Gender, Crime, and Migration

newsletter of the ucla Center for the OCT08 CSW study of women

The black woman has the brain of a child and the passions of a woman steeped in centuries of A Rage in Harlem ignorance and savagery, and wrapped about in immemorial vices. – Eleanor Tayleur, “The Gender, Crime, and Migration Negro Woman: Social and Moral Decadence” by Courtney Marshall Now the fundamental agency under God in the regeneration, the retraining of the race, as ebates in the early twentieth century concerning well as the ground work and starting point of so-called Negro criminality represented African Americans its progress upward, must be the black woman. Das degenerate and unfit; the rise of the New Negro at the – Anna Julia Cooper, A Voice From the South beginning of the century coincided with the invention of new Negro 1 Harlem rightly has been judged hard- crime. Historically, the media had used discourses of black criminality working, respectable, indubitably religious, to argue for the inherent inferiority of African Americans and to justify a community keen to state and maintain its increasing segregation and discrimination, and black authors responded own respectability. It has also been a Harlem 2 in part by warning of the dangers of inner city life in their works. As edged with crime and violence, whether from racketeering, narcotics, “hustle” in general, or early as 1927, authors like Rudolph Fisher wrote stories about a criminal the everyday abrasion of a people often made underworld which threatened to corrupt young migrants. Paul Laurence A film of The Sport of the to feel pressured and boxed in to the point of Gods was released in 1921. Dunbar’s The Sport of the Gods (1902), a novel thought to usher in the implosion. – A. Robert Lee, “Harlem on My Mind: era of black naturalism, also showed the effect that fast city life has on Fictions of a Black Metropolis” 1 OCT08 in this issue

1,10–13

1 7–9

3-4 13–16

5-6 DEPARTMENTS

2 Close Relationships and Health, continued from page 1 OCT08 DIRECTOR’s Commentary

Of Pigs and Pit Bulls or Read my Lipstick…

ever, in recent memory at animal and cosmetic reference by way of had to do with difference; hers the differ- least, has a presidential criticizing John McCain’s assertion that ence between a class of women to which campaign been so much he was the candidate of change. Citing she belongs and vicious attack dogs; his aboutN animals and cosmetics. With Sarah McCain’s similarity to George Bush on between what McCain’s policies are and Palin, it’s a zoo and an aquarium too. foreign policy, health care, domestic policy, what he and his campaign claims they are. There are the animals she kills—moose, the military, and use of Karl Rove cam- Obama was talking policy; Palin was talk- wolves—and the animals she says she paign tactics, Obama observed that you ing about herself. She was pointing at her is—barracuda and pit bull. To introduce can call the “same thing something differ- own lips and saying, look here, read my herself to the American people at the ent” but really it was the same; it was like lipstick. Let’s do just that. Republican National Convention, she putting “lipstick on a pig.” McCain and Palin’s joke invoked a certain kind of told a now oft repeated joke: “What is the company seized on Obama’s reference to middle-class maternity. A hockey mom difference between a hockey mom and a lipstick—if it’s cosmetics on an animal, shuttles kids to practice, cheers from the pit bull? Lipstick,” and pointed at her own it must mean Palin—and declared, with sidelines, cultivates a competitive ethos. lips to secure the self-nomination. Several outrage, that Obama was calling Palin a Her reference to a pit bull joined the ma- days later, Barack Obama made his own pig. Both Palin and Obama’s comments ternal, homey, domestic service inferences

