pm, at Ghost Town Brewing, the one in West Oakland. It's so informal there's no more information than that.
In other news, today is giving…. Tuesday. (Get it? See what I did there? six-seven!). Anyway, here’s our pitch if you’re consulting the weird post-Thanksgiving schedule that people have for some reason decided is a thing (and on that note, how about “Poetry Wednesday”? Yes?): All the money that ORB collects from people is, simply, our “writers fund.” Our editors donate their time, and after we pay our (very few) expenses, all the money we collect will go to one thing: paying writers to write things. That's it. So if you want to send some money to some writers to write things for us, here’s how, and we thank you kindly.–AB, MS
Tuesday, December 2
How AI Really Works (and Who Benefits), 4pm, Social Science Matrix (Cal). Maximilian Kasy shows in The Means of Prediction that the real conflict isn’t between humans and machines, but between those who control the machines and the rest of us. The answer is always communism! [matrix]
Advancing Peace, 5pm, Berkeley Way West Colloquia Room 1104 (Cal). Book launch for Jason Corburn and DeVone Boggan’s Advancing Peace: Ending Urban Gun Violence Through the Power of Redemptive Love, on how a community-based approach to violence prevention developed in Richmond, CA, truly works. [UCB]
[Bonus West Bay] It's giving Coyote and BFF.fm, 5pm, Casements Bar (Mission). Prizes, DJ, merch, meet the teams, etc, things of that nature. Give money. [insta]
Black Studies Collective reading group, 6pm, West Branch OPL (De Fremery environs). This Tuesday evening reading series--from December to April--got a grant to reflect on how Black Studies shapes neighborhoods, histories, and everyday lives, building out of Our History Has Always Been Contraband: In Defense of Black Studies. [insta]
[Bonus West Bay That's Almost North Bay] Sentences vs. Paragraphs, 6:30pm, The Firehouse (Fort Mason). Lucy Corin likes sentences; Daniel Handler likes paragraphs. Somehow, they’ll debate the issue? [eventbrite]
Year of the Cat, 6:45 New Parkway (Uptown). Iranian movie about Jahangir, born in an unlucky year (poor cats, getting all the bad press), who brings trouble for those around him because he’s willing to do anything to become famous. This is the global mind virus America’s really been exporting. Followed by Q+A with filmmakers. [insta]
[West Bay Bonus Event Again] Let the Moon Wobble, 7pm, Green Apple (On the park). Ally Ang releasing their new poetry collection, with Sagaree Jain and Giovanna Lomanto. “Journeying through concurrent apocalypses: the COVID-19 pandemic, the climate crisis, and the rise of fascism,” that sort of poetry. [GreenApple]
Also: In the Heart of Italy at Piedmont Avenue OPL (Not Actually Piedmont though, still Oakland) / Denise Newman at CCA (West Bay)
Poetry Wednesday, December 3
Northern Indigenous Cooking Presentation, 2 pm, Anthony Hall (Cal). Tori McConnell (Yurok), Miss Indian World and News from Native California writing intern, will demonstrate how to cook acorn mush with traditional Yurok cooking techniques, alongside UC Berkeley student Tiah Ross Butner. Acorns are the staple food of California tribes and of Butler’s Parable of the Sower, and are in my fridge, soaking right now. [UCB]
St Mary’s Visiting Writers Features Leila Mottley, 2:30pm, Hagerty Lounge at St Mary’s (Moraga). Local phenom novelist and former Oakland Youth Poet Laureate, whose newest novel The Girls Who Grew Big focuses on a group of teenage mothers finding a haven of community with themselves. Her first book Nightcrawling, about a teenager’s serial abuse, was based on a true story involving the Oakland Police. [insta]
[Bonus West Bay] Aventurera, 6pm, Roxie (West Bay). ZYZZYVA and Ingrid Rojas Contreras present the greatest film in Mexico’s rumbera genre, along with Daniel Handler. You can watch it on youtube, but don’t, my goodness. [Roxie]
Radical Harmonies, 6pm, Queer Arts Center (3411 Lakeshore). Screening the 2002 documentary about the lesbian feminist women's movement that asks "What is women's music?" and doesn’t answer. [insta]
Selector Series: DJ BAQVAS, 8pm, Bar Shiru (Downtown). DJ BAQVAS is a Pakistani (Afghan-Kashmiri) DJ and East Bay local who loves throwing down punchy tracks, with an emphasis on South Asian and Arab electronic music. Their vintage collection of Pakistani (Lollywood) & Indian (Bollywood) vinyl is a big inspiration for their sound, and will inspire you. Bring a notebook, write your way through a whiskey and an album before calling it a night. [instagram]
Also: Kitty Stryker's Love Rebels at BPL (North Branch)
Thursday, December 4
Connie Mae Oliver, 12pm Berkeley Time, Morrison Library (Cal). This month’s Cal Lunch Poems reading (check out this interview on her last book.). Eat poems, they’re very satisfying. [Cal]
East Bay Print Sale, 3pm, Max’s Garage Press (West Berkeley). The opening day of the BIGGEST BESTEST Bay Area printer extravaganza. Over 15,000 handmade prints from 200 artists and independent presses will be available, go get your holiday presents for all the print lovers (and soon to be lovers) in your lives. [EBPS]
