GWSS Community Blog

On Friday, December 9th Professor Jigna Desai presented her work-in-progress entitled "Cinema of Exception, Cinema of Insecurity: Race and Terror in Post 9/11 Media." Positioning her work in the context of former President George W. Bush's post 9/11 remarks, which propelled the nation into a "state of exception" she illustrated how the U.S. was able to justify its persecution of "bad" brown bodies (muslim terrorists). Bush's campaign relied on the idea that the surveillance and violence against these "bad" brown bodies must be done to preserve the national security of the U.S. and the international community at large. The former President successfully gathered national and international support for his campaign against terror by laying out a framework for determining what made a "good" and "bad" brown muslim body through his executive actions. More specifically, this exercise of hegemonic power and global violence would be explored in popular films. By examining two Harold and Kumar films Desai argued that these parodies do more than provide a venue to purge the U.S. of the fear of a terrorist attack.

The point I remember the most during her analysis of the films was the role that citizenship played in the stories developing narrative. For instance, in one of the films the ability of the two main characters to access goods or to participate in consumer culture became a major signifier of American citizenship. The fantasy of the American dream and the constant pursuit of inclusion became the basis of almost all the interactions that took place throughout the film.

A question that arose for me relates to the ways that representations of the American dream have shifted alongside the state of exceptions persecution of "bad" brown bodies. More specifically, how do these films disrupt the ideological particularities of the American dream? Why is that important to a parody film that aims to use humor to challenge and disrupt the idea of the "good" and "bad" brown body?

I am have always been particularly interested in the ways that the American dream continues to define, confine and legitimize certain ways of being in the world. I believe a closer examination of its role in tandem with your works established goals could open up your exploration of the role that citizenship plays in contemporary racial formation.

Good Luck!

Jigna Desai's great talk "Cinema of Exception, Cinema of Insecurity: South Asian Diasporic Radical Formations in Post 9/11 Media" ended this semester's GWSS colloquium on a high note. In her talk, Jigna analyzed the two popular Harold and Kumar cinematic depictions of the Post 9/11 U.S. "state of exception" where anxieties around race, (in)security, nation, and death are negotiated. Jigna's work shows how these films in particular exemplify the (white) neoliberal/multiculturalist struggle with the racialized Other that is managed through the recognition of the "good Muslim" and the simultaneous dehumanizing of the "bad Muslim" allowing for validation of violence, death, and unfreedom for some (raced bodies) in the name of security for others (white Americans). Furthermore, the Harold and Kumar films provide a narrative toward citizenship via assimilation for the racialized Other through 1. Consumerism 2. Heternomativity 3. Reproduction & Capital. While providing an incredibly convincing argument regarding the films as popularly (parody) of these socio(cultural)politic negoations, Jigna argues that the films also provide space for subversive ruptures that should not be noted.

As someone considering media analysis as a potential aspect of my dissertation project, Jigna's work provided a great example of what feminist media scholarship can look like and its place in our department. During the question and answer portion of the colloquium I asked Jigna about larger audience reception to the Harold and Kumar films. Though in no way diminishing the intellect of the typical Harold and Kumar viewer/consumer, I wondered how Jigna's readings of the films compare to popular readings. Audience research is quite the contentious topic in critical media studies because of how impossible it is to ever quality how any given media is understood. Any given "text" can have any number of meanings to any number of audiences. The entire "death of the author" bit via Barthes right. However, I do find it an important question to consider. Jigna's work brilliantly outlined many of the larger current cultural negotiations being played out in the films themselves. I wonder how audiences of the films connect these parodies to such negotations, and what impact the films have on audience conceptions of the very poignant issues Jigna's talk raised: (in)security, global injury, recognizability, the racialized Other, "expendable" populations, citizenship, etc. I realize there is no answer or even easy way to find such an answer. Jigna's responded to my question noting that the films are and must be legible in various ways (genre for example) but are able to do so while still providing opportunity for subversive understandings of race, citizenships, and Post-9/11 anxieties. I agree with the necessity of legibility for popularity, but wonder more about these moments of subversion. Kumar marrying a bag of marijuana is surely saying something, but I am interested in more detail regarding other moments of subversion and if/how popular audiences seem them as such.