3 DIRECTOR’s Commentary, continued

of “mom” with the pure aggression and sav- mother and all woman too! Palin’s lipstick agery of an animal born and bred to attack. comment both slapped the sex on the dog The difference? Cosmetic. In pointing at her and implicitly warned against any quid pro own lips, Palin clearly indicated that the dif- quo, a warning the McCain campaign made ference to which she referred was both her explicit after the convention, saying that she own and any hockey mom’s sexuality. Savage needed to be treated “with deference.” Their at heart, but pretty, sexual on the surface. use of this term was both contradictory and Her audience went wild. And understand- loaded. Who ever heard of a pit bull that ably so. American popular culture (and some needed to be treated with deference? Defer- In pointing at her own lips, Palin clearly Americans as well) tends to blur and often ence refers to the courteous respect and sub- indicated that the difference to which she confuse aggression and sexuality. In her joke mission due to “ladies” and one’s social bet- referred was both her own and any hockey and in her recent comments to “put her heels ters in outdated codes of gender, class, and, mom’s sexuality. Savage at heart, but on and take the gloves off,” Palin speaks to yes, racial etiquette. Reading Palin’s lipstick pretty, sexual on the surface. that blur; she embodies that confusion. And reveals a campaign stooping to play the race that embodiment pleases and excites others card with innuendo and plausible deniability who share that confusion. What is more dis- by using female sexuality to mobilize acts of turbing is the purpose to which this blurring racial aggression. Pundits and the press sup- has been put in the national arena, pitting porting McCain perversely infer that this a white woman against a black man. At the toxic mix of animals, sex, and aggression has convention, Palin introduced herself as John something to do with feminism and legiti- McCain’s attack dog, and she went after mate power. But it’s just lipstick. her target, Barack Obama, from the mo- – Kathleen McHugh ment she hit the stage. We all know about attack dogs and black men. But wait, she’s a

OCT08 4 CSupdateW The Color of LGBT: Race in Sexuality

Fall Quarter's Faculty Curator Series Will Feature talks by Jasbir Puar, David L. Eng, and Kathryn Bond Stockton

by Joseph Bristow

his fall’s CSW Faculty Curator series, that questions of color necessarily inform 2007). Her incisive book focuses on the titled “The Color of LGBT: Race analyses of eroticism in our world. intersections of race and homosexuality in Tin Sexuality,” addresses the complex Jasbir Puar the politically fraught climate that followed ways in which debates surrounding cultural 9/11. In particular, Puar concentrates on the difference have emerged within the study The first event on October 22 will feature development of “U.S. sexual exceptionalism,” of contemporary sexualities. During the Professor Jasbir in which ideas about sexual citizenship past ten to fifteen years, the flourishing field Puar, who teaches at enfold homosexual subjects into oppressive of LGBT studies has become increasingly Rutgers University nationalistic formations. An important resistant to a number of normative and who is the author strand of her argument shows that in the assumptions about race and ethnicity in of the remarkable recent past—an era marked by intense fears debates about the history and theory of Terrorist Assemblages: of terrorism—“homonational” identities dissident desires. The series brings together Homonationalism in enjoy increasing privilege because they three leading scholars whose inquiries show Queer Times (Duke, have participated in the Islamophobia that

OCT08 5 CSupdateW resulted in racial slurs and assaults. Her During the past ten to fifteen years, the flourishing field of LGBT presentation, entitled “Prognosis Time: studies has become increasingly resistant to a number of normative Pathologies of Terror,” will build on the findings of her book. assumptions about race and ethnicity in debates about the history David L. Eng and theory of dissident desires. The series brings together three leading scholars whose inquiries show that questions of color In his powerful study, necessarily inform analyses of eroticism in our world. Racial Castration: Managing Masculinity in Asian America Kathryn Bond Stockton Morrison’s Sula, and Robert Mapplethorpe’s (Duke UP, 2001), Professor photography. Her presentation, 'Oedipus David L. Eng argues that Professor Kathryn Bond Stockton, who Raced, or the Child Queered by Color,' is in modern culture race is teaches English and gender studies at drawn from her current research on different a constitutive component the University of Utah, is the author of versions of queer childhood experience. of the sexual psyche. Entitled “The Queer Beautiful Bottom, Beautiful Shame: Where Space of China,” his presentation, which is “Black” Meets “Queer” (Duke UP, 2006). This Joseph Bristow is a Professor in the Department of English at UCLA. His reserach interests include based on a recent extended visit to Beijing, imposing book looks British writing and culture,1830 to the present; explores the reasons why Western models of unflinchingly at the theories and histories of sexuality; and Victorian homosexual identity are not always relevant intersections of sexual drama, fiction, and poetry. The receipient of the to the ways in which dissident sexualities are and racial debasement CSW Faculty Curator Grant for Fall 08, Bristow organized “The Color of LGBT” speaker series. Puar taking shape in twenty-first-century China. in a broad span of will speak on Wednesday, October 22, in 314 Royce Professor Eng teaches English, comparative cultural and literary at 4 pm. Eng's presentation is scheduled for Wednes- literature, and Asian American studies at the documents, including day, November 5, in 314 Royce at 4 pm. Stockton's University of Pennsylvania. His second book, Jean Genet’s Querelle, talk is on Wednesday, December 3, in 193 Humani- ties at 4 pm. The Feeling of Kinship, is forthcoming from Isaac Julien’s Looking Duke University Press. for Langston, Toni OCT08 6 CSupdateW The Women the Picturehouse, 2008 Written and directed by Women Diane English What has changed?

