User:Tash/SI5 Synopses
Synopses written for my chapter of the Special Issue 5 Reader. I decided to include these writings to accompany and interleave through each core text as a form of annotation. Some are more personal and subjective in tone than others, but their goal is the same: to add a layer of reflection and intention to my reader.
The Book: Its Past and Future by Roger Chartier
http://www.booksandideas.net/The-Book-Its-Past-Its-Future.html
Abstract
What is a book? And how has the digital age transformed what we read and how we read it? These are some of the key questions addressed by Roger Chartier in this interview. Besides the materiality and mutability of text, Chartier also examines the contemporary life of books online, and questions the digitization of all printed knowledge by private enterprises.
Synopsis / Annotations
Roger Chartier begins this interview by addressing some fundamental aspects of what makes a book a book. He defines the medium as having two levels of meaning: that of a material, manufactured object, and that of an intellectual or aesthetic work. Whether we are talking about an ancient scroll, or a digital publication, it is the relationship between these two aspects which greatly dictate how and what we read.
That the computer is now the ‘sole object’ through which we do most of our reading, means that it in today’s media environment, it is the gatekeeper of almost every type of discourse. Instead of discrete texts in separate codex, the screen allows us to engage with a plurality and fluidity of information. This means reading becomes a more mobile, interpretive and reciprocal act. As such, our role and responsibility as readers also expands.
In the context of book scanning culture, it’s very interesting what Chartier says here about how we treat electronic text. Why do we still insist on such fixed ideas of ownership, and how does this impact the way books are distributed online? What would happen if we break away from the conditions of ‘saleability’? This is why I think the commercial aspect of book digitization is important to study.
Moving on to Google Books, the largest book scanning project ever undertaken, Chartier notes several key limitations. The first, is its capitalist framework, which takes power away from the public and puts it into a hands of giant, private enterprise. The second, is its bias for the English language. Google Books may seem like an attempt at as a ‘universal’ library, but their scanning process betrays some obvious hierarchical attitudes. In terms of content, Anglo-American collections take top billing, and in terms of values, speed and profit are more important than transparency of process or even the quality of digitization. What results is less a universal library and more a bookshop with many blind spots.
To close, Chartier dispels the notion that as a society, we are reading less. In fact, we are reading more today than ever. However, we are also doing so more unconsciously than ever. It seems that the more we communicate through computers, the less we question how this information exchange really happens, and who is being included / excluded in the process. In this reader, I hope to further question the power structures in the books we read and the way they are digitized and distributed today.
Treason Our Text: Feminist Challenges to the Literary Canon
by Lillian Robinson
Abstract
Lillian Robinson examines the exclusion, distortion and misrepresentation of female authorship in the Western literary canon. She also charts a way forward for feminist criticism to reinsert the female tradition into the canon, while at the same time challenging the biased ideologies which are being reproduced by it.
Synopsis/annotations
What is the role of women authors in the literary canon? How does their exclusion or misrepresentation reflect the politics involved in canon-formation? And how has feminist criticism approached this issue historically? These are the central questions asked by Lillian Robinson in her essay, which also suggests an examination of the canon “as a source of ideas, themes, motifs, and myths about the two sexes.”
Robinson begins with an immediate dismissal of the idea of a naturally occuring, or indeed inevitable canon. Instead she positions the canon as a social and cultural construct, in which the “cold realities of patronage, purchase, presentation in private and public collections, or performance create the conditions for a work’s canonical status or lack of it.” As such, she argues that the “apparently systematic neglect of women’s experience in the literary canon” is a reflection of the dominant narratives embedded in the process of its making. Moreover, “the male authored canon contributes to the body of information, stereotype, inference and surmise about the female sex that is generally in the culture.” This becomes even more concerning when we realize that the canon also exists in the institutional context, proliferated through syllabi and anthologies.
