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Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto
Simone de Beauvoir said “One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.” The glitch announces: One is not born, but rather becomes, a body.
The divide between the digital and the real world no longer exists: we are connected all the time. What must we do to work out who we are, and where we belong? How do we find the space to grow, unite and confront the systems of oppression? This conflict can be found in the fissures between the body, gender and identity. Too often, the glitch is considered a mistake, a faulty overlaying, a bug in the system; in contrast, Russell compels us to find liberation here. In a radical call to arms Legacy Russell argues that we need to embrace the glitch in order to break down the binaries and limitations that define gender, race, sexuality.
Glitch Feminism is a vital new chapter in cyberfeminism, one that explores the relationship between gender, technology and identity. In an urgent manifesto, Russell reveals the many ways that the Glitch performs and transforms: how it refuses, throws shade, ghosts, errs, encrypt, mobilizes and survives. Developing the argument through memoir, art and critical theory, Russell also looks at the work of contemporary artists who travel through the glitch in their work. Timely and provocative, Glitch Feminism shows how the error can be a revolution.
The divide between the digital and the real world no longer exists: we are connected all the time. What must we do to work out who we are, and where we belong? How do we find the space to grow, unite and confront the systems of oppression? This conflict can be found in the fissures between the body, gender and identity. Too often, the glitch is considered a mistake, a faulty overlaying, a bug in the system; in contrast, Russell compels us to find liberation here. In a radical call to arms Legacy Russell argues that we need to embrace the glitch in order to break down the binaries and limitations that define gender, race, sexuality.
Glitch Feminism is a vital new chapter in cyberfeminism, one that explores the relationship between gender, technology and identity. In an urgent manifesto, Russell reveals the many ways that the Glitch performs and transforms: how it refuses, throws shade, ghosts, errs, encrypt, mobilizes and survives. Developing the argument through memoir, art and critical theory, Russell also looks at the work of contemporary artists who travel through the glitch in their work. Timely and provocative, Glitch Feminism shows how the error can be a revolution.
178 pages, Paperback
First published September 29, 2020
About the author
Legacy Russell
13 books60 followersLegacy Russell is an American curator and writer. She is associate curator of exhibitions at the Studio Museum in Harlem. Previous to this role Russell worked as an independent curator alongside her work at online platform Artsy expanding the company's gallery relations across Europe.
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October 17, 2020
This manifesto is blurbed by Lil Miquela, which in and of itself should give the reader pause. In the chapter "Glitch is Anti-Body" Russell compares Miquela to the queer artist Kia Labeija—an HIV-positive Black and Filipino woman who practices voguing and self-portraiture—arguing that both "deploy the imaginary as a computational strategy of survival" and act as "embodiments of persistent refusal ... actively re-imagining and re-centering neoteric realities." Although Russell does briefly consider that Miquela represents "a perverse intersection of a neoliberal consumer capitalism and advocacy," she never fully engages with what this means. Nor does she fully explain why we should embrace Miquela as a model of glitch feminism. Miquela doesn't have a real body—and what? Draw it out for us please.
While Glitch Feminism is an enjoyable primer on basic ideas from gender theory/cyberfeminism, it's not really offering any new ideas on its own, instead regurgitating what we can already glean from Judith Butler, Donna Haraway, etc. We already know that the border between online and offline is fuzzy, and that the Internet allows us to inhabit multiple identities, and that it perhaps lets us temporarily transcend our race, class, gender, so on. The counter-response, of course, is that surveillance and algorithms and so on enable big tech to monetize whatever identities we assume. Russell does point out that, say, Facebook adding 58 gender options isn't actually progress, but her analysis still feels too optimistic — there's not enough clarity on how we can bypass, thwart, disrupt surveillance to create our own spaces of play. I was also disappointed bc Fred Moten (whom she quotes) has written so much good stuff on "the break," "the cut" and the politics of invisibility (drawing from Ralph Ellison), all of it tied to technologies of reproduction, and she doesn't effectively incorporate those concepts to flesh out her idea of the glitch. The idea of "glitch feminism" probably felt more radical when she wrote her original manifesto but as it stands this book feels more like a rebrand of existing ideas than a genuinely new way of thinking.
While Glitch Feminism is an enjoyable primer on basic ideas from gender theory/cyberfeminism, it's not really offering any new ideas on its own, instead regurgitating what we can already glean from Judith Butler, Donna Haraway, etc. We already know that the border between online and offline is fuzzy, and that the Internet allows us to inhabit multiple identities, and that it perhaps lets us temporarily transcend our race, class, gender, so on. The counter-response, of course, is that surveillance and algorithms and so on enable big tech to monetize whatever identities we assume. Russell does point out that, say, Facebook adding 58 gender options isn't actually progress, but her analysis still feels too optimistic — there's not enough clarity on how we can bypass, thwart, disrupt surveillance to create our own spaces of play. I was also disappointed bc Fred Moten (whom she quotes) has written so much good stuff on "the break," "the cut" and the politics of invisibility (drawing from Ralph Ellison), all of it tied to technologies of reproduction, and she doesn't effectively incorporate those concepts to flesh out her idea of the glitch. The idea of "glitch feminism" probably felt more radical when she wrote her original manifesto but as it stands this book feels more like a rebrand of existing ideas than a genuinely new way of thinking.
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February 3, 2022"Ognuno di noi contiene moltitudini, e in quanto femministe glitch, non abbiamo uno ma tanti corpi".
Partendo dal principio - ereditato, in parte, da Simone de Beauvoir - che "corpo non si nasce, lo si diventa", Legacy Russell struttura il suo manifesto glitch, o meglio, il manifesto della sua comunità di appartenenza, formata da artisti queer che rivendicano l'uso di corpi feticizzati e marginalizzati, attivisti che hanno fatto del digitale il loro luogo, uno spazio in cui sperimentare ibridando la fisicità con la filosofia cyborg. È una prima persona plurale quella che si fa soggetto, non si è mai soli nel processo di ristrutturazione del reale e di costruzioni di nuovi immaginari. Perché è questo l'obiettivo del femminismo glitch: "mandare in cortocircuito il maledetto sistema" per preparare il terreno "al futuro caleidoscopico che desideriamo".