[West Bay Bonus Event] Shatter Party, 4:00pm, the 465 Collective. If you wish you could have thrown crockery over Thanksgiving but held it together, you’re cordially invited to let it all out in support of an art project by Midori. Smashing! [Queerly Complex]
To Know a Place, 4pm, Social Science Matrix (Cal). Alexis Madrigal explains it all -- ”all” in this case meaning how to write about and understand place, and how perspective, memory, and narrative inform the stories we tell about the world around us. Go listen, then practice your vibe reporting. [Matrix]
[West Bay Bonus Event Even More] Gen Blend Open Mic, 5:30pm, Ruth's Table (The Mission). An intergenerational writers’ potluck and open mic. Show up with a casserole for a warm evening of poetry, stories, music, and creative sharing — with featured readers Isabelle Correa and Keith Ross, live music, and open mic spots for pieces under 3 minutes. I heard about Ruth’s Table from a retired train engineer and future novelist who came out to a Headlands Dinner from the city as part of a once yearly vacation he takes to Sausalito, so good people is what I am saying. [insta]
Oakland Creates Zine Reading, 6pm, South Berkeley Public Library (Berkeley). Oakland Creates Zine Fest 2025 is hosting an artist preview night, featuring some of the artists who will be highlighted at the Oakland Creates Zine Fest on 12/13 at Oakstop. [BPL]
Tech Workers Coalition Bay Area Social, 6:00pm, Tamarack (Uptown). We all have day jobs, solidarity makes them better. [insta]
SFF/Nomadic Literary Awards Celebration, 6:00pm, Nomadic Bookshop (Uptown). Celebrate winners of the SFF/Nomadic Literary Awards—writers whose voices carry the pulse of possibility, resistance, and care. The very first event in the new Nomadic Bookshop! Go, and share in conversation, joy, and the kind of collective brilliance that reminds us why literature matters. [insta]
[Bonus West Bay] Panafold Issue Launch, 6pm, Boffi | DePadova Studio (West Bay). Tomas Muniz will read a new story inspired by the GHOST murals across the Bay Area. [panafold]
Mahjong Night with Nicole Wong, 6pm, Local Economy (Broadway). Nicole Wong, author of The Mahjong Project: House Rules from Across the Asian Diaspora brings a little how-to and history. SOLD OUT but prep for tomorrow's Asian-Am+Marxism conference and slide in to talk class solidarity over tiles. [edited for date error] [luma]
Fantastic Negrito: Have You Lost Your Mind Yet?, 6:30pm, Oakstop (1721 Broadway). Part of the Sarah Webster Fabio Center for Social Justice Black Film series that’s fully sold out now but maybe you got a ticket for the showing and talk back to hear the story of the hustler, reinventor, musician, and local arts guy in this rollercoaster story of life and creation after destruction. [eventbrite]
Melon Collective plays Maya Deren, 7:30pm, BAMPFA (Cal). Berkeley musicians improv through some avant garde films by Maya Deren, from the 40s. [BAMPFA]
On Miss Major Speaks, 7:30pm Bathers Library (Uptown). Toshio Meronek talks about this memoir from Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, veteran of Stonewall, former sex worker, and a transgender elder and activist who has survived all of it. [insta]
Also: Emilie Lygren and Danusha Laméris Poetry Reading at North Bay Letterpress Arts (Sebastopol) / Pie Making Class at Fig Leaf Gardens (The Laurel) / Justice Winter House with Urban Peace Movement at the Black Panther Museum (Downtown)
Friday, December 5
Marxism and Asian American Studies: Past and Present, 9 AM, RSVP for location (Cal, generally). During the late 1960s and 1970s, Third World Marxism was at the center of Asian American Studies. The role of the Asian American Left has been left out of the story of ethnic studies today. Come resuscitate it! [UCB]
Wood St Commons Holiday Party Fashion Show Fundraiser, 6pm, Omni Commons (Temescal). Potluck: bring a dish, enjoy the show, give generously to support your neighbors. [insta]
Dire Straights Live, 6pm, Local Economy (College Ave). Writers and podcasting superteam Tracy Clark-Flory and Amanda Montei record their show, Dire Straights, with special guest Myisha Battle, a feminist sex and dating coach, and a live studio audience (as long as the tech guy remembers to press all the right buttons). It’s sold out and standing room only but squeeze in for the gossip, and sisterly advice on becoming a Marxist in the kitchen and a freak in the sheets. [Luma]
“Small But Tiny” Exhibit Opening, 6-9pm, Rock Paper Scissors Collective (MLK JR Ave). Artworks ten inches or less! Say hi to our friend Gregory. [bsky]
Mississippi Masala, 6:30pm, Shapeshifters Cinema (Jack London environs). Bay Area Current screening Mira Nair’s great film, for free, just ‘cause, no other reason. Unrelated: Mira Nair is married to the great Ugandan academic Mahmood Mamdani. Also, the Indian subcontinent is part of Asia, socialism rhymes with Marxism. [insta]