In the second part of the essay, Robinson moves on to focus on several key feminist responses to the canon. Historically, the most common approaches were to “emphasize alternative readings of the tradition, readings that reinterpret women's character, motivations, and actions and that identify and challenge sexist ideology,” and to “concentrate on gaining admission to the canon for literature by women writers.” While both have produced successes in their own ways, Robinson’s critique is that they do not sufficiently call into question the idea of the canon itself. The first focuses itself on a new reading of the existing standards, while the second often manifests itself in a case-by-case demonstration of certain writers, and a crusade to prove them ‘good enough’ to merit inclusion.
Robinson also questions the creation of the feminist ‘counter-canon’. While “the emergence of feminist literary study has been characterized, at the base, by scholarship devoted to the discovery, republication, and reappraisal of "lost" or undervalued writers and their work,” we must be careful how we treat them. How can we move the discourse on women’s literature and female tradition forward from being an autonomous cultural experience, to one which truly engages with literary history?
Over the next several paragraphs Robinson turns to the issue of intersectionality. She goes deeper into the experiences of black and queer women authors, and questions the ‘elite’ as a social and literary category. She writes: “Whereas many white literary scholars continue to behave as if there were no major black woman writers, most are prepared to admit that certain well- known white writers were lesbians for all or part of their lives.” This exclusion of certain social groups also has implications on the type of written word which is admitted into the canon. Speaking of the abundance of written ephemera not classed as ‘literature’ Robinson explains that, “In this way, women's letters, diaries, journals, autobiographies, oral histories, and private poetry have come under critical scrutiny as evidence of women's consciousness and expression.”
In her conclusion, Robinson charts two possible ways forward for the feminist challenge to the literary canon: the continued development of the female tradition, and the simultaneous confrontation with “the” canon. “The point in so doing is not to label and hence dismiss even the most sexist literary classics, but for all of us to apprehend them, finally, in all their human dimensions.”
The key idea in this text for me is that literary canon formation is political in both its construction and its effect. The exclusion, distortion and misrepresentation of female authorship is at the same time reflecting and reproducing the dominant narratives about gender and race in our culture. This is extremely relevant in my reader because it exposes some of the potential blind spots in book scanning culture.
I am a woman writer, I am a western writer
An interview with Ursula Le Guin
Abstract
In this interview, William Walsh speaks to Ursula Le Guin about her writing practice and women’s role in Western literature. As America’s preeminent science fiction writer, she discusses the female voices who have inspired her, those who have been forgotten or hidden by history, as well as her own experience with bias and privilege which “always defends itself.”
Synopsis/annotations
I am sad to say I’ve never read anything by Ursula Le Guin. It’s no secret that male writers are more widely recognized and canonized than their female counterparts, but as ‘America’s preeminent writer of science fiction’, it’s telling that I’m not even moderately familiar with her work. In this interview, she speaks of her own experience as a woman writer, and points out the many others who have been undervalued in literary history.
Its interesting to see how cultural biases reflect themselves in processes of classification. The way things are ordered and categorized often expose the attitudes of the dominant culture: these are the groups worth naming, and here is how we should speak about them. In today’s age of book search, this issue of classification is even more pertinent. But instead of becoming more open, ranking algorithms and indexing processes are becoming more opaque.
Here Ursula Le Guin begins to discuss more explicitly the role of women writers in the Western literary canon. She points out that though nearly half of American fiction has been written by women, their contributions continue to be widely undervalued and grossly underreported. Women writers are not getting recognized, paid or read as much as they deserve. Le Guin notes that things are changing, but the canon still does not reflect who is writing. Also interesting to see here the interviewer’s comment about the few female winners of the Nobel, and Le Guin’s answer: “Sure, you can name them, but now start naming the men.”
Le Guin makes a connection here between the safe ‘mainstream’, and the dominant male tradition. They are so interconnected, and reveal a complex web of dependent conservative attitudes. Instead of turning towards differences, our society is one which often looks inward to what we already know and accept. We look for what is normal, what is tradition, who is familiar. While Le Guin’s criticism is leveled at the literary industry, the same can also be said about the echo chamber of the internet.
