The body has always been a key site for interpretation. How do we interpret bodies in their myriad roles as targets (and agents) of disciplinary power, as the embodiment of Nature and the expression of modern cultural logics of gender, race, sexuality, and nation? How do bodies work and how they “mean”? A heavily interdisciplinary exploration of the body, this course ranges from the reading of bodies in scientific, sociological, literary, and historical texts to the interrogation of representations of the body in anthropological, philosophical, and cinematic sources. Topics will include: Discipline and the modern body; cosmetic surgery and other forms of body modification or “somatechnics”; sexual violence and narratives of trauma; commodity culture and media constructions of the body; eating disorders and cultural constructions of gender; diseased bodies, hysteria and psychoanalysis; transnational bodies and the politics of labor; technology and embodiment in a digital age. Some of the key questions that will structure our work include: What does it mean to explore the body as a socially meaningful, historical object of analysis rather than as a purely “biological entity”? How do we define “deviant” bodies and which bodies get to count as “normal”? How does our understanding of Nature and Culture, authenticity and artifice structure our beliefs about the body and gender, sexuality, ethnicity and race? What does it mean to be “embodied” and how does embodiment complicate some of the ways we think about identity and difference?
2. the body in zines
Choose a zine, report back on one or more of these
questions:
●
Why did the artist/writer choose this medium? How
does its communication style differ from online media?
●
What does the zine reveal about the body—the
author's relationship with theirs, how their body is
viewed or treated, how they regard others' bodies?
●
How do the visual elements or style support or
contradict the text?
5. library stuff
●
Zines website
●
Using CLIO to find zines
●
Be our friend on
Facebook, Flickr,
LiveJournal, or MySpace.
Follow the library on
Twitter.
●
Contact Jenna Freedman
zines@barnard.edu,
212.854.4615, IM:
BarnardLibJenna
6. library stuff
●
Zines website
●
Using CLIO to find zines
●
Be our friend on
Facebook, Flickr,
LiveJournal, or MySpace.
Follow the library on
Twitter.
●
Contact Jenna Freedman
zines@barnard.edu,
212.854.4615, IM:
BarnardLibJenna
Editor's Notes
The body has always been a key site for interpretation. How do we interpret bodies in their myriad roles as targets (and agents) of disciplinary power, as the embodiment of Nature and the expression of modern cultural logics of gender, race, sexuality, and nation? How do bodies work and how they “mean”? A heavily interdisciplinary exploration of the body, this course ranges from the reading of bodies in scientific, sociological, literary, and historical texts to the interrogation of representations of the body in anthropological, philosophical, and cinematic sources. Topics will include: Discipline and the modern body; cosmetic surgery and other forms of body modification or “somatechnics”; sexual violence and narratives of trauma; commodity culture and media constructions of the body; eating disorders and cultural constructions of gender; diseased bodies, hysteria and psychoanalysis; transnational bodies and the politics of labor; technology and embodiment in a digital age. Some of the key questions that will structure our work include: What does it mean to explore the body as a socially meaningful, historical object of analysis rather than as a purely “biological entity”? How do we define “deviant” bodies and which bodies get to count as “normal”? How does our understanding of Nature and Culture, authenticity and artifice structure our beliefs about the body and gender, sexuality, ethnicity and race? What does it mean to be “embodied” and how does embodiment complicate some of the ways we think about identity and difference? 5 students
Figure 8 Zines D87f Cocoa Puss Zines M458c no.5 No Better Voice Zines J235n DIY guide to Preventing Sexual Assault Zines D22 Two rapes in the third person to be read deadpan Zines A77t Skinned Heart Zines N66s no.1 Cutting: a Diary Zines K693c 2010 Gendercide : v. 3, part 1 the chemical warfare issue Zines A483g
DEFINITION Self-published and the publisher doesn’t answer to anyone Small, self-distributed print run Motivated by desire to express oneself rather than to make money Outside the mainstream Low budget No need for any special equipment or knowledge Portable An expression of Do It Yourself (DIY) culture Foster a community among their creators and readers No ISSN, no barcode, no paid ads HISTORY 17 th century pamphlets in England: Women and the pamphlet culture of revolutionary England, 1640-1660 18 th century revolutionary US—Common Sense 20 th century science fiction and soviet dissidents, beat poets and punk rockers, riot grrrl, art books TYPES DISCUSS EXAMPLES , or show from catalog Personal, political, fanzine, literary zine, mamazine, art zine, comix, DIY zine, compilation zine, split zine
WHO—question and answer Young people: majority teens & early twenties Mothers of young children librarians! Writers and artists, bookmakers WHY—question and answer Proof I exist Communicate/share Create/contribute E.g. Kelly Shortandqueer—feels an obligation to his community (FTM transgender people) to document his experience FROM The Long Tail, Self-publishers are Differently motivated, not differently skilled Amateur does not equal amateurish Low selling does not equal low quality WHY Control Only choice
CLIO Show how to search for zines Zine? (bind? OR bound?) Zine? (biograph? OR diar? OR journal?) Look by title, browse by call #