Glitch è un termine ripreso dalla tecnica, vuol dire errore, imprevisto. Abbracciare un malfunzionamento significa rifiutare il sistema dato, rifiutarlo e registrare l'anomalia. Glitch è una negazione critica al mainstream ma è anche un'opportunità, una strategia di disobbedienza e una forma d'espressione del sé. Spesso il glitch è associato a un vero e proprio effetto visivo presente sugli schermi, una deformazione di un'immagine, di un suono. Uno squarcio che lascia intravedere un mondo che sta al di sotto della superficie. "Un moto di liberazione in cui immergersi per demolire i limiti che definiscono il genere, la razza e l’identità sessuale". Il glitch diventa il simbolo di un femminismo profondamente digitale, che vede il cyberspazio come “una stanza tutta per sé” in cui esplorare ed espandere la propria identità. Ecco allora la rassegna di artisti e attivisti QTPOCI+ (Queer & Trans, People of Color, Indigenous) che indagano le relazioni che si sviluppano tra genere, identità e tecnologia e si domandano se c'è modo di andare oltre il corpo così come ci è stato "consegnato" e per ribellarsi al binarismo di genere. Proprio il digitale e la creazione di avatar genderless, così come le infinite sperimentazioni e i "travestimenti" che ognuno di noi attua online, potrebbero essere una strada percorribile, nonostante tutti i limiti e le criticità legate alla Rete.
La parte più interessante del saggio è la critica al "dualismo digitale" che troppo spesso distingue il tempo passato allo schermo e il tempo passato nel mondo, semplificando la relazione tra il mondo online e quello “away from keyboard” ovvero "distante dalla tastiera". Questo termine - AFK - è decisamente preferito dall'autrice rispetto a IRL - "In Real Life"- perché quest’ultimo suggerisce che la vita online non sia vita reale bensì una semplice fantasia, mentre tutto il libro si basa proprio sul registrare l’impatto che abbiamo online e le sue ramificazioni all’interno di uno spazio offline. Per tante comunità infatti il cyberspazio è un luogo sicuro, di accettazione, in cui vivere ed esprimere se stessi in libertà mentre l'offline è un mondo violento e discriminatorio.
È una lettura che fa quello che promette: squarcia l'unico schermo che credevi dovessi guardare e ti fa vedere cosa c'è dietro. Una commistione tra critica d'arte contemporanea (un po' malriuscita considerando che quando si parla di opere visuali, non si capisce quasi NIENTE di come siano fatte) e manifesto attivista.
Per chi cerca qualcosa di decisamente diverso rispetto al canone.
Avvertenze: si ammanta di una retorica poco esplicativa e possiede una specificità metropolitana newyorkcentrica che potrebbe non interessare ai più.
Partendo dal principio - ereditato, in parte, da Simone de Beauvoir - che "corpo non si nasce, lo si diventa", Legacy Russell struttura il suo manifesto glitch, o meglio, il manifesto della sua comunità di appartenenza, formata da artisti queer che rivendicano l'uso di corpi feticizzati e marginalizzati, attivisti che hanno fatto del digitale il loro luogo, uno spazio in cui sperimentare ibridando la fisicità con la filosofia cyborg. È una prima persona plurale quella che si fa soggetto, non si è mai soli nel processo di ristrutturazione del reale e di costruzioni di nuovi immaginari. Perché è questo l'obiettivo del femminismo glitch: "mandare in cortocircuito il maledetto sistema" per preparare il terreno "al futuro caleidoscopico che desideriamo".
Glitch è un termine ripreso dalla tecnica, vuol dire errore, imprevisto. Abbracciare un malfunzionamento significa rifiutare il sistema dato, rifiutarlo e registrare l'anomalia. Glitch è una negazione critica al mainstream ma è anche un'opportunità, una strategia di disobbedienza e una forma d'espressione del sé. Spesso il glitch è associato a un vero e proprio effetto visivo presente sugli schermi, una deformazione di un'immagine, di un suono. Uno squarcio che lascia intravedere un mondo che sta al di sotto della superficie. "Un moto di liberazione in cui immergersi per demolire i limiti che definiscono il genere, la razza e l’identità sessuale". Il glitch diventa il simbolo di un femminismo profondamente digitale, che vede il cyberspazio come “una stanza tutta per sé” in cui esplorare ed espandere la propria identità. Ecco allora la rassegna di artisti e attivisti QTPOCI+ (Queer & Trans, People of Color, Indigenous) che indagano le relazioni che si sviluppano tra genere, identità e tecnologia e si domandano se c'è modo di andare oltre il corpo così come ci è stato "consegnato" e per ribellarsi al binarismo di genere. Proprio il digitale e la creazione di avatar genderless, così come le infinite sperimentazioni e i "travestimenti" che ognuno di noi attua online, potrebbero essere una strada percorribile, nonostante tutti i limiti e le criticità legate alla Rete.
La parte più interessante del saggio è la critica al "dualismo digitale" che troppo spesso distingue il tempo passato allo schermo e il tempo passato nel mondo, semplificando la relazione tra il mondo online e quello “away from keyboard” ovvero "distante dalla tastiera". Questo termine - AFK - è decisamente preferito dall'autrice rispetto a IRL - "In Real Life"- perché quest’ultimo suggerisce che la vita online non sia vita reale bensì una semplice fantasia, mentre tutto il libro si basa proprio sul registrare l’impatto che abbiamo online e le sue ramificazioni all’interno di uno spazio offline. Per tante comunità infatti il cyberspazio è un luogo sicuro, di accettazione, in cui vivere ed esprimere se stessi in libertà mentre l'offline è un mondo violento e discriminatorio.
È una lettura che fa quello che promette: squarcia l'unico schermo che credevi dovessi guardare e ti fa vedere cosa c'è dietro. Una commistione tra critica d'arte contemporanea (un po' malriuscita considerando che quando si parla di opere visuali, non si capisce quasi NIENTE di come siano fatte) e manifesto attivista.
Per chi cerca qualcosa di decisamente diverso rispetto al canone.
Avvertenze: si ammanta di una retorica poco esplicativa e possiede una specificità metropolitana newyorkcentrica che potrebbe non interessare ai più.
Read
October 22, 2020solid book but i had to keep reminding myself that it is a ‘’manifesto” and to not get frustrated that many ideas are not fully fleshed out. the first two chapters resonated the most and i enjoyed how Russell brought in examples from black artists and other artists of color to explore the core concepts of GF. the two major critiques i have are 1) it didn’t feel like feminism was the most accurate foundational concept for the work - feels much more focused on identity and gender more generally (ie resistance to a binary concept of gender) 2) the work seems to intentionally evade the commodification of identity in the virtual realm and how that influences engagement/community building/value/sense of self and limits ones ability to truly resist the systems that exist AFK. The influence and role of capitalism cannot be overlooked and i’m hopeful the author will continue to build on the ideas in this work in future writings.
