When it comes to issues of intersectionality in gaming, often the response is to only address the bare minimum in order to survive as a game, developer, or platform, then continue on. Unfortunately, when marginalized voices do speak, they often go unheard, or ignored. Given that the dominant faction of gaming communities in places like Twitch, […]
Assistant Professor of Women’s Studies (at the University of Maryland, College Park), Alexis Lothian’s recent talk at the University of Michigan, “Queer Geek Methodologies: Social Justice Fandom as a Transformative Digital Humanities,” highlights several aspects of the non-normative modes of discourse found in internet fandom, such as the mixture of creative, artistic expression with legitimate television theory, that […]
In “Can the Subaltern Speak?” Gayatri Spivak considers the issues of navigating the representation of marginalized identities within mainstream media when the marginalized individuals lack a platform to voice their own opinions. Although these representations in film and media often come from a desire to help, or understand, they ultimately act to speak over the voices of the actual […]
Recently, there was a movement at Rutgers University where several women created a video in which they wore hijabs for a day (they do not normally where hijabs) and recounted their experiences. The goal of the video was to shed light on what hijabis go through and face in terms of disadvantages and harassment on a […]
Love is often understood as a transformative political practice, subconsciously or not. This is through the ambiguity with the term “love.” The issues with relying on an abstract concept like love as a reference point or call to action is that the way each person defines love is often relative to how others have defined […]
Nicole Arbour is a Youtube personality that has found herself in headlines on more than one occasion. Famously, her video titled “Dear Fat People,” garnished viral media attention, responses from fellow Youtubers who were angered and disgusted, and from millions of views, comments, and shares on the video. Upon looking it up, I learned that […]
From what I gathered about Spivak’s arguments regarding the subaltern, she is investigating the ways in which Western, dominant identities observe and then reach (often prejudice, racist) conclusions about groups that are deemed “other.” She seemed most interested in the fact that the dominant group finds a way to speak over the subaltern about their […]
Spivak’s argument in “Can the Subaltern Speak” is a challenge for allies to recognize their privilege in being heard, and not silence the oppressed in their allyship. Oftentimes, particularly in white activist communities, speak out can be synonymous with speak for. We try to understand foreign struggles by defining them in our own cultural terms. […]
http://www.today.com/parents/boy-wants-haircut-look-his-friend-trick-teacher-t108795 The article posted above is a viral story that I saw frequently across my Facebook feed all of last week. It is about a young boy who asked his parent if he could get the same haircut as his best friend so that his teacher could not tell them a part. The “giant” twist […]
Alexis’ Lothian talk on “Queer Geek methodologies: Social Justice Fandom as a Transformative Digital Humanities” was incredibly interesting and applicable to the discussions that we have been having in class. I thought that Lothian did a great job of showing how queer theory is applicable to life, through the medium of digital platforms. Individuals also […]
You must be logged in to post a comment.