The current 17th edition of the Subversive Festival is approaching its grand finale, to be marked by a lecture by prominent US political activist, feminist and theorist of Black Marxism Angela Davis on 7 June at the Vatroslav Lisinski Concert Hall in Zagreb.

Davis became known in the 1960s as a member of the Communist Party of the USA and also had close contacts with the Black Panther Party through her involvement in the civil rights movement.

Davis speaks on a wide range of topics

She will speak in Zagreb about her long-standing activism and theoretical work, which is characterised by reflection, organising and action against systemic racism and violence in US prisons.

She will point to the particularities of the co-constitution of race, gender and class in a time of neoliberal globalisation and in the current political and economic landscape marked by war zones and the building of walls against peoples “terrorising” the West, according to the festival organisers.

Davis’ research interests include feminism, African-American studies, critical theory, Marxism, popular music, social consciousness and philosophy, and the history of punishment and prisons.

Due to her membership in the Communist Party, in 1969 the then governor of California, Ronald Reagan, demanded that she be banned from teaching at all universities in California.

Black history teacher, author and civil rights activist

She was suspected of involvement in the kidnapping and murder of Judge Harold Haley, committed by the Soledad Brothers in Marin County, California, in August 1970, but was acquitted in court.

In the 1980s, she was twice a candidate of the Communist Party of the USA for the office of US President.

Davis is best known as a black history teacher, author and activist for civil rights and other social justice issues.

In an interview with Bob the Drag Queen (winner of season 8 of RuPaul’s Drag Race), Davis was asked how she identifies: “I identify as a communist, abolitionist, internationalist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, feminist, black, queer, activist, working class advocate, revolutionary, intellectual, community builder.”