WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU MEAN BY PERSONAL LIFE? BUT WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU MEAN BY PERSONAL? 

things i have been asking in public since at least 1996 (when i participated in this roundtable for my college alumni magazine). 

“well who is it for then?”

my father asked me this on the phone today, after he tried to talk to me about one of my posts, and i tried to tell him that it is really not a good idea for him to be reading my tumblr. i approve of willful not-knowing in many situations and i guess i am going to have to be the willful not-knower in this one; luckily, refusing to acknowledge who might be watching is a life skill that anyone who wears small dresses as often as i do is constantly honing. a part of me wanted to say “it’s for itself,” which is not untrue. “who is it for” is actually a really hard question. 

"If I cannot tell a story about myself, then I will die."

Judith Butler, Giving an Account of Oneself (via spaceshipignition)

if i cannot have people i am close to tell stories about me then i will die also. 

"if we can say that murder and hate designate everything that excludes closeness, it is insofar as they ravage from within an original relationship to alterity. the hostis responds to hospitality in the way that the ghost recalls himself to the living, not letting them forget."

anne dufourmantelle in of hospitality: anne dufourmantelle invites jacques derrida to respond. footnote 2: “the latin hostis means guest but also enemy.” this reminds me of my favorite line in this song with “you’ve been a guest in your own home” and what it was like living as a guest and an enemy for a year and a half (i’m feeling somewhere between too blase and too magnanimous tonight to link) and i so get this and this is how i understand of hospitality: anne dufourmantelle invites jacques derrida to respond.  

—chris kraus, i love dick 

unclear why i did not underline and star “i still hadn’t gotten round to explaining what guatemalan genocide had to do with the 180 pages of love letters that i’d written with my husband and then given you,” which is an equally crucial line.  

whyiamtellingyouaboutit:

Tracey knows…

tracey emin, i whisper to my past do i have another choice, 2010 

Digital Identity 1

sassmadness:

Sarah and I are liveblogging the conference on Tumblr, because what else would we do?  We also femme flagged as Tumblr academics last night: reddish-orange nails, with a gold ring finger.

Sarah’s friend Bonnie is talking about Shakesville and safe space.  It’s so funny, because when we first got the program for the conference, I saw Bonnie’s presentation and was really worried that her presentation was going to be really similar to mine.  But then surprise!  It’s very similar to mine, which is actually relieving insofar as that maybe my research is a little validated?  

Thinking about safe space as a practice- authoritative public speech, the ability to attach authority to this public speech.  Using Althusser’s concept of ideology in order to enforce what’s happening- mocking, shaming, affection, boundary policing.  Why we should care- it dramatizes the reality of dominant political space (I don’t feel safe commenting elsewhere on the Internet.)  The negotiation of public feminist identity, not perfectly done.

Next up is some early research on asexuality- he pulls out the History of Sexuality vol. 1 and says “I”m going to read from a book you may have heard of.”  LOL PERHAPS THEORY BRO?  But also incredibly endearing bro.  How has the internet informed the creation of these sexual identities?  The internet as a place for the production of experts.  Issues of control- a comfort placed in the fact that the page itself (asexuality.org) looks like an institution.  Allows splinter groups to claim space by taking it off of Yahool.

“Beyond Binary Digital Embodiment”- Complex matrix of interactions between the organic body, the cyberbody, the network of information flows, the software which mediates these reactions.  (What are bodies).  An active interface through which one relates to others.  Which bodies mean which to what self at what time?  The experience of the body as understood through the Deleuzian fold (I’m glad that I have the intenet to look things up.)

“Queer Space, Cyber Space”- the implications of a queer internet.  She’s talking about online temporalities, which I really wish that I had been able to incorporate into my presentation.  Overlapping and disjointed presences.  The internet is queer in both structure and nature.  How is it that the internet queers us all?  It is accomplished by exposing identities as superfluous and unnecessary, by dissolving the identities that queer theory/politics finds so problematic.  This presentation was incredible!  So many things I want to talk to this person about.  

i am so into this conference liveblogging. (all bolding mine)

one time i was going over to aliza’s and she mentioned another friend was coming over too. “you’ll like her, we made a blood pact last night,” she texted. i liked her. this picture is going to get me through these moody last few hours. 

"You’re not the mom of my archive. GTFO with that."

me to emily re: men telling us how to remember our relationships. (via marc4marc)

You two are just pure gold <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

(via suzy-x)

december was such an innocent time.