Cooking commoning subjectivities: guerrilla narrative in the Cooperation Birmingham solidarity kitchen

In this chapter, we explore the recently developed concept of guerrilla narrative as a tool that offers great potential for militant research. "Guerrilla narrative" emerged from the politicization of the oral history tradition; it was developed by Marco Armiero as a research tool to explore histories of contamination and resistance in subaltern communities. In this chapter, we broaden the scope of guerrilla narrative and explore its role in the reclamation/invention of the urban commons. Particularly, we look closely at the tools that contribute to the creation of commoning subjectivities. We focus on the mutual aid relief operations led by the grassroots organization Cooperation Birmingham during the COVID-19 pandemic, analysing both their solidarity kitchen and newsletter. We argue that both are manifestations of guerrilla narrative in the sense that both produce counter-hegemonic narratives while fostering commoning practices. This means that guerrilla narrative goes beyond the wording, textual or even artistic paradigms to incorporate more embodied forms of storytelling, such as the practice or running a solidarity kitchen or other forms of material commoning practices.