by Ellen C. DuBois

The Women, Clare Boothe Luce’s 1936 Broadway play and 1939 hit movie, is playing well right now in a big budget 2008 update. With all of its parts written for women and its wide variety of female roles and fabulous dialogue, it is irresistible to actresses. The 1939 version starred Norma Shearer as the luminous Mary Haines and Joan Crawford as the scheming Crystal Allen and Rosalind Russell as Mary’s friend Sylvia Fowler and featured Paulette Goddard, Joan Fontaine, Marjorie Maine, and—the only African Ameri- can in the movie and in her first movie role— The Women Butterfly McQueen. The 2008 version stars MGM, 1939 Meg Ryan in the lead role of Mary, along with Screenplay by Anita Loos Candace Bergen, Cloris Leachman, Annette Based on the play by Benning, Eva Mendes, Debra Messing, Carrie Clare Boothe Luce Fisher, Bette Midler, and Debi Mazur. The only Directed by George Cukor African American woman (doing double duty as DVD release, Warner Brothers, 2002 the only lesbian) is Jada Pinkett Smith.

OCT08 7 CSupdateW Clare Boothe Luce wrote The Women as if she knew what she was talking about, and she did. In 2008, the saving power of friendships As “good” as wife Mary is, schemer Crystal has among women is the ultimate romance. the author’s attention. Luce herself was a true crossover: moving from being an independent Annette Benning’s Sylvia (left) undergoes working woman of unclear origins to the wife of as much of a transformation as does one of the most powerful men of the mid twentieth century. Clare Boothe was divorced and an Ryan’s Mary, as she regrets and atones editor at Vogue when Henry Luce left his wife for her disloyalty to her friend. Indeed, to marry her. A year later, The Women opened on Broadway. She went on to be a two-term Con- Sylvia becomes the most compelling gresswoman, ambassador to Italy, and a powerful character of the movie, no longer a plot figure in the rising Republican far right. I expected to hate the 2008 version, but I did device, foil for the heroine, or comic relief. not anticipate its many pleasures. If you know the 1939 version, it is great fun to watch the filmmakers playing with their adaptation. Some ter of the Countess, a comic character who con- is misled into abandoning her husband to the great lines repeated in their pristine integrity tinues to believe in the power of love despite her scheming Crystal, only to relent and reconcile play fabulously seventy years later. (Of Crystal: numerous divorces, is played this time by Bette in the end. The clever trick of The Women is to “She’s got those eyes that run up and down a Midler as a cynical Hollywood agent sneering as make men as irrelevant as they are central to this man like a searchlight.”) The updating of the she preaches “l’amour, l’amour!” dilemma. Men are at once easy to manipulate plot is fascinating. The last third of the 1939 Above all, The Women remains irresistible through their predictable sexual desires and the version takes place in a divorce resort in Reno, because the question it poses—can a woman prize over which women struggle. Flesh and Nevada, where Mary has gone to spend her nec- be married and modern at the same time, can a blood men are absent from the movie. They are essary six weeks to get a quickie divorce. In the woman, in other words, have it all?—needs to solely women’s fantasies, enchanting and infuri- new version, Reno has undergone a makeover be asked and answered endlessly. The dangers ating in equal parts. and is now a yoga resort (somewhere north of remain the same—a slutty, scheming woman The absence of men points to the lesson at San Francisco, I imagine), where the same sort knows how to work a roving, middle-aged the core of The Women. A smart, modern woman of women go for the same purpose of marking husband’s interest when his sweet but naive is in charge and that means fighting for her time as their marriages dissolve. The 1939 charac- wife does not. Surrounded by her friends, Mary marriage but not overreacting to her husband’s

