mission | archive | zine | manifestos | weblog | contact

10.04.00, 11:14 p.m.

The last few days have been packed. Friday morning I explained to my students modernity, postmodernity, modernism, postmodernism, the humnist subject and its critique, structuralism and poststructuralism, and the relationship between language, ideology, and the constitution of (how we understand) reality. Seriously, and it was not easy. The latter I did by way of The Matrix: not only is "the real" (the Matrix construct) constituted by language (the computer code that is seen trickling down screens like rain), but it is a historical function of uneven power (the artificial intelligence subordinating the human population) and the control of resources (humans are enslaved to provide energy to the machines). Thomas Anderson/Neo is a poststructuralist in the sense that he discovers that the code is not fixed, and can be manipulated to change the reality of the Matrix. Serious. It works as long as you ignore the implications of the rest of the film (the assertation of a more "authentic" reality, a self-knowing humanist subject, et cetera).

Friday evening I went to the APAture performance and saw three fiction/short story readings involving intergenerational family narratives in which food acted as a metaphor for alienation and assimilation. (Can Asian American literature move on now, please?) I also witnessed a terribly problematic performance art piece by a Asian-Latina lesbian that reproduced dominant discourses about black masculinity and had to leave shortly after, I was so appalled. We ended up joining Jason and Serena (and about three hundred others) at the UC Theater for some (weak, sort of fortunately) 3-D porn. Saturday I stapled and collated zines and spent a total of three hours visiting tattoo parlors in the City with Mark before heading out to the APAture main event. I set up on a corner table next to a former student and felt out of place because I don't have a merchandising scheme. (There's a reason for that, which I'm not going to get into right now.) The panel on Asian Americans and the internet took place on an unfinished landing, each of us shouting over the drumming at the other end of the warehouse. I gave away more zines than I sold and wasn't surprised much. (It inspired me to ponder the differences between punk rock zine culture and the post-"zine explosion" wave.) Sunday was a blur of research. Monday I headed out to the MRR house to help with new issue day, but the printer delivered the magazines five hours late. Instead Arwen and I discussed Phillip Pullman and his upcoming reading from The Amber Spyglass, argued with Casey and Garnder over political activism (how to do it) and health care.

Tuesday involved class, more class, and a show: Justice League, Le Tigre, guest list (aw yeah). Iraya was a trashy New Wave femme in her black slip, shirred silver tights and pink fishnet scarf wrapped around her neck -- a mestiza Molly Ringwald to Nikki's dressed down but dapper Andrew McCarthy butch, sans pastels or pads. I'm not sure if that makes me Ducky or Mona, but I was dressed like neither in black. Perhaps a box hat with a veil would have helped, or some wingtips and a dash more pomade. Earlier Iraya had tried to give me a pink belt to complement or clash with my black studded one, but I swore off further accessorizing after the visor glasses. There's only so much a girl (like me, at least) can handle in the way of plasticine flourishes, though I can't say I'm not admiring of her clear pumps. Gary and Stanley had dressed without prior consultation in matching outfits: legwarmers, tight pants, sleeveless tees (Gary also wore fishnet over his), vinyl belts, scarves and too-large sunglasses for the club. They were riding the New Wave, florescent Kahunas of a tidal degree. Nikki and I were impressed by the camp with which we were surrounded. Shouting over the second band (a duo involving a biracial funk crooner and a whiteboy guitarist, Iraya called it "White Zombie meets Badu"), we dished on white rockers and middle-class dykes in gas-station attendant gear, wondering out loud about the class politics of affecting a proletariat style. I gave Stanley my X button (the Australian X, not the overrated Los Angeles X) and plotted a series of grant proposals; Gary and Iraya together are performance art, disrupting public space with their oddly symbiotic moves and exaggerated expressions. (To have seen them on stage as Sta-Prest was genius.) Le Tigre took the stage and we danced (or everyone but Nikki did) and considered the political implications of the slideshow behind the band. (We noted that the audience identified with Matthew Shepard and the WTO protests, but by and large were silent when scenes from the Diallo or Louima protests were flashed overhead.) Kathleen invited audience members to show them their various tricks, which involved one girl eating a cookie, swallowing, regurgitating and swallowing again. (Iraya murmured, "That's so bulemic!") The show let out at one-thirty and after catching a quick word with Kathleen and too tired to otherwise comment much, we left the club and made our various ways home. 

There's so much more to say about the last few days --nevermind last night!-- but I can't seem to find the time or energy to be as eloquent as I'd like about fame, celebrity, feminist art, Asian American art, politics as pop music. (But Ciara does!) Thursday (later tonight) I'm apparently giving a reading with Shellac, a new magazine featuring queer people of color, and next weekend it's the American Studies Association national conference in Detroit. I'm on a panel about race and technology with the amazing Wahneema Lubiano as chair/discussant -- suffice to say I'm shaking in my boots.