Overall, Jigna's talk and reading of the films was convincing, intriguing, brilliantly articulated, and quite fun. I will certainly be watching the Harold and Kumar films in the near future. ☺

Professor Jigna Desai spoke at the final colloquium of the semester about post-9/11 media and film, particularly focusing on the Harold and Kumar series. Spurred by the murder of Balbir Singh, Desai addressed the media's role in producing biopolitical racial formations, delineating (and teaching how to distinguish) between the 'good' immigrant/person of color, and the 'bad'.

In the first of the series, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Desai argued that the film made a critique of white heteromasculinity, making it 'disgusting', while also attempting to show both Harold and Kumar as 'good' racial citizens, creating a queer American Dream that critiques American consumption-as-identity. In the second film, in which they escape from Guantanamo Bay, Kumar becomes the central character, and the two again must prove their 'goodness' as racial citizens.

While Desai argued that satirizing and parodying terrorism lead to a catharsis for the viewer - finally, we can laugh again, therefore we are secure - m y question is about such laughter and what it might do for the viewer. For me it seems that laughter can mean a great many things for an audience, and indeed not everyone will laugh at the same things and for the same reasons. But in this case laughter about prison rape, for example, is to me a de-ethicizing move. Does laughter de-ethicize or absolve the viewer of responsibility? What does it mean when a viewer laughs at a situation that cannot but call to mind the many abuses occurring in Guantanamo, not least the horrifying abuses of Abu Ghraib? I would have liked to hear more discussion about the work that laughter and satire of such terrible conditions does, and what laughter and satire do in relation to ethics.

On Monday, visiting scholar Gundula Ludwig gave a talk entitled, "Thinking Sex as a State Concern: How Turning to State Theory can Stimulate New Directions in Queer Theory and Vice Versa." I am not certain if this colloquium was a part of the GWSS colloquium or another colloquium series, but since Gundula is a visiting member of the GWSS department I thought I would post my response to her talk regardless of its sponsorship.

What I found most exciting about Gundula's work was that it aims to bridge a conversation between fields of thought that typically do not engage with one another. I am intrigued by the ways in which theory and scholarship travel and the ways in which they do not. Specifically how some "fields" regularly engage with work from other "fields" and some do not. Different scholarship is weighted differently in terms of intellectual exchange or currency. Gundula's project stages a conversation between political theory and queer scholarship, showing both what can be gained (and also what limitations still persist) by such engagement. While interdisciplinary scholarship often speak with other interdisciplinary scholarship, it seems as though conversations between interdisciplinary scholars and more traditional scholars are less frequent. Or rather, where interdisciplinary work might include strictly disciplinary scholarship, the engagement does not always happen the other direction. Gundula's talk was inspiring in that she poses that queer theory and political theory can both gain intellectual traction by engaging with the other. More conversations and projects like this need to take place.

My other lasting thought after Gundula's paper was in regard to Naomi Scheman's question during the question and answer portion of the talk. Naomi asked Gundula to comment on two different political responses to the state's investment in identities of gender/sex/desire. Pointing to gay men who claim to be "born this way" and trans-identified individuals who push for a fluid unrestrictive acknowledgement of their gender, Naomi wondered how Gundula accounted for such different responses state power. Although I won't provide an answer for the question, as I am far less versed in political theory than Gundula, I do think the general question speaks to GLBT negotiations with hegemony. This is perhaps obvious. However, I have been thinking about hegemony throughout the semester in Gundula's class and I think understanding these activist responses as two different approaches to hegemonic power helps to contextualize them. Some individuals (gay, white men as Naomi pointed out) benefit in many ways from the hegemonic power structures that are in place, and are perhaps thus more willing to negotiate with hegemony for inclusion. Others, (such as some queer/trans individuals - particularly those who are economically disadvantaged and queers of color) "have nothing [or little] left to loose" and so they are less invested in "sitting at the table" that has never, and will likely never value their presence anyway. Either way, it is significant to note that via Gramsci - and Gundula's talk - hegemony will inevitably find a way incorporate both responses into its larger power structure. Moves and changes within this structure happen incrementally as large changes are foreclosed by such refolding and in ways that also often simultaneously marginalize other bodies as they occur. Thinking about responses by marginalized groups/individuals as varied negotiations with hegemony, in direct correlation to their distance from the benefits of such power structures, allows us to deconstruct such responses in a way that avoids the "transgressive" or " assimilationist" binary that is in fact, not real, and never quite as simplistic as some would like to think.