OCT08 8 CSupdateW dalliances. The 1939 version is quite explicit that Despite its superficial hard-headedness in Benning’s Sylvia undergoes as much of a trans- such selflessness is the very mark of emancipa- contrast to the 1939 version, The Women of 2008 formation as does Ryan’s Mary, as she regrets tion. Keeping a marriage going in the face of is at its core less clear-eyed. The Women in 1939 and atones for her disloyalty to her friend. the weaknesses in men’s nature requires all the know that choices must be made, and an un- Indeed, Sylvia becomes the most compelling political skills that a modern woman can muster. dercurrent of the movie refuses to celebrate the character of the movie, no longer a plot device, The movie presents this combination of romance compromises that Mary learns to make. Perhaps foil for the heroine, or comic relief. In 1939, and realism as Mary’s modernness and as a cor- it has something to do with how much less Mary’s mother warns her not to count on her rective to the excesses of feminism’s first wave. compelling Meg Ryan is in the lead role, but in girlfriends. In 2008, Mary’s mother has nothing For as the movie’s lone unmarried career gal says 2008, the lesson offered (“find yourself ”) is put to offer except the mistakes of her own devotion of her spinster self, “nature abhors an old maid forward as a successful solution to the modern to marriage. In 2008, girlfriends are all a girl has. with frozen assets.” woman’s dilemma, not a necessary concession to Even more than in 1939, men are emotionally as What has changed? The route for Mary back an irresolvable contradiction. There are no mis- well as cinematically absent. As The Women of to marriage takes a long detour—through per- givings. Can we have it all? While the original 2008 draws to its resolution, Mary is weeping sonal discovery. Mary must “find herself ” before says no and insists that a smart modern woman for her emotional loss. “Stephen?” someone asks. she dare return to her marriage. Finding herself needs to understand this; in 2008, the answer is “No,” says Mary, “Sylvia.” means finding a career that isn’t so much about an unqualified yes. money (which is curiously missing from any Into the emotional void that this attenuated Ellen C. DuBois is a Professor in the Depart- one’s consideration) but about self-discovery. In and slightly hysterical devotion to marriage for ment of History at UCLA. She's the co-author with the blink of an eye, Mary is the head of a bus- the modern woman opens up, comes an entirely Lynn Dumenil of Through Women’s Eyes: An tling production and design company with a staff new and distinctive element in the 2008 version, American History with Documents (St. Mar- of thirty women. Repairing the marriage is still straight from the just preceding Sex and the City, tin's, 2005). A version of this essay appeared earlier n the ostensible goal, but it seems to have receded another Hollywood feminist movie. Ryan, Ben- Dissent (http://www.dissentmagazine.org). Images into the background. Mary will get her husband ning, Pinkett Smith, and Messing look for all from the 2008 movie of The Women are copy- back—when she has the time. The memorable the world like Charlotte, Carrie, Samantha, and righted 2008 by Picturehouse. Images from the 1939 final scene in the 1939 version has Mary run- Miranda strutting the streets of New York. In version are copyrighted 2002 by Warner Brothers. ning open armed toward the husband just on 1939, women are the real evil-doers in Mary’s life, the other side of the camera. In 2008, she’s on a especially the devious Sylvia. The movie looks at cell phone, squeezing a dinner with him into her the claims of sisterhood with a withering eye. crowded agenda. Selfishness, not selflessness, is In 2008, the saving power of friendships what makes a modern marriage work. among women is the ultimate romance. Annette OCT08 9 CSupdateW A Rage in Harlem, continued from page 1 young migrants. Black people able than working for it” (268). an early depiction of the welfare from the baggage and racial who were unfamiliar with urban The decadence that Tayleur queen. In these formations, the violence of the South, black life and the competition needed observes, was most prominent woman and the home reflect Americans can learn a new way one another in their filthiness, of interacting with one another to survive it often found them- in black women’s new urban homes: “In the cities the major- unfitness for children, and scan- and with their environment. selves in trouble. ity of negro women have no dalous reputation. However, let’s not ap- To talk about racial progress homes, but a room which they As a response to ideas such plaud this new doctrine just in the early twentieth century oftener than not share with as Tayleur’s, black benevolent yet because these organiza- is to talk about the natures of strangers. The beds are unmade, societies felt that policing black tions suggested black women, black women, particularly their the dishes unwashed, the floor women more closely was the and again Harlem itself, hid criminal natures and sexual unswept. Here children are born solution. They “establishe[d] a a penchant for opportunistic proclivities. During the Great to be thrust out into the street direct relationship between the wrongdoing that could take Migration, their proper pres- as soon as possible” (267). In social supervision of black wom- over if left unchecked. We see ence in the cities was of utmost addition to not being maternal en migrants and the control of this sentiment repeatedly in importance to both racist social (an old