June 25, 2021
i want to be made uninterpretable by the algorithm
October 8, 2020
Agh, this is a difficult book to review. I was hooked on the bio but the book, for me, just didn't live up to its blurb. It's less a book and more of an extended metaphor slash niche and lengthy university essay. Hats off to the writer though for writing something very unique that transgresses boundaries and genres (much like the Glitch).
November 8, 2020
More manifesto than theory, but creative and thoughtful throughout! Is lacking a madness or disability studies perspective which is a rather significant cause for concern when so many obvious parallels exist. How are we still discussing embodiment and body politics without directly engaging with (dis)ability? Nonetheless Russell is incisive and critical in their call for feminists and queer theorists to look to the internet as a legitimate space of theory, community, and identity. Completely worthwhile as an intro text, and to familiarize oneself with how anti racist feminisms can and already do manifest digitally.
March 9, 2021
i like the premise of this book, that the virtual world, as a place you don't need a body, is a place to "glitch" the gender binary/other oppressive systems
provocative and refreshing in a theoretical landscape that fetishizes idea of bodies/embodiment + still tends to be technophobic
i guess when all we had was the non-virtual, bodies/embodiment mattered (and ofc still do). but now memes serve the same purpose. "the body is itself an architecture that is activated and then passed along like a meme to advance social and cultural logic"
the "right to complexity" is such a nice idea
but! i thought overall this book did not have much to say / glossed over touchy issues w the ideology. like yes embodiment can be bad. so can virtuality. russell will concede this briefly then move on. like yah the internet is being overtaken by corporations/mega platforms, all the beautiful cool shit on it is being commodified, but let's not deal with this reality and instead celebrate the theoretical liberatory potential of being bodiless as represented by these very specifically interpreted works of art
she has a weird uncritical take on lil miquela where she's like, yah lil miquela could "epitomize a perverse intersection of a neoliberal consumer capitalism and advocacy," but she also "epitomizes what becomes possible with avatar perform-ativity" so... let's move on! and then she criticizes fraud icon anna delvey (as well as amalia ulman who's work i'm not familiar w) for representing how white women can get away w anything when it seems like delvey does represent something about glitching capitalism... she exposes the fraud that it is?? of course delvey is not like a 100% pure political good but that's because glitch, and representation, are really not that politically potent. i much prefer materialist analyses of technology from like logic magazine. grounded in the material world, they can better account for nuance instead of a simple good/bad binary. read blockchain chicken farm!
i like this review quote that "glitch feminism takes technology primarily as an aestheticized metaphor" https://www.bookforum.com/print/2703/...
and "glitch feminism emphasizes the power of representation"
unlike the reviewer i think these are real flaws. i did like the works cited. black/queer artists kinda on the margins of the art world. but i guess what's cool about that art is that it doesn't have a single meaning, it isn't dogma, and her interpretations felt like simplifications in order to serve her utopian theory. it is a manifesto, maybe i don't like manifestos, still shouldn't manifestos at least be written in direct, not repetitive language since there's not much space to begin w? i didn't like the gushy prose and felt all 12 theses ("glitch is X") were effectively the same thing reworded differently
provocative and refreshing in a theoretical landscape that fetishizes idea of bodies/embodiment + still tends to be technophobic
i guess when all we had was the non-virtual, bodies/embodiment mattered (and ofc still do). but now memes serve the same purpose. "the body is itself an architecture that is activated and then passed along like a meme to advance social and cultural logic"
the "right to complexity" is such a nice idea
but! i thought overall this book did not have much to say / glossed over touchy issues w the ideology. like yes embodiment can be bad. so can virtuality. russell will concede this briefly then move on. like yah the internet is being overtaken by corporations/mega platforms, all the beautiful cool shit on it is being commodified, but let's not deal with this reality and instead celebrate the theoretical liberatory potential of being bodiless as represented by these very specifically interpreted works of art
she has a weird uncritical take on lil miquela where she's like, yah lil miquela could "epitomize a perverse intersection of a neoliberal consumer capitalism and advocacy," but she also "epitomizes what becomes possible with avatar perform-ativity" so... let's move on! and then she criticizes fraud icon anna delvey (as well as amalia ulman who's work i'm not familiar w) for representing how white women can get away w anything when it seems like delvey does represent something about glitching capitalism... she exposes the fraud that it is?? of course delvey is not like a 100% pure political good but that's because glitch, and representation, are really not that politically potent. i much prefer materialist analyses of technology from like logic magazine. grounded in the material world, they can better account for nuance instead of a simple good/bad binary. read blockchain chicken farm!
i like this review quote that "glitch feminism takes technology primarily as an aestheticized metaphor" https://www.bookforum.com/print/2703/...
and "glitch feminism emphasizes the power of representation"
unlike the reviewer i think these are real flaws. i did like the works cited. black/queer artists kinda on the margins of the art world. but i guess what's cool about that art is that it doesn't have a single meaning, it isn't dogma, and her interpretations felt like simplifications in order to serve her utopian theory. it is a manifesto, maybe i don't like manifestos, still shouldn't manifestos at least be written in direct, not repetitive language since there's not much space to begin w? i didn't like the gushy prose and felt all 12 theses ("glitch is X") were effectively the same thing reworded differently
October 30, 2021
I think the idea is good, but I wanted more substance from the book. I would, however, read a straight memoir from Russell.
February 19, 2021
Very nice very good i loved this!!!! Trying to delve more in2 cyberfeminism n its variations so this was an extremely delicious primer of Russell’s take on cyberfeminism via her work on glitch feminism!
I found the “glitch” rly straightforward to understand, which also made me feel empowered and capable of understanding sum rly complex ideas that Russell unpacks vry well. She writes so passionately its truly infectious, a call 2 action like no other.
Most of what (little) i know abt cyberfeminism is based on hayles’ work so my perspective felt rly refreshed reading Russell’s take on the same/similar ideas of corporeality, the digital as materiality, marginalised bodies etc. which in and of themselves serve to question the visibility of white cis women in this field and the invisibility of anyone who falls outside of that category, Russell herself bein Black femme and queer.
This has also been the most interrogative book on gender n the (gender) binary i have ever read so far ever n i must say everyday i question more n more its relevance n usefulness lol. Just a thought but i cant help continually seeing gender as an outdated way to assign labour n continue to subjugate one against the other under capitalism (under the name of equal competition lol) which then arguably serves 2 marginalise all (inevitably) save for one breed of human called the White Cis Man. Nobody mention how much this paragraph doesnt make grammatical sense pls .