I thoroughly enjoyed Gundula's talk and extremely grateful for the opportunity to work with her this semester!

In his talk on Friday Yichiro Onishi presented his work on Abbey Lincoln's 1973 jazz recordings. Onishi offers a detailed personal, political, and cultural contextualization for recordings to claim that the tracks illustrate Lincoln's "aesthetic of radical black feminism." More specifically, Onishi used a queer of color critique (via Rod Ferguson) to read interviews with Lincoln, along side her vocalization of "Caged Birds" as a direct revolt against white heteropatriachy.

Although Onishi's presentation itself raised many questions for me, I was particularly intrigued by the "question and answer" discussion that followed his talk. Amy Kaminsky posed one of the first questions regarding Onishi's claim that Lincoln was standing in resistance to heteropatriachy in her embrace of polyamory. Although Onishi presented this stance as queer, Kaminsky was concerned because Lincoln made no direct reference to same-sex desire, but rather continued to express heterosexual desire, albeit in a polygamous form. After this comment, a number of other people responded including Edén Torres, Zenzele Isoke, Naomi Scheman, and Charlottee Albrecht. I would like to join this conversation, virtually, as well as use it as a starting point for my questions.

I agree with Edén's reading of Lincoln's statement of desire for "you and you and you" as a potential opening for same-sex desire. However, I would like to resist the notion that same-sex desire needs to be at the forefront of queerness. In fact, I would argue that same-sex desire does not have to be present at all in queerness. I agree with Onishi's reading of Lincoln as queer in that her embrace of polyamory stands in direct resistance to heteropatriachy. Furthermore, to agree with Brittany's post - the ambiguousness of Lincoln's statement itself makes it queer by refusaling the demanded intelligibility of heterpatriachy. Lastly, I agree completely with Zenzele's ascertain that Lincoln's queerness is rooted in disrupting the normalized white (hetero/monogamous) relationality. This is specifically clear in Onishi's presentation of Lincoln in that Onishi situates Lincoln's polyamory in the same historical moment as the release of the Moynihan Report.

The gender/sex of Lincoln's "you and you and you" potential partners is thus irrelevant to her queerness. It is queer for anyone to claim polyamory as their preferred structure of intimacy in a sociocultural (political) world that sees monogamy as the only "respectable" kind of relationality. (Something that is undoubtedly racialized and classed). Furthermore, for Lincoln as a woman of color this claim, without question, queers her in a post-Moynihan world. Race, just as much as desire, situates Lincoln as queer, radical, and powerful.

This conversation left me more aware then ever how much work queer theorists still have to do. Scholars like Rod Ferguson, Omi Tinsley, E. Patrick Johnson, Cheryl Clarke , to (re)name but a few, have done great work addressing race within queerness and queerness within race. As feminist scholars and thinkers we all too often claim and praise intersectionality within our work, but yet so often queerness moves unmarked as white leaving the queerness queers of color embody as marginalized or even worse misrecognized, or disregarded. My question is then, how can work like Onishi's, and the discussion that followed, help us all rethink/remember the possibilities of queer as an analytic which - by its very naming - refuses any form of standardization or boundedness?

In Yuichiro Onishi's talk entitled Abbey Lincoln's Japan: Slave Art in the Creation of 1973 Albums" Onishi argued that Abby Lincoln's divorce from drummer Max Roach in 1970 did not defeat her intellectual or activist spirit, but rather gave her "the courage required to go on living in the present." Lincoln's hiatus to Japan during this time then signified a major shift in the artists concsiousness where she explored two things primarily. First, Lincoln challenged the notion that the enslaved did not speak back by recalling the importance of her ancestral past. Second, In this act of "monkery" (the act of self-searching through past exploration) Lincoln aimed to rethink and reorientate the Black families usage of the normative family model.