stereotype from the their moral and sexual behavior, the writings of social activists critics and progressive racial up- days of slavery), the urban black between the morally unaccept- and benevolence campaigners. lift campaigns. In 1904, Eleanor woman was dirty, and her living able economics of sex for sale In 1905, The Colored American Tayleur described the downward conditions, though not directly and a morally acceptable polic- Magazine printed an essay by spiral black women had suc- stated here, led her to be sexu- ing of black female sexuality” Frances Kellor, warning of the cumbed to following the end of ally indiscriminate. She lives in (Carby 24). What we see is that dangers that could come to slavery. Because black women no a filthy room with strange men instead of the houses described black women in Northern cities, longer benefited from the pater- and unmade beds, and it’s not a in the earlier texts reflecting imploring young women not nalistic slavery system, particu- place for children. Hypersexual- black women, the depictions of to “depend upon the word and larly the proximity to the piety ity was also a long-held stereo- Harlem itself mirrored those promises of young Negro men and purity of white women, they type about black women, but of its black female inhabitants. who may have been honest and were reverting to their savage the urban setting exacerbated it Like black women, Harlem has true when living in the South. state. According to Tayleur, “In and transformed the figure of the capacity to be respectable Many of them who have been the peculiar code of ethics that the fertile black woman from a and invested in uplift. What’s industrious there go astray in governs the negro woman any tool which increased slavehold- more, it can be the site of racial Northern cities” (697). Young way of obtaining a livelihood is ers’ wealth into a social burden, re-invention. In this space, away black women who came to the more honorable than respect- OCT08 10 CSupdateW North to reunite with husbands warned that “so successful have at the train station, much like male unemployment and deser- and boyfriends were warned been the operations of certain the services offered to immi- tion, black women also had the that these men often lived off of associations for the bringing of grant women at Ellis Island. added pressure of symbolizing the earnings of women and that young innocent girls from the These “helping hands” would the new racial future for black to become involved with them South for immoral purposes, then direct new migrants to safe Americans. If they were indus- would mean economic disaster. that all southern girls are com- and affordable housing because trious and hard-working, they These women were also warned monly adjudged to be weak the need to pay Harlem rents would reflect well on the race. If not to be misled by the promise morally…Many of the dangers would almost ensure women’s they failed, however, particularly of easy employment because confronting our girls from the immoral behavior. Finally, a in moral and sexual matters, the arrangements were often South in the great cities of the training school connected with the entire race fails. Matthews exploitative. Young women were North are so perfectly planned, the boarding house would help writes that “the public, seeing often told that they would have so overwhelming in their power women learn skills that would these women haunting certain jobs in offices, but when they to subjugate and destroy that no prepare them for clerical jobs. portions of the city in such an arrived in New York, they were women’s daughter is safe away Above all, black female mission- unfailing stream, takes it for forced to live in squalid condi- from home” (381–2). aries who felt it their duty to granted that all black people— tions and to work as domestics. The answer to these challeng- help new migrants navigate the all Afro-Americans are naturally 3 Those who did not want to es was the founding of benevo- city would administer all these low” (385). be cheated were particularly lent societies that would not services. If Harlem can mean multiple vulnerable because employment only help migrants in the North, Though this discourse of things simultaneously, so can the agents charged exorbitant fees but also spread their message benevolence places some of the depictions of Harlem’s women. and would threaten the girls’ to women still in the South. In blame on unscrupulous employ- In A. Robert Lee’s quote at the Southern families if they did not 1905, Frances Kellor, in an article ers and a well-connected net- beginning of this piece, a dis- cooperate. Desperate for money entitled “Southern Colored work of people set out to lead tinction is made between those and freedom, these women were Girls at the North: The Problem black women astray, the authors who are involved in organized most likely to be led astray by of Their Protection,” advocated still place the ultimate responsi- crime and those who fall into “strange men who make attrac- for a network of social agencies bility in the hands of the black crime due to the pressures of tive proposals” and into what re- for female migrants. These agen- woman. In addition to navigat- urban living, just as the social former Victoria Earle Matthews cies would first provide scores ing a new environment in which reformers made distinctions be- would later call “moral death” of women who would meet and sexuality and gender relations tween black women who could (Kellor 377). In 1898, Matthews befriend young migrant women played out in a setting of black still be saved and those who