Super excited 2 research more in2 this rich n luscious, emerging n evolving topic, n also endeavour 2 read more by Black authors and prioritise their worldviews as a way 2 further question and dismantle the prioritisation of white views n white supremacy in pretty much every area of lyf whether that b online or in the AFK world. Very nice book i enjoyed vry much🥸!!
Edit: i jus skimmed over a lot of the reviews for this lil book n i dont understand why ppl r faulting Russell for doing anything other than writing n presenting exactly what she already claims to be doing ... which is writing a manifesto . LOL like she promised one and delivered! Expecting exactly food for thought or an introductory primer on her own contribution to cyberfem discourse i was still extremely impressed! Jus my 2 cents :)
I found the “glitch” rly straightforward to understand, which also made me feel empowered and capable of understanding sum rly complex ideas that Russell unpacks vry well. She writes so passionately its truly infectious, a call 2 action like no other.
Most of what (little) i know abt cyberfeminism is based on hayles’ work so my perspective felt rly refreshed reading Russell’s take on the same/similar ideas of corporeality, the digital as materiality, marginalised bodies etc. which in and of themselves serve to question the visibility of white cis women in this field and the invisibility of anyone who falls outside of that category, Russell herself bein Black femme and queer.
This has also been the most interrogative book on gender n the (gender) binary i have ever read so far ever n i must say everyday i question more n more its relevance n usefulness lol. Just a thought but i cant help continually seeing gender as an outdated way to assign labour n continue to subjugate one against the other under capitalism (under the name of equal competition lol) which then arguably serves 2 marginalise all (inevitably) save for one breed of human called the White Cis Man. Nobody mention how much this paragraph doesnt make grammatical sense pls .
Super excited 2 research more in2 this rich n luscious, emerging n evolving topic, n also endeavour 2 read more by Black authors and prioritise their worldviews as a way 2 further question and dismantle the prioritisation of white views n white supremacy in pretty much every area of lyf whether that b online or in the AFK world. Very nice book i enjoyed vry much🥸!!
Edit: i jus skimmed over a lot of the reviews for this lil book n i dont understand why ppl r faulting Russell for doing anything other than writing n presenting exactly what she already claims to be doing ... which is writing a manifesto . LOL like she promised one and delivered! Expecting exactly food for thought or an introductory primer on her own contribution to cyberfem discourse i was still extremely impressed! Jus my 2 cents :)
October 28, 2020
Really good manifesto. In "Glitch Feminism", Legacy Russell sets down the fundamentals for her theory of feminism - which is, intuitively, glitch feminism - whose aim is to break with the excessive dogmas which coerce us into categorised existence by embracing the glitch - the error which breaks with categories - and performing it extensively. The author recognises that these systems of dogmas - such as race, gender and sexuality - are both at fault for creating and a manifestation of a hierarchy of permissions to exist for those who are disenfranchised, forcing them to either give up their life or change it into a more socially conforming life.
Through the book, Russell shows us numerous examples of mostly digital art done by black and/or queer artists which relate to this and demonstrate how online life is no longer dragged to the subalternity of relevance and how it becomes increasingly important to truly express ourselves as beings which seek to be free from the AFK category systems and to revolutionise our offline existence - Whitman's popular verse "(I am large. I contain multitudes.)" is here often quoted and acts as a motto to propel this plurality of online existences into a dominant plain of existence. Taking after Simone de Beauvoir, Legacy Russell claims that "one is not born, but rather becomes, a body", to signal how the right to have a body for those who are disenfranchised, to exist as an outlier in this heavily categorised society, can be reclaimed.
I have not read much on cyberfeminism, but this book greatly helped me understand a few questions surrounding it and how one can use glitch feminism to break with the shackles of stereotypical existence.
Through the book, Russell shows us numerous examples of mostly digital art done by black and/or queer artists which relate to this and demonstrate how online life is no longer dragged to the subalternity of relevance and how it becomes increasingly important to truly express ourselves as beings which seek to be free from the AFK category systems and to revolutionise our offline existence - Whitman's popular verse "(I am large. I contain multitudes.)" is here often quoted and acts as a motto to propel this plurality of online existences into a dominant plain of existence. Taking after Simone de Beauvoir, Legacy Russell claims that "one is not born, but rather becomes, a body", to signal how the right to have a body for those who are disenfranchised, to exist as an outlier in this heavily categorised society, can be reclaimed.
I have not read much on cyberfeminism, but this book greatly helped me understand a few questions surrounding it and how one can use glitch feminism to break with the shackles of stereotypical existence.
February 20, 2023
This was the absolute worst book I've ever read. I was really uncertain about adding it to my 'nonfiction' tag - I know this is meant to be a conceptual manifesto, but not one page of this book is rooted in reality. I was tempted to tag this book as 'comedy' because it was a joke start to finish. It has 'feminist' in the title, but this is 100%, not a feminist book. In fact, quite the opposite, it did not discuss misogyny ONCE. This book is all about recreating lives and 'personas' online, yet didn't discuss the misogynistic and / or misogynoir vile threats and insults that bombard pretty much every girl and woman's accounts. 🤔 Two quotes really struck me because of how utterly ridiculous they are; "one is not born a body but acquires one," and "the corporeal body is becoming obsolete." What?! This divorce from our physical selves and dismemberment of us into parts is deeply concerning. Humans are bodies. Our minds and bodies are not separate entities engaged in conflict. Not liking aspects of ourselves is a normal experience that everyone goes through. The answer is not to project our self-hatred and insecurities into avatars and live half lives in reality and unobtainable fantasies online. I struggle to see how this book is revolutionary. From my perspective, it's a narrative that adds more sand to the sandbox where people can bury their heads.
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April 6, 2023I am not the most internet/cyber-oriented person, but I found this very thought provoking! my favorite parts were exploring feminism as a virus or cog in the machine of the social order, a kind of philosophy of disruption. I haven't read much gender expansive theory and this felt like a good place to start.
February 2, 2021
"Facebook's fifty-eight gender options (and three pronouns, lest we forget!), first made available for users in 2014, was not a radical gesture—it was neoliberalism at its finest. If a body without a name is an error, providing more names, while proffering inclusivity, does not resolve the issue of the binary body. Rather, it makes and requires a box to be ticked, a categorisation to be determined. Binaries are still presented within the variety of options, and moreover recognition via these platforms urges us to believe that signifying who we are to others is the only pathway to being deemed fit to participate. Poet, artist, and "academia-adjacent independent researcher" Caspar Heinemann puts it best: "In a climate of generalised precarity and instability, naming skin should be the least of our worries: if everything is collapsing, gender's coming down with it. So traumatised cyborg subject is the new normal, but is that the best we can hope for?"
hated some of it, thought other parts were overwrought, but some of it was really smart and interesting. i particularly loved the above page and am extremely inclined to check out the references🫀
hated some of it, thought other parts were overwrought, but some of it was really smart and interesting. i particularly loved the above page and am extremely inclined to check out the references🫀
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March 4, 2021Not planning on writing a review for this one (never do for research-related stuff, aha), but I love this line so much: We want wild, amorous, monstrous bodies.