Unburdened, 7pm, Bathers (Uptown). Quinn Edlin's new book, which is “an exploration of shame in short story, interview & essay" with readings from LT Schuster and Carvell Wallace, as well as a film screening from Gisele Herrera. [insta]
The Empathizer: A Documentary About Vietnam, 7 pm, Oakland Asian Cultural Center (Chinatown). Second gens find their way back to Viet Nam, get asked questions by a comedian and fellow guy who went back. But what is a place that has forked into memory and imagination in American living rooms of refugees while being remade on the ground by those who stayed – explore this and other important questions about belonging and place and roots and trauma, possibly with jokes. Not sure how they feel about communism – seems like a fun topic for the in-person Q&A with documentary producer and director Fred Le. [OACC}
[West Bay Bonus Event] Samar, 7 pm Kearney St Workshop (Folsom St). A SWANA-and-Friends reading featuring Adam Ahmed, Layle Omeran, and Sam Sax. Some will read poems, some will play the oud, all will send you. [insta]
Also: First Friday Poetry at Golden Sardine (North Beach) / Amy Tan with John Muir Laws on The Backyard Bird Journal at Dominican University (San Rafael) / Brian Nelson's photos at Evergreen Cafe (Berkeley)
Saturday, December 6
Fire and the Berkeley Campus Walking Tour, 10:00am, Schlessinger & Campanile Way (Cal). Tour a “few toppled chimney tops” on the Berkeley campus that the 1906 earthquake destroyed, and everything else that happened. [doc]
Rock Breaking Ceremony at Esther's Orbit Room, 10am Esther's Orbit Room (7th street). Food and music, self-guided building tours, and watch the process of deconstructing and preserving the venue’s original rock facade (on that, check out Reo’s great piece at Coyote). [insta]
2025 Social Justice Children's Book Fair, 11 AM, Emerson Elementary School (Temescal). Book creators, literacy organizations, publishers gather to celebrate books that wake you up. Librarians abound, along with Alphabet Rockers, Mr. Juan of the Storytime Band, a live drawing demonstration, and more! [eventbrite]
[West Bay Bonus Event] Small Press Book Bazaar, 12:00pm, The Lab. Bay Area artists, designers, printers, and publishers gather to sell their printed wares. If you liked the SF Art Book Fair, come back for more, but more local. [The Lab]
ancestors taught me: a poetry/writing workshop, 1:30pm, The Sanctuary (Grand Ave). Come for a soft landing place for reflecting and writing with amalee b. Look back on the poets read in the workshop this year and the tools they've offered. You'll also have space to reflect, gather, and arrange words from your year -- whether they are old leaves to be composted or seeds to be planted is up to you. For those who attended last month, bring your ars poetica poems (ex) to share! If you attended any workshop this year, join in the creation of a commemorative anthology [ Google Docs RSVP ]
Free Geology Ramble with Andrew Alden, 2pm, Montclair Park (The Hills). Join the author of Deep Oakland for a 3.75-mile one-way downhill ramble to visit the Hayward fault plus interesting rocks and terrain, ending up in Lower Rockridge, where there are neither many rocks nor ridges, but there are bookstores. [eventbrite]
36th Annual PEN Oakland Awards, 2 pm, Black Repertory Group Theater (Berkeley). “The Blue Collar PEN” and the one that definitely supports a Free Palestine. PEN Oakland announces the winners of the 36th Annual PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Awards, celebrating diversity in literature, as well as other achievements. [All Events]
An Independent Man: Ed Roberts and the Fight for Disability Rights. 2 pm, Central Library (Downtown Berkeley). Prof Scot Danforth on his new book, the first biography of one of the founders of the disability rights movement, Ed Roberts, the East Bay activist, rabble rouser despite paralysis, and generous provider of curb cuts. [BPL]
The Art of Palestinian Embroidery, 3pm Central Library (Berkeley). Palestinian Tatreez artist Amanne Sharif in this two-hour, hands-on workshop! Discover the historical and political significance of Tatreez while learning the fundamentals of the falahi stich. [insta]
Formerly Incarcerated People’s Project, 3:30pm, Planting Justice (El Sobrante). Hear stories from Formerly Incarcerated People’s Project performers Pamela Ann Keane, Christina Aanestad, and Algiin Ford. [insta]
The Store, 4pm, BAMPFA (Cal). Wiseman goes to Nieman Marcus for Christmas, but not to buy things, instead, his jam is more the making of “a subtly informative—and incidentally entertaining—tract that will likely be of sociological importance for generations to come.” [BAMPFA]
Pamplemousse release party! 4pm Underdog Film Lab (16th st). Issue 12, Foundations, refreshments, take photos. Pamplemousse is a “film photography art magazine containing basically just photos, an extension of [Nora Lalle’s] zine-making past.” [insta]
Opening Reception: Asma Ghanem Art Show, 6pm, couchdate (Temescal). Asma Ghanem is a Palestinian artist born in Damascus-Syria, an experimental musician, and a writer. Her work tells stories of her childhood, homeland, and the everyday under occupation.
