Gymbox

Hi Guys,

Hope you are all going to join us at the Climate Camp on Wednesday?
And we are all on for meeting at SOAS at 11am in the JCR on Friday this week?

Thought you might like to check this out, its a gym on high holborn which i cycled past yesterday and was shocked by the sign outside which was inciting street violence, so thought i'd check out their website and... well i'm in even more shock. Its loaded with heteronormative ideals of what masculinity and femininity should be and also explicitly promotes 'chav fighting'... I couldn't believe what i was reading:

http://www.gymbox.co.uk/index.php

I would like to hear your thoughts on this also, maybe theres a way of bringing it into the presentation.

Thea

Presentation ideas

sorry to bug you all today-i hope yoou are not too stressed with the work load ( I AM!). Clare.x

Just a few thoughts...

We like the idea of playing with ridiculous academese, and we talked about doing the presentation gameshow style.

We could do a panel game, like Jeopardy if you know it, where the show host provides the answer in academese then the contestants have to come up with the question.

So, for example: The answer is - a metaphsical presence who appropriates the highest subjective position within the celestial body, at times within a pantheon, but most usually as a divine unity.

The contestants then press the buzzer and guess the question which, in this example, is: 'What is God?'

The contestants could get it wrong lots of times when the answer (from the host) is academese, but get it correct when it is in more acessible language.

We could then also get the host to cut to video shots of some answers provided by the public and again the contestants have to guess the question.

Because Butler has done this topic before we need to do it with another angle. We could do it through a Derridian lense-that of the Metaphsics of Presence, or a reverse derridian lense. (i cant remember which way round he prioritises-speech or writing?-will look this up in a mo)

This would hightlight how Butler writes in complicated language, but when she speaks she is much easier to understand.

Hmmm Very Sexy!!

JUDITH BUTLER INTERVIEW

Beached

trust me, its paradise.
this is where the hungry come to feed
for mine is a generation that circles the globe in search for something we haven't tried before
so never refuse an ivitation, never resist the unfamiliar, never fail to be polite and never outstay your welcome
just keep your mind open and suck in the experience
and if it hurts, you know what, its probably worth it
you hope and you dream
but you never believe that something is going to happen to you
not like it does in the movies
and when it actually does
you expect it to feel different, more viceral, more real
i was waiting for it to hit me.

Minutes from meeting (on step!)

Please fill in the gaps:

Meeting April 2, 11am at Clare's. I will post the map sooon

Main reading:

Clare and Ina to do technical work

Thea and Tom - deeper  theory on Butler

Clare on critique maybe

Iva designing stuff! Handouts etc

Tom to  research the Genesis passage to use for videoing. i suggest we take one verse but three dif versions???

Here are LOADS of dif versions...http://bibref.hebtools.com/?book=%20Gen&verse=2:4-3:26&src=!

Woman's bible: http://www.sacred-texts.com/wmn/wb/

{p. 22}

She shall be called Woman," in the ancient form of the word Womb-man. She was man and more than man because of her maternity

Wiki page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_of_Eden

Other ideas: add to this as we go along

Do an interview style panel, University Challenge, Weakest Link,

Benedict XVI, please GO AWAY...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2009/mar/17/religion-hiv-pope-condoms-africa/print

How? Why? does the vatican have the authority to control peoples lives in such a violent manner. Don't blame the Anthropologists, Blame the POPE!

Vile but interesting discussion on sexuality in the NUS

http://www.educationet.org/cgi-bin/anyboard.cgi/messageboard?cmd=iYz&aK=1175533551&iZz=1175533551&gV=0&kQz=&aO=1&iWz=0

Dana Hoey

http://www.petzel.com/exhibitions/2006-05-04_dana-hoey/


For this body of work, Hoey has combined original and appropriated images and arranged them into kaleidoscopic patterns, juxtaposing the nudes with more simple portraits. Initially inspired by Judith Butler to enact satirical, imitative performances of social patterns, Hoey quickly saw the limitations of such a practice. Noting that there is no way around the "tissue-thin reduction of the female form to sexual viability," Hoey departed from the main themes of her previous work and did away with the picture plane, pictorial narrative, and any semblance of photographic perfection. New participants, these champions of the first wave of feminism, entered the work and not only demolished, but restructured their "pornification." They left messes, carefully ordered into misaligned, dusty, and gluey flat patterns. All dirt and dust was then buried in the ultra-flat picture plane, and laminated over to complete the sealing and erasure of the hand. The result of this grotesque process is a large, vibrant collage that plays with geometric patterns and twisted social norms....

Making Gender Trouble

Video shot by Del LaGrace Volcano,
"one of instigators of polymorphous perverse queer culture." (Wilton, Tamsing. An Encyclopedia of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Culture. Chicago: 2002)

Del is a professionally trained photographer, whose work interrogates the performance of gender on several levels, especially the performance of masculinity and femininity by queer individuals.

Author of several pioneering (my opinion) photography books which challenge normative assumptions surrounding the performative aspect of gender identity.

His/her/hes/hir/she/hes/esh work is challenging, courageous and innovative.

"As a gender variant visual artist I access 'technologies of gender' in order to amplify rather than erase the hermaphroditic traces of my body. I name myself. A gender abolitionist. A part time gender terrorist. An intentional mutation and intersex by design, (as opposed to diagnosis), in order to distinguish my journey from the thousands of intersex individuals who have had their 'ambiguous' bodies mutilated and disfigured in a misguided attempt at 'normalization'. I believe in crossing the line as many times as it takes to build a bridge we can all walk across." Del LaGrace Volcano, September 2005

Reality Lost

Found this article on Lacan, Garden of Eden and IT!!

The Garden of Eden was the place where Man and Woman were supposed to live in contentment, without any lack. Everything was supplied and free to use, apart from the fruits of one tree, ‘The Tree of Knowing Good and Bad', located at the center of the garden. The other famous tree, ‘The tree of life', is briefly mentioned and no prohibitions are issued regarding it.

At this stage both the Man and the Woman are still nameless. The Hebrew word Adam literally means ‘A Man', it is a noun but confused by most translators as a name. The name “Eve” appears only at the end of this chapter, post the primordial sin.

God warns his creations that whoever will eat from that tree will die. God does not threaten or vows to punish, but merely describes death as the inevitable effect of the fruit.

The snake shows the woman the fruit and encourages her to give it a try. He assures her that she will not die on the spot, but merely become godlike and know good and bad. It is important to note that both God and the Snake describe the effect of the tree not as ‘Knowing good or Bad', but ‘Knowing good and bad'. So before eating it none of these concepts exists. The woman tastes the apple and later gives her man a bite as well.

The next scene depicts God walking around the garden, calling for Adam. But Adam is hiding. Why are you hiding? , God asks. Adam replies that he is hiding because he is naked. God then replies with a rhetorical question that exposes the apple's effect:

“Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat?” (Genesis, Ch.3, Verse 11)

Read more HERE