December 4, 2020
Nothing is perfect but then again maybe I say that as one who fully embraces a sense of rejection. That is to say, I am quick to acknowledge my desire to say "no." This book is also collection of rejections. It says "no" over and over again. Whatever slips in agreements that I might have with Russell are mostly minor and as such I appreciate how much of this book was centered on rejection as well as the synthetic and thus gives strength to the virtual (and what might also be called "artificial"). This book speaks to art and maybe also artifice to a certain extent. At any rate, Black queer women/NB of a certain age may really resonate with theses certain ideas. And what does not resonate is worth investigating and exploring. Even if one disagrees wholeheartedly, I'd suggest having the argument with the text so that you can further form your own manifesto for there are not nearly enough manifestos for us as queer Black people in this digital/virtual/synthetic age.
January 10, 2021
Though Glitch Feminism incorporates art and anecdotes, it’s still very academic in tone – not a beginner’s guide to queer theory, nor a light read. I’m glad to have more insight into the malleability of our identities in the digital era, but probably could have used a primer first…
My full review is up now on Keeping Up With The Penguins.
My full review is up now on Keeping Up With The Penguins.
August 24, 2023
Interesting, fun + well written but did that weird thing typical of post-modernist philosophy where it used a bunch of terms and arguments that it expects you to already have an understanding of and agree with without explaining anything
Has some sentences that feel more like a vague collection of words than an actual point
Incoherency literally defeats the point of philosophy
Has some sentences that feel more like a vague collection of words than an actual point
Incoherency literally defeats the point of philosophy
May 8, 2022
Requires so much background information that I felt most of the book that the author is just saying words without meaning anything. A me problem again, but every statement was so far removed from my personal lived experience that I couldn't even take what it was saying seriously.
March 14, 2023
more like a 4.5 bc although it’s brilliant and thought provoking, intersecting our digital world with both feminism and art, it is not entirely accessible
Read
December 9, 2023read this because i thought it would be useful for a paper i’m writing. interesting book, advances some good arguments, makes me very curious to check out a lot of the scholars and creatives cited throughout. and i like the glitch thing. glad i read this.
March 11, 2022
Other than that the title specifically includes "feminism," I didn't really feel that this was a feminist book at all. I can see how it is, in a way, an extension of feminist thought - sort of an inclusion of those previously excluded and a normalization of an other - but to me that's a stretch. It felt more sort of norm-critical in general with a soft eye towards marrying the cyber and tactile worlds (I'm specifically avoiding the use of "irl" here since the author argues for the online world being more real than the physical one - she champions the use of "afk," away from keyboard, instead).
But who knows, maybe I'm just so far away from being the target audience here that I just can't connect - especially when the author doesn't even try to sort ease the reader in, it's full-bore from page one and pretty heavy in the lingo (or, that is, what I presume to be the lingo since I am not already initiated).
"Glitch Feminism" is definitely a manifesto more than anything. It's light on substance and fleshed out though and more interested in getting the activist word out. Because of this, I really don't see the use in this book for someone it doesn't speak directly to. That is, for myself. I read this purely out of curiosity and to gain some knowledge and insight into a movement that I know nothing about. Well, I still know nothing about it - other than that the author feels strongly that it is necessary and urgent.
Don't get me wrong, I totally get the appeal of an online life for those who have not found their niche in society, for those who feel that they fall through the cracks. Indeed, these are the people Russel speaks to - and she shows how their art-forms and more or less active protests express this. However, I get a bit of a sour taste in my mouth anytime people start talking about overthrowing systems without providing alternate solutions. It's been tried. It's been done. And it's almost always ugly.
In fact, throughout the book I couldn't help but draw parallels to some unsavory elements that have made similar claims (albeit with different target groups) and capitalized on the disenfranchised of society.
In summary then, I did not find much to write home about in this book, but I'm sure some will. It's also a niched introduction to an interesting wider discussion about the convergence of physical and online life, so I can't say that it's a waste of time. However, for me, it was just barely ok, and I wouldn't recommend it.
But feel free to let me know how and why I'm wrong!
But who knows, maybe I'm just so far away from being the target audience here that I just can't connect - especially when the author doesn't even try to sort ease the reader in, it's full-bore from page one and pretty heavy in the lingo (or, that is, what I presume to be the lingo since I am not already initiated).
"Glitch Feminism" is definitely a manifesto more than anything. It's light on substance and fleshed out though and more interested in getting the activist word out. Because of this, I really don't see the use in this book for someone it doesn't speak directly to. That is, for myself. I read this purely out of curiosity and to gain some knowledge and insight into a movement that I know nothing about. Well, I still know nothing about it - other than that the author feels strongly that it is necessary and urgent.
Don't get me wrong, I totally get the appeal of an online life for those who have not found their niche in society, for those who feel that they fall through the cracks. Indeed, these are the people Russel speaks to - and she shows how their art-forms and more or less active protests express this. However, I get a bit of a sour taste in my mouth anytime people start talking about overthrowing systems without providing alternate solutions. It's been tried. It's been done. And it's almost always ugly.
In fact, throughout the book I couldn't help but draw parallels to some unsavory elements that have made similar claims (albeit with different target groups) and capitalized on the disenfranchised of society.
In summary then, I did not find much to write home about in this book, but I'm sure some will. It's also a niched introduction to an interesting wider discussion about the convergence of physical and online life, so I can't say that it's a waste of time. However, for me, it was just barely ok, and I wouldn't recommend it.
But feel free to let me know how and why I'm wrong!
February 3, 2022
There aren't many books that can theorize what it means for humanity to become more absorbed in our tech without having an all-out existential brain crisis. Glitch Feminism, however, provides us with a critique and manifesto of how our physical bodies and social perceptions of those bodies fail our freedoms of expression, identity, and finding community.
In embracing the contradiction of the "glitch," or a computing/systems error—that simultaneous liminal place where we straddle both a frozen moment in time and a movement of frustration to progress forward—Legacy Russell proposes a cyberfeminist theory that aligns with the contradictions of an ever-expanding, cosmopolitan social system. In cyberspace, we can exist as multiple avatars that spawn from one AFK human body and feel liberated in expressing our creative and authentic identities when communicating with others.