[West Bay Bonus Event] Christine Imperial + Lara Mimosa Montes, 6:30pm, et al (The Mission). Small Press Traffic hosts Imperial: writing in and around a Tagalog translation of Rudyard Kipling’s “The White Man’s Burden” & Montes: who wrote "a future classic of our favourite genre, PLOTLESS FICTION.” [SPT]
Plastic Man, 7pm, BAMPFA (Cal). William Farley's documentary on "The Artful Life of Jerry Ross Barrish," kicking off a BAMPFA series on the guy who bailed out sixties activists while making films and art. https://bampfa.org/event/plastic-man-artful-life-jerry-ross-barrish
Also: The Muni Diaries Art Market at KALW (West Bay) / Cine-Gastronomy at 500 Capp Street (West Bay) / A Memoir Workshop with Sunita Puri at Mesa Refuge (West Marin) / Volunteer Appreciation Celebration at EastSide Arts Alliance (Deep East) / Olema Friends Art Bazaar on Hwy 1 (West Marin)
Sunday, December 7
[West Bay Bonus Event] Howard Zinn Book Fair, 10 AM, The Mission Campus of CCSF (The Mission). Basically church. All your favorite leftists gather to talk, write, forge bonds, and sell books to fund the revolution. With childcare, because that’s actual social change. [Zinn Book Fair]
Shell Bagging for Marine Habitat Restoration, 10am, REAP Climate Center (Alameda). Get your hands into the work of fixing up the Bay by moving and bagging oyster shells into biodegradable bags that will later be used to restore vital local marine habitats.[eventbrite]
Playdate for Palestine, 10am, Jerusalem Coffee House (Temescal). Storytime followed by open play for babies, fundraising for Jerusalem Coffee House legal defense. [insta]
Revolutionary Poetry Reading Circle, 2pm, meet outside Lake Chalet (The Lake). Explore the themes of hiphop, personal narrative & resilience with Mecedes Lindsay and Sohini Mukherjee in an outdoors poetry reading for everyone. [insta]
Graphic Novel Art Talk & Auction for Chapter 510, 2pm, Local Economy (College Ave). Bobby Podesta with his first graphic novel, North for the Winter. The long-time Pixar animator, first time novelist, brings his process drawings and they’ll be available alongside other art to the highest bidder to support the Oakland creative writing space for the youth. [luma]
Suddenly Something Clicked, 4pm, Clio's (The Lake). Walter Murch (this guy who is also this guy) on the language of film editing and sound design. [eventbrite]
Free the People to Free the Money to Free the People book launch, 4:30pm, Oakstop (2323 Broadway). “organizing wealth” and “the lessons learned from cross-class movement spaces.” I guess that means rich people giving their money against rich people? OK. [insta]
Punk Rock Docs - Louder, Faster, Shorter & I Get Knocked Down, 5:00 PM, Shapeshifters Cinema (Jack London Square). First one is a short about punk bands who played a 19978 benefit in the WEst Bay for striking Kentucky coal miners -- the second is “a surreal, punk version of Dickens' A Christmas Carol” but about Chumbawamba. [Shapeshifter’s Cinema]
The Hour of Liberation Has Arrived, 5pm, Moments Cooperative (Downtown). Heiny Srour's 1974 movie about anticolonial resistance. Fundraiser for Gaza. [eventbrite]
Also: Learn Tree Pruning at Fig Leaf Gardens (The Laurel) / Hem Those Pants! with Network Effects Theater Company (Emeryville) / Triage Basics & Chemical Weapons Defense at Bay Anarchist Free School / Make It Sewcial with Network Effects Theater Company (Emeryville)