The privileged category becomes the norm. As Sara Ahmed writes in her book ‘On being included’, it becomes the burden of the oppressed to either let things go, insist on belonging, or embark on reforming the entire discourse. For women writers, the approaches have varied throughout history, from those who imitate men’s writing to become more canonical, to those who passionately defend l’écriture feminine, and those who do the work of rediscovering and promoting women’s work case by case.
This performative, reciprocal view of the reader’s role is something which comes up again and again in this reader. Text, like knowledge itself, does not exist in a vaccuum. We always bring our own contexts into a reading, and together with the interface (whether it be a book or a screen), we make sense of the information. Knowing this, we can be more experimental and critical in the way we present books.
I hope that equality of the sexes can be more than just an ‘imaginary toad’. Since so much of our knowledge lives in the written word, a more inclusive canon is one way to challenge all the stories we tell ourselves.
Merekam Perempuan Penulis dalam Sejarah Kesusastraan
Wawancara dengan Melani Budianta
Abstract
Teks ini adalah wawancara diantara Jurnal Perempuan dan Melani Budianta, seorang pengajar dan kritikus sastra ternama di Indonesia. Didalamnya, Budianta membicarakan perjalanan sastra perempuan dari tahun ke tahun, dari jaman Kartini sampai era kontemporer, dimana penulis perempuan Indonesia mulai lebih terlihat dan bebas berkarya.
Synopsis/annotations
Dalam wawancara ini, Profesor Budianta membahas status dan peran penulis perempuan dalam sejarah sastra Indonesia. Secara pribadi, ini adalah pertama kali saya mengalih fokus kepada kesusastraan Indonesia, dan memang sangat menarik untuk membandingkannya dengan wacana dan kritik di Barat. Yang pasti sama, suara perempuan tidak selalu terekam oleh kritikus, editor dan badan penanganan bidang kesusastraan, suatu kelompok yang sangat terwarnai bias patriarki.
Yang beda, adalah isu sosial dan politik yang mempengaruhi produksi sastra di Indonesia. Mulai dari jaman Kartini, dia yang membuka pintu untuk emansipasi perempuan pribumi, banyak perempuan penulis Indonesia yang posisinya naik-turun dalam periode sastra. Disini Budianta membicarakan Sariamin Ismail, penulis Indonesia yang mulai aktif tahun 1930an dan tercatat sebagai novelis perempuan pertama di Indonesia. Sejak itu, juga banyak sastrawan-sastrawan perempuan yang telah digali kembali. Tapi, proses ini tidak semudah di Barat karena kurangnya dokumentasi.
Isu sensor juga sangat menarik untuk dibahas kalau melihat konteks politik dan religius Indonesia. Dibawah Soeharto, ketidakbebasan menaik. Sekarang, sensor malah datang dari masyarakat sendiri, yang menonjokkan kecenderungan ekstremis. Dalam satu sisi, memang ada lebih banyak sastrawan perempuan hari ini daripada sebelumnya. Ayu Utami adalah contoh satu penulis yang sedang naik daun karena tulisannya yang membahas seksualitas perempuan. Tetapi, di sisi lain, suara kaum minoritas di Indonesia lagi sering dipendam. Lihat saja kasus Ahok.
Yang memberi harapan, adalah keberanian penulis perempuan untuk terus bereaksi dan berkarya. Lewat tulisan mereka, mereka menantang pikiran tidak adil dalam masyarakat. Melani Budianta menutup wawancaranya dengan menutur harapan untuk kebangkitan variasi perempuan penulis di Indonesia. Saya sangat setuju dengan kata-katanya bahwa “Perempuan itu tidak cuma satu atau tunggal.”
Linguistic Sexism and Feminist Linguistic