This theory seems to harken back to the more uplifting, aspirational Internet 1.0 days of yore, but integrates creative and artistic expression of the contradictory bodies, the raced and hypervisible and invisible and impossible bodies that refuse to be simply categorized and catalogued in this new decade of a more politically polarized America.
I had also found this manifesto insightful and empowering as a nonbinary, mixed race Asian American who has to confront being boxed in and labelled on a daily basis by those outside me who wish to categorize and pin down "who I am" like an entomologist does with the husks of dead insects. This book provides a powerful reminder to raced, trans, queer, non-white folks that we are allowed to exist as we are, to create as we please, without having to succumb to cis/het/white/male perceptions of identity and art.
While I certainly wanted to see more critique of cyberfeminism and Legacy Russell's glitch fem theory at work, I was also thrilled to read the manifesto she left us with instead.
In embracing the contradiction of the "glitch," or a computing/systems error—that simultaneous liminal place where we straddle both a frozen moment in time and a movement of frustration to progress forward—Legacy Russell proposes a cyberfeminist theory that aligns with the contradictions of an ever-expanding, cosmopolitan social system. In cyberspace, we can exist as multiple avatars that spawn from one AFK human body and feel liberated in expressing our creative and authentic identities when communicating with others.
This theory seems to harken back to the more uplifting, aspirational Internet 1.0 days of yore, but integrates creative and artistic expression of the contradictory bodies, the raced and hypervisible and invisible and impossible bodies that refuse to be simply categorized and catalogued in this new decade of a more politically polarized America.
I had also found this manifesto insightful and empowering as a nonbinary, mixed race Asian American who has to confront being boxed in and labelled on a daily basis by those outside me who wish to categorize and pin down "who I am" like an entomologist does with the husks of dead insects. This book provides a powerful reminder to raced, trans, queer, non-white folks that we are allowed to exist as we are, to create as we please, without having to succumb to cis/het/white/male perceptions of identity and art.
While I certainly wanted to see more critique of cyberfeminism and Legacy Russell's glitch fem theory at work, I was also thrilled to read the manifesto she left us with instead.
December 28, 2020
Eggcellent. Be a glitch. I think the primary thing that's worthy of taking away from this book is not necessarily that it is so novel, nor is it necessarily unblemished in a metaphysical regard (or perhaps even an ethical regard as others have pointed out in their reviews. Certainly some comparisons here need to be investigated more fully.) But is a MANIFESTO after all, which it appears many reviews seem to forget. Manifestos have a messy habit of splashing through lots of thoughts without fully investigating them.
What's important here for me is a clear language of action that many other similar radically intersectional feminist manifestos seem to just miss. In that sense, at least for me, this was a welcome success! This book comes along at just the right time for lots of questions I have and connects to some important "glitchy" moments that I never had quite put together in my own academic journey such as remix, "ghosts", encryption, and virus, all of which have their space in digital humanities on their own. However, this contextualizes them in a way that adopts a much more ethical bent that I needed to understand in juxtaposition to the common scientism of digital sociology and information sciences.
The plan is to continually find the space to break our semiotically encoded bodies in a way that materializes other material feminists even more. To become a space in which energy is rerouted into one's self away from our (post-)demographic metadata as normal, to insist upon our materiality by putting ourselves in spaces between. To be glitches which insist upon the right to queer existences where the cybernetic design never worked to begin with by making breaks known.
What's important here for me is a clear language of action that many other similar radically intersectional feminist manifestos seem to just miss. In that sense, at least for me, this was a welcome success! This book comes along at just the right time for lots of questions I have and connects to some important "glitchy" moments that I never had quite put together in my own academic journey such as remix, "ghosts", encryption, and virus, all of which have their space in digital humanities on their own. However, this contextualizes them in a way that adopts a much more ethical bent that I needed to understand in juxtaposition to the common scientism of digital sociology and information sciences.
The plan is to continually find the space to break our semiotically encoded bodies in a way that materializes other material feminists even more. To become a space in which energy is rerouted into one's self away from our (post-)demographic metadata as normal, to insist upon our materiality by putting ourselves in spaces between. To be glitches which insist upon the right to queer existences where the cybernetic design never worked to begin with by making breaks known.
January 25, 2022
Would have prefered to give 3.5 stars than just 3, but I have too many issues to give 4.
I only picked up this book for the cover art, which is 5/5. The book itself is insightful and beautifully written, but a lot of the arguments aren't fleshed out enough, with the author jumping between different topics without linking that well.
My least favourite comparison in the book has likely already been pointed out; Legacy suggests that Lil Miquela and queer artist Kai Labeija both "deploy the imaginary as a computational strategy of survival," with both actively re-imagining our realities. I don't fully understand why we're looking towards Miquela in the world of Glitch Feminism, and I don't see how it can be linked to a person who's creating art about their struggles and how they see the world. The idea was not strong enough for me.
Finally, I do think the title of the book is misleading. I don't think this is really a book about feminism, to me it's a book about gender and identity, with feminism and race theory sprinkled in for good measure. It was still a compelling read and I definitely enjoyed it, but I wouldn't go into the book expecting what's actually on the blurb.
I only picked up this book for the cover art, which is 5/5. The book itself is insightful and beautifully written, but a lot of the arguments aren't fleshed out enough, with the author jumping between different topics without linking that well.
My least favourite comparison in the book has likely already been pointed out; Legacy suggests that Lil Miquela and queer artist Kai Labeija both "deploy the imaginary as a computational strategy of survival," with both actively re-imagining our realities. I don't fully understand why we're looking towards Miquela in the world of Glitch Feminism, and I don't see how it can be linked to a person who's creating art about their struggles and how they see the world. The idea was not strong enough for me.
Finally, I do think the title of the book is misleading. I don't think this is really a book about feminism, to me it's a book about gender and identity, with feminism and race theory sprinkled in for good measure. It was still a compelling read and I definitely enjoyed it, but I wouldn't go into the book expecting what's actually on the blurb.
January 11, 2023
I really wanted to relish this book since someone I admire recommended it to me. I struggled to finish it since the writing was slippery, requiring me to read paragraphs over and over for meaning. Most of the time I gave up and moved on. I did learn about a number of artists that I wouldn’t have known about otherwise, so I was grateful for that. Happy to see Juliana Huxtable called out!
I thought the thesis was interesting and important but can see how it’s derivative of others’ work. It’s probably a good way to catch up on what’s happening in the art world and feminist and queer circles for those who aren’t living in them already.
I thought the thesis was interesting and important but can see how it’s derivative of others’ work. It’s probably a good way to catch up on what’s happening in the art world and feminist and queer circles for those who aren’t living in them already.