OCT08 11 CSupdateW were just lost to the streets. The Service, which just released the city, then, represents a hostile “Black Cinema” postage stamp place for women, particularly set, featuring film posters from those seeking to function inde- the 1920s to 1950s. STATE of the UNION pendent of a man. It symbol- A Conference on Marriage and Politics

izes the racist and patriarchal NOTES &2)$!9 /#4/"%2 s!-to 0-s2/9#% forces summoned to keep her in 1. See Fred Moten, “Criminality her “proper place” and encloses and Uplift,” Next to the Color TOAM 7%,#/-%"9 Kathleen McHugh /0%.).'2%-!2+3"9 Juliet Williams her and her image in a cage of Line: Gender, Sexuality, and W. E. B. Du Bois, Susan Gillman TOAM 3%33)/. sexual and gendered stereotypes. and Alys Eve Weinbaum, Laws of Love Courtney Marshall is a PhD editors, University of Paul Apostolidis, Susan Koshy, Rachel Moran candidate in the Department of Minnesota Press, 2007. 2. See Carol Stabile, White TOAM "2%!+ English at UCLA with a con- Victims, Black Villains: Race AMTOPM centration in Women’s Studies. Media, and Crime Reporting, SESSION 2 Her dissertation, entitled “Law, Routledge, 2006. Thinking Through Literature, and the Black Female 3. In the previous sentence, Same-Sex Marriage Subject” traces the theoretical Matthews writes, “So our Tom Boellstorff, Mignon Moore, Nancy Polikoff ‘tenderloins’ are filled.” connections between critical race TOPM LUNCH studies and Black feminist literary According to my research, this term refers to a red light TOPM 3%33)/. criticism. Her related interests district, and the term was Intimacy and include queer theory and critical allegedly coined by Police Intersectionality prison studies. She was awarded Captain Alexander Williams Anna Marie Smith, Judith Stacey the CSW Paula Stone Disserta- in the late 1870s. So though TOPM #,/3).'2%-!2+3 the tenderloin refers to an area tion Research Fellowship in June 4 to 5 pm RECEPTION of 2008. south of Harlem and not the Cosponsored by the UCLA Center for the Study of Women, UCLA Department of setting of The Street, I think Anthropology, UCLA Department of Political Science, UCLA Department of Sociology, it is important for illustrating UCLA Department of Women’s Studies, the Williams Institute of the UCLA School of Credit: The image of The Law, and the UCLA Center on Everyday Lives of Families the almost hysterical focus on For more information, visit www.csw.ucla.edu Sport of the Gods film poster black women’s sexuality that comes from the US Postal the novel references.

OCT08 12 CSupdateW Kaleidoscopes on the Coffee Table Catherine Lord and Richard Meyer’s Art in Queer Culture: 1885–Present