During the question and answer portion of the talk a number of interesting comments and questions arose, but the most intriguing came from Professor Amy Kaminsky. Kaminsky suggested that the author leave room for Lincoln's work to be interpreted as queer. In short, Kaminsky found that Onishi's reading of Lincoln's message as solely rooted in heterosexuality was limiting to the message that she believes Lincoln was trying to send in her music. Kaminsky was commenting specifically on an interview clip we watch where Lincoln talked about Polygamy in the African community and ended her comments by describing the multiple connections and linkages that should be possible, "with you, and you, and you and you."

Onishi was not 100% sure that he understood Kaminsky's comments, because he did not believe that Lincoln's reference to the "you" in the video clip made any reference to a specific gender desire. This however, is not the precursor for something being "defined" as queer (a specific gender notation), however I believe queerness does the exact opposite it relies on the ambiguity and unsureness that disrupts the heteronormative frame. But what I found interesting in Onishi and Professor Zenzele Isoke's comments back to Kaminsky was this idea that "queerness" in early Black feminist understandings was rooted in disrupting the normality of whiteness.

My question is then; How does important articles like Cathy Cohen's "Punks, Bulldaggers and Welfare Queens: The Radical Potential of Queer Politics?" help further this claim? Or rather how has the use of "queer" by Black feminist scholars been pushing back on the exertion of power by an elite ideological frame that aims to police and control "unruly Black bodies?"

Catherine Squires in her colloquium talk discussed her attempts to bring bell hooks to the discipline of Journalism and Mass Communication. She linked hooks' ideas of civility and political engagement to those of John Dewey and C. Wright Mills. Squires emphasized the idea of civility in an approach of 'what I can do for you', decentering the self and promoting 'civilized' exchange. I was curious about this discussion of civility and why hooks utilizes this term given its proximity to civility and the idea of 'civilization' (as opposed to barbarism) in western ideas of liberalism and democracy. I wondered what Squires' own understandings, critiques, and interventions are regarding this. While I appreciate efforts that seek to encourage discussion between traditional disciplines and feminist studies, in utilizing the terms of debate of that discipline to draw feminist theory into it, what potential is lost, and what remains, of critique and alteration of that discipline? Could an approach that keeps hooks' discussion at critical disagreement with Communications Studies (or Dewey and Mills) and allowing her words to remain at odds with these ideas be an enactment of the very approach that hooks proposes - of sitting with disagreement and ambiguity?

I also am curious about how the 'you' to be helped in 'what I can do for you' is assumed to be the other in political discourse, and not someone who is similarly positioned with respect to social location. Can one reorient this language to think of space to speak with 'you's who may be similarly oppressed? This would also be a political choice to generate spaces of discussion and action, which supports others without centralizing self or re-centering an oppressor.

Yuichiro Onishi spoke in his colloquium talk about Abbey Lincoln and the work she created while away from the U.S. Lincoln lived in Japan after her divorce to work on several albums, and in the talk Onishi addressed Lincoln's views on polygamy or polyamory, and the development of Lincoln's unique reworking and extension of African American slave art.

While others have been talking of Onishi's discussion of Lincoln's understandings of polyamory, I was curious about how the location of Japan figured in the production of Lincoln's art and music - or why it didn't - and why Lincoln was drawn to this location. Was it a particular cultural moment in which Japan-U.S. connections were strengthened? What were the connections between Japan and African American experiences? I also wonder whether Onishi could have addressed Lincoln's understandings and experiences of race and racism in Japan, and what linkages were created between the specificity of place and time in 1970s Japan and Lincoln's work.

Although the entirety of Friday's colloquia was thought provoking, two particular aspects of Dr. Squires talk stood to me: interpersonal civility in Academia and Buddhism as an alternative entry point into theorizing. I have been thinking about both on my own all semester, so I found the space for thinking about these things as a community particularly rewarding this week.