January 2, 2021
really dig the central idea here but i think overall it takes a way more optimistic view about being able to exist outside of capitalism online and would’ve liked to see more about what happens when recognition becomes exploitation for profit
October 21, 2021
the idea of exploring feminism in a digital age - where you can create your own identity and pick + choose which parts of you people see online - is a really interesting one, i only wish this had gone into more detail instead of just outlining things
August 15, 2022
Il termine "glitch" deriva dall'yiddish "gletshn" o dal tedesco "glitschen" e in entrambi i casi significa scivolare. Il glitch è un errore, un'interferenza imprevedibile difficile da correggere, un incidente che manda in cortocircuito il sistema generando il caos.
Applicato al femminismo, il glitch è disobbedienza, rifiuto del binarismo, del capitalismo, di "funzionare entro i limiti di una società che esclude".
A partire dall'assunto caro a Simone de Beauvoir, secondo cui "Corpo non si nasce, lo si diventa", il femminismo glitch di Legacy Russell mira al superamento del binarismo di genere, a partire dalla consapevolezza che il "genere circoscrive il corpo, lo protegge dal rischio di diventare illimitato, di tendere a un'infinità vastità, di realizzare il suo vero potenziale".
Liberare il corpo dalla gabbia del genere, renderlo un non-corpo -un anti-corpo, per usare le parole di Russell-, significa renderlo illeggibile o inaccessibile a coloro che non sono autorizzati a decifrarlo, abituati a osservare il mondo attraverso le loro lenti normative e binarie.
Affinchè il corpo si espanda illimitatamente e resista alla programmazione normativa, è necessario un sistema nuovo e una nuova pelle. Attenzione, però: le femministe glitch rifiutano la retorica dell'"inclusione", che presuppone una certa passività: "non aspetteremo che questo mondo ci ami, ci comprenda, o ci faccia spazio. Ci prenderemo questo spazio". Questo spazio, il cyberspazio, diviene "una stanza tutta per sè", un luogo da occupare dove sperimentare la creazione di nuovi mondi e modificare il nostro. Sì, perché il femminismo glitch supera il dualismo digitale, distruggendo la scissione tra un io online e un io reale: "sperimentare online non ci allontana dai nostri io AFK, nè ci impedisce di coltivare comunità significative e collaborative al di fuori dei nostri schemi. Anzi, è l'esatto opposto: la creazione di questi io e la camaleontica pelle digitale che costruiamo e indossiamo online ci aiutano a capire chi siamo in tutte le nostra sfaccettature";
"l'eperienza digitale non è una realtà inesistente, perché la viviamo, la sentiamo, possiamo esserne modificati".
Il femminismo glitch, ovviamente, si sviluppa anche a partire dalla consapevolezza della forte connotazione politica del corpo dell'autrice -una donna Nera, cisgender, femme, queer-, ponendosi a tutti gli effetti come superamento e ampliamento del cyberfemminismo, il cui volto pubblico è sempre stato esclusivamente bianco. Proprio per questo l'equazione internet=alienazione non tiene conto dell'importanza del cyberspazio come luogo di resistenza e aggregazione per le voci e i corpi marginalizzati, ipervisibili ma invisilibizzati. In senso molto più pratico "il femminismo digitale è uno spazio in cui si può unire ad altre donne nere ignorate dall'ambiente accademico, in cui si può diffondere il loro lavoro e offire un'analisi delle forme d'arte nera".
La particolarità del testo (oltre ad un lessico propriamente informatico) è che Legacy Russell, curatrice d'arte contemporanea, accompagna al manifesto varie rappresentazioni e declinazioni materiali e non del femminismo glitch, introducendo artistз che offendono il sistema con la loro semplice esistenza e usano il corpo contro la normatività, operando prevalentemente sulle piattaforme social o partendo da internet per espandersi AFK. Dal momento che ogni tecnologia è modellata sulla società che l'ha prodotta, anche gli algoritmi non possono che riprodurne la rete di potere e i pregiudizi. Alcunз artistз, conscз di ciò, tentano di hackerare la rete stessa: è il caso di American Artist, il cui avatar sovverte il canone in maniera sottile, facendo sì che il proprio nome si collochi accanto a quello dei maestri che la storia dell'arte ha scelto di riconoscere, in uno spazio di intersezione tra coloro che lo cercavano e gli altri che si sono imbattuti lì per caso.
American Artist è solo uno dei tanti nomi che costellano e arricchiscono la lettura, anzi aspettatevi una preponderante presenza di nomi e volti artistici poco noti, ma i cui lavori sono incredibilmente stimolanti.
Credo insomma sia una lettura rinfrescante e contemporanea, che reputo necessaria al superamento dell'odierna dicotomia tra la militanza online e le azioni dirette in piazza, così da poterle considerare due dimensioni che si compenetrano a vicenda. In una conclusiva chiamata alle armi, Legacy Russell ribadisce: "ognuno di noi contiene moltitudini, e in quanto femministe glitch non abbiamo uno, ma tanti corpi. Gli avatar digitali ci hanno insegnato qualcosa: che la realtà è quello che ne facciamo e che se vogliamo una "vita vera", online o AFK, dobbiamo andarcela a prendere. Ne abbiamo il diritto [..] Nessuno deciderà mai di rinunciare al potere per rimediare al male che abbiamo subito, e comunque non sarebbe sufficiente -quindi perché perdere tempo ad aspettare? Spacchiamo tutto, prepariamo il terreno per il futuro caleidoscopico che desideriamo".
Applicato al femminismo, il glitch è disobbedienza, rifiuto del binarismo, del capitalismo, di "funzionare entro i limiti di una società che esclude".
A partire dall'assunto caro a Simone de Beauvoir, secondo cui "Corpo non si nasce, lo si diventa", il femminismo glitch di Legacy Russell mira al superamento del binarismo di genere, a partire dalla consapevolezza che il "genere circoscrive il corpo, lo protegge dal rischio di diventare illimitato, di tendere a un'infinità vastità, di realizzare il suo vero potenziale".
Liberare il corpo dalla gabbia del genere, renderlo un non-corpo -un anti-corpo, per usare le parole di Russell-, significa renderlo illeggibile o inaccessibile a coloro che non sono autorizzati a decifrarlo, abituati a osservare il mondo attraverso le loro lenti normative e binarie.