by Vivian Davis

or many students, history books can be stolid affairs. Dusty tomes, filled with names and dates best suited for rote memorization. Only occasionally is there color. Rarely a stray joke. FEven art history books, a discipline that offers readers the anodyne of full-page pictures, can be a bit predictable. Republished volumes such as Helen Gardner’s Art through the Ages (1926) or E.H. Gombrich’s The Story of Art (1950) retain their popularity because they rehearse, rather than contest, the familiar chronological narratives. Gardner’s book, now in its twelfth edition, offers readers a review of the art world from the Paleolithic era to the twentieth century, from the Venus of Willendorf to Warhol’s “Marilyn Diptych.” Similarly, Gombrich’s The Story of Art leads a breakneck tour through cave painting, Leonardo’s “Mona Lisa,” and the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright. Though daunting in size (Gardner’s Art through the Ages clocks in at just under 1200 pages), such books offer little in the way of surprises. Their survey approach reinforces a recognizable canon of luminaries, faces not unfamiliar to gallery walls and glassy-eyed tourists, and constructs compact versions of history that are, for the most part, neatly linear. Timelines and tidbits are both plentiful. Peddling the promise that art history is somehow fully Amy E. Conger, from Reversing Vandalism, “Queer Reader Mandorla,” 2004 OCT08 13 CSupdateW David McDermott knowable and, moreover, comprehensible, these and Peter McGough, titles quickly find their way into undergraduate “A Friend of Dorothy, classrooms and onto coffee tables. 1943,” 1986 An upcoming volume from Phaidon, however, looks to clear off said coffee tables. Or at least, reshuffle them. Edited by Catherine Lord, Department of Studio Art, UCI, and Richard Meyer, Department of Art History, USC, Art in Queer Culture: 1885 – Present pieces together a patch of visual landscape (including sketches, paintings, illustrations, photography, print documents, and ephemera) in order to think through the complex relationships between art, queerness, and culture from the late nineteenth century to the present. During Friday’s plenary panel of the 2008 Los Angeles Queer Studies Confer- ence, Professors Lord and Meyer outlined the general aims of their project, discussing the ways in which writing queer culture into the history of art means rethinking categories of “Art” and “History” more broadly. Referring to the book as a “collage of footnotes,” Lord explained that Art in Queer Culture will work in several ways to resist traditional art historical approaches and hierarchical thinking. For example, the collec- tion is set to feature only one piece from each of the selected artists, no matter how supposedly

OCT08 14 CSupdateW Djuna Barnes, significant. Leveling the playing field in terms Ladies Almanack, of structure and included materials reshapes the 1928 lines between high and low culture, center and margin, “Art” and detritus. The proposed volume therefore raises questions while answering them, as straight canonical narratives are set into the shifting motion of a kaleidoscope. The lively collaboration between Lord and Meyer appears to be the engine of this critical conversation. Lord, an artist, and Meyer, an art historian, each bring valuable, though varying perspectives to the table. These differences, as the two demonstrated during the session, are productive of a rich dialogue, one comprised of questions and asides, rather than adherence to a strict script. During the session, the pair provided a brief preview of the different kinds of mate- rial they would be incorporating into their book. Lord led the audience through a slide show of the art and intimacies of “scribblers” such as Djuna Barnes, Janet Flanner, and Bertha Harris. Her presentation thoughtfully considered the public/private correspondences between these women, with highlights including reflections on Barnes’ The Ladies Alamanack (1928) - “a zine before there were zines” Lord quipped. Meyers, likewise, looked at a wide variety of images, such OCT08 15 CSupdateW as a series put together by activist/artist collec- architecture whose titles include, among others, tive Gran Fury and McDermott and McGough’s Gombrich’s influential and ubiquitous The Story Race, Class, Gender, provocative “A Friend of Dorothy, 1943” (1986). of Art. When asked by an audience member and Sexuality: A Cross Most striking, however, was his discussion of a what the consequences were of moving beyond Generational Examination recent exhibition, entitled “Reversing Vandal- the academic press into the mainstream, Meyer ism,” organized by the San Francisco Public remained staunchly optimistic. He pointed to of Politics, Theory, and Library, a showcase of slashed public library the benefits of placing the book within a global Activism books transformed, by a number of artists, into market, seeing opportunity in its widespread pieces of art. Because the books were defaced for distribution. “I could have used this book in A Conference and Reception in their subject matter (usually depictions of same- graduate school,” he told the questioner, “even Honor of Karen Brodkin sex desire, sometimes the simple inclusion of undergraduate.” By making use of Phaidon’s the word “gay” in the title or author’s name), the resources, however, Lord and Meyer will be able MONDAY refashioning of the damaged property provided to see their volume placed not only on library October 20 artists with an opportunity to recontextualize shelves and classrooms, but on coffee tables as 314 Royce and reclaim. As Meyer suggested, the exhibi- well. The potential to appeal to readers outside of tion took what was once stigmatized and forced academia or queer subcultures is one of the most 1 pm it into another register, an insight that brought important points about the ambitious scope of to light the work of Lord and Meyer’s project the project. In some ways, it is at the very heart more generally. With its recycling, reversing, and of the challenges to art, history, and canon the remaking, theirs is a book that holds up similar project presents. As Lord later joked with the transformative possibilities. audience, the session drawing to a close, “Think Though originally proposed as a museum of the coffee table, not the book.” exhibition (it was, according to Lord, promptly Vivian Davis is a doctoral student in the Depart- Please RSVP to [email protected] rejected), Art in Queer Culture: 1885-Present is ment of English at UCLA and a writer for CSW or call 310-825-1565 if attending the forthcoming from Phaidon, an international Update. publisher of books on art, photography, and conference, reception, or both.