It is no secret that many educators love bell hooks because of her "radical" feminist pedagogy. Dr. Squires did not speak directly about hooks' work in education theory, but the conversation about civility situated itself in my mind in the classroom. Following Brittany's question about civility between colleagues who find themselves in differently places in the hierarchy of recognized academic achievement, the talk left me thinking about how we (graduate students) interact with one another in the classroom. I have been focused on this idea all semester with respect to the space I personally take up in the classroom. Dr. Squires talk provided an interesting alternative frame for my thoughts. Just as its important for instructors to think about the dynamics of their classroom as a part of pedagogy, it is equally important for members of a class to think about their participation in that space and what kind of energy they put forth. To some extent we are all responsible for the spaces we move within. Even if we do not have the power, authority, or ability to shift the dynamic dramatically we can - as Squires outlined - control how we respond and situate ourselves in those moments. The examples of how bell hooks responded to hostile colleagues at conferences shows exactly this. I've found that so many of my graduate seminars have gotten bogged down with what I've previously called ego, but with what Squires/hooks calls dominator culture. When, as a member of a conversation, your desire in that exchange is to be right, or to be recognized as the most knowledgeable you are participating in dominator culture. Even if you are the most knowledgeable, to interact with peers as though their lack of understanding is a burden to you is more than unproductive, it is hostile. I was particularly taken by the conversations about when to say "I'm not your teacher" in regard to explaining privilege to those who have it blinding and when to take the time and work with someone who generally wants to be a more conscious human being.

All of this is to position the hooks quote Squires put forth to us as a standard for academic interpersonal civility. What would classrooms, department meetings, committee meetings, mentor/mentee meeting look like if we all asked ourselves not just "what's in it for me" but also or more so, "and what can I do for you?" What could we learn, where would this take us if we honestly approached each moment with this attitude?

Unsurprisingly I was incredibly excited to hear bell hooks' Buddhist practice centered as one of the major frameworks for her thinking. As someone who has studied Buddhism for 10 or so years, this connected directly to my academic projects. Like hooks much of my thinking is framed in my mind through my Buddhist practice, even though I often use other language to discuss it. Squires is exactly right in her response to a question posted to her - Buddhism is not the answer, and hooks does not position it at such. Buddhist thought is simply another avenue or entry point toward answering some of the difficult questions we face as feminist scholars/thinkers/activists. As Squires showed so much of Western academic thinking is based on Judeo-Christian thought. To situate your work on alternative ways of knowing is to risk being viewed as unsubstantial.

My question then - via hooks/Squires - is how does structuring your feminist analysis though Buddhism differ from other feminist epistemologies seen as "alternative?" Could Buddhism Feminist thinking be seen as equal to Women of Color Feminisms, or Latina/Chicana Feminisms, or Queer Feminisms? To start thinking from some place else in rejection of dominant modes of thought is without question a feminist practice. If we are looking for different answers, then starting with different parameters for our questions seems advantageous. How might Squires talk, and bell hooks, help us understand Buddhism, eastern philosophies and other non-western genealogies of thought as a worthwhile, and equally valid mode of theorizing?

Catherine Squires talk on bell hooks aimed to place her work in conversation with media and critical communication theory to prompt the field to rethink how it understands the topic of civility and communication in the public sphere.

In this talk I found the following connections extremely compelling:

1. According to Squires reading of bell hooks the starting point for civility is not unity or consensus, but rather equity and mutuality (what can I do for you). Hooks makes this distinction, because she believes the most important step in this process is resisting the bondage of dominator culture. dominator culture is the constant positioning of the self over the other. A mechanism of power that we are all implicated within.

2. This process of communicative exchange also requires that we tolerate ambiguity. In hooks conception this means that each party must engage in exchange willing to walk away without making any clear determinations, but accept fragmentation and psychological discomfort. Squires uses the example of the media's persistent demand that the current "occupy" movement provide them with a leader and a specific set of agenda items. In many ways drawing our attention to the limits of our current communcative practices.

These points were of interest to me, because Squires project unearths past writings by hooks that many publishers have deemed as passé'. However, it is clear that much of her work is still very relevant to the current "age of fracture" (i.e.;post-movement era). As I consider the role that dominator culture and the tolerance of ambiguity (a phrase that other women of color feminists like Gloria Anzaldua utilize) plays in the creation of civility I imagine that this conversation can not happen without talking about the ways that language or particular discursive manuvers frame these debates or discourses of civility.