Affinchè il corpo si espanda illimitatamente e resista alla programmazione normativa, è necessario un sistema nuovo e una nuova pelle. Attenzione, però: le femministe glitch rifiutano la retorica dell'"inclusione", che presuppone una certa passività: "non aspetteremo che questo mondo ci ami, ci comprenda, o ci faccia spazio. Ci prenderemo questo spazio". Questo spazio, il cyberspazio, diviene "una stanza tutta per sè", un luogo da occupare dove sperimentare la creazione di nuovi mondi e modificare il nostro. Sì, perché il femminismo glitch supera il dualismo digitale, distruggendo la scissione tra un io online e un io reale: "sperimentare online non ci allontana dai nostri io AFK, nè ci impedisce di coltivare comunità significative e collaborative al di fuori dei nostri schemi. Anzi, è l'esatto opposto: la creazione di questi io e la camaleontica pelle digitale che costruiamo e indossiamo online ci aiutano a capire chi siamo in tutte le nostra sfaccettature";
"l'eperienza digitale non è una realtà inesistente, perché la viviamo, la sentiamo, possiamo esserne modificati".
Il femminismo glitch, ovviamente, si sviluppa anche a partire dalla consapevolezza della forte connotazione politica del corpo dell'autrice -una donna Nera, cisgender, femme, queer-, ponendosi a tutti gli effetti come superamento e ampliamento del cyberfemminismo, il cui volto pubblico è sempre stato esclusivamente bianco. Proprio per questo l'equazione internet=alienazione non tiene conto dell'importanza del cyberspazio come luogo di resistenza e aggregazione per le voci e i corpi marginalizzati, ipervisibili ma invisilibizzati. In senso molto più pratico "il femminismo digitale è uno spazio in cui si può unire ad altre donne nere ignorate dall'ambiente accademico, in cui si può diffondere il loro lavoro e offire un'analisi delle forme d'arte nera".
La particolarità del testo (oltre ad un lessico propriamente informatico) è che Legacy Russell, curatrice d'arte contemporanea, accompagna al manifesto varie rappresentazioni e declinazioni materiali e non del femminismo glitch, introducendo artistз che offendono il sistema con la loro semplice esistenza e usano il corpo contro la normatività, operando prevalentemente sulle piattaforme social o partendo da internet per espandersi AFK. Dal momento che ogni tecnologia è modellata sulla società che l'ha prodotta, anche gli algoritmi non possono che riprodurne la rete di potere e i pregiudizi. Alcunз artistз, conscз di ciò, tentano di hackerare la rete stessa: è il caso di American Artist, il cui avatar sovverte il canone in maniera sottile, facendo sì che il proprio nome si collochi accanto a quello dei maestri che la storia dell'arte ha scelto di riconoscere, in uno spazio di intersezione tra coloro che lo cercavano e gli altri che si sono imbattuti lì per caso.
American Artist è solo uno dei tanti nomi che costellano e arricchiscono la lettura, anzi aspettatevi una preponderante presenza di nomi e volti artistici poco noti, ma i cui lavori sono incredibilmente stimolanti.
Credo insomma sia una lettura rinfrescante e contemporanea, che reputo necessaria al superamento dell'odierna dicotomia tra la militanza online e le azioni dirette in piazza, così da poterle considerare due dimensioni che si compenetrano a vicenda. In una conclusiva chiamata alle armi, Legacy Russell ribadisce: "ognuno di noi contiene moltitudini, e in quanto femministe glitch non abbiamo uno, ma tanti corpi. Gli avatar digitali ci hanno insegnato qualcosa: che la realtà è quello che ne facciamo e che se vogliamo una "vita vera", online o AFK, dobbiamo andarcela a prendere. Ne abbiamo il diritto [..] Nessuno deciderà mai di rinunciare al potere per rimediare al male che abbiamo subito, e comunque non sarebbe sufficiente -quindi perché perdere tempo ad aspettare? Spacchiamo tutto, prepariamo il terreno per il futuro caleidoscopico che desideriamo".
October 10, 2021
so, this book was a wild ride. i love that i continually find books that break my before thinking, that challenge my already made views about aspects of life and that educate me in the most endearing way. this was one of them and i loved it.
the way legacy russell writes about heavy topics, with all the love and acknowledging the binary world we are tought from a young age.
it speaks of the intersectionality between the digital world and corporality and how they affect one another. about the paradox of the glitch body: the hiper visibility that it has and the invisibility it is given. about the gender as an economic inherently capitalistic performance we have to dismantle and, once again, to recreate.
and i really liked this paragraph that they quoted:„When gender is a bianry, it's a battlefield. When you get rid of the binary, gender becomes a playground.” amazing
the way legacy russell writes about heavy topics, with all the love and acknowledging the binary world we are tought from a young age.
it speaks of the intersectionality between the digital world and corporality and how they affect one another. about the paradox of the glitch body: the hiper visibility that it has and the invisibility it is given. about the gender as an economic inherently capitalistic performance we have to dismantle and, once again, to recreate.
Fluid, insistant, we refuse to stand still: we slip, we slide.
To exist within a binary system one must assume that our selves are unchangeble, that how we are read in the world must be chosen for us, rather than for us to define-and choose-for ourselves.
With physical movement often restricted, female-identifying people, queer people, Black people invent ways to create space through the rupture. Here, in that disruption, with our collectiva congregation at that trippy and trip-wired crossroad of gender, race and sexuality, one find the power of the glitch.
The idea of <> carries this weapon: gender circumscribes the body, <> it from becoming limitless, from claiming the infinte vast, from realizing its true potential[..]When we gender a body, we are making assumptions about the body's function, its sociopolitical condition, its fixity
and i really liked this paragraph that they quoted:„When gender is a bianry, it's a battlefield. When you get rid of the binary, gender becomes a playground.” amazing
June 19, 2023
Me ha gustado la teoría del uso de internet y las redes como escapatoria de las identidades disidentes y diversas. Internet como el lugar desde el q puede expresarse alguien que no sería escuchado en cuerpo o AFK (away from keyboard), bien por ser alguien racializada, queer o perteneciente a algún otro colectivo que sufre discriminación. La autora cuenta su propia experiencia y la de otras artistas q han usado internet para burlar los moldes. No sé si he acabado de pillar bien el concepto del glitch (el fallo informático, he entendido yo) y como aplicarlo a todo esto, con lo cual creo q me he perdido parte importante del libro. Por otro lado, el libro defiende el valor de nuestros yoes de internet poniéndolos un poco al mismo nivel q nuestro yo físico, esto como teoría me seduce pero como práctica me agobia, y no creo q las posibles ventajas de esto compensen la pérdida de la corporeidad para muchas cosas. Aún así, cabe la posibilidad de q no haya entendido todo bien. Me ha interesado, en cualquier caso.
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