OCT08 16 CSupdateW OCT08 NEWS Travel Grant Recipient Robert Summers Researches Zines by Vaginal Davis

Robert Summers, a on the development of PhD candidate in the underground music. Like Ron Athey, Ms Da- Department of Art vis made her name in LA’s club performance History at UCLA, was scene, and has earned herself a similar awarded a CSW travel notoriety as a cultural antagonist and erotic grant this year. His es- provocateur.” In Summers's view, Davis say titled “Vaginal Davis has practiced, for over 30 years, a “queer- Does Art history” was recently published in feminist politics of aesthetics” that surfaces the anthology Dead History, Live Art (Liver- the racial, gender, class, and sexual tensions pool University Press, 2008). His disserta- and discriminations within certain lesbian tion, titled “Enacting a Queer Aesthetic Ex- and gay communities and heteronorma- istence: The Art/Life of Vaginal Davis,” from tive culture by performing her transgender Currently, Summers is researching Vagi- which the published essay comes, is built African-Mexican-American body/self within nal Davis’s “zines.” These ephemeral, non- around the L.A.- and, now, Berlin-based clubs and alternative spaces—not to men- commercial, handmade, and self-distributed conceptual, literary, video, and performance tion in public, on the streets. As opposed to “underground” publications, before the artist Vaginal Davis. As Dominic Johnson a traditional art-historical monograph that Internet, were one of the few ways queers of Freize Magazine (see www.vaginaldavis. strictly focuses on the “fine art” and life of across various locations could meet others, com), noted, “Vaginal Davis is an originator an individual artist, Summers’s dissertation find out what was happening outside of of the homo-core punk movement and a simultaneously gives worth and weight to (white, middle-class) lesbian and gay and gender-queer art-music icon. Her concept ephemera and the intersections made be- heterosexual politics, clubs, and art and bands— including Pedro Muriel and Esther, tween Davis and other queer and feminist music scenes, and support one another. Cholita! The Female Menudo, black fag, and artists working antagonistically within the Summers argues that by the creation and the Afro Sisters—have left an indelible mark social-sphere. deployment of Davis’s zines, she unwittingly 17 OCT08 NEWS

(or wittingly) commenced a “queer archive” of queer modes of existence, which needs to Vaginal Davis 1 Million BC, 1992 photo be researched and brought into “our” present by Beulah Love, styling by i love Ricky, make-up by Glen Meadmore conservative and reactionary climate in order to learn from it. With the generous grant from the CSW, Summers will be able to complete his work on this under-researched topic, which is crucial to understanding an aspect of queer culture, creativity, and politics. Indeed, it is imperative to continue to research Vaginal Davis’s zines at various institutions in order to complete the first monograph on Davis and, at the same time, work on a radically demo- cratic and aesthetic moment within queer culture, from which we can learn much today, and which, Summers argues, we must learn from for the future(s) of queer theories, queer studies, and queer lives.

18 OCT08 STAFF

UCLA Center for the Study of Women CSW Update is published monthly during the academic DIRECTOR Kathleen McHugh Professor, English and Cinema and Media Studies year. UCLA faculty, staff, and students are welcome to sub- ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR Juliet Williams Associate Professor, Women’s Studies mit articles for inclusion. If you have questions, please ASSISTANT DIRECTOR April de Stefano, Ph.D. email the publications staff at FINANCIAL MANAGER Van DoNguyen [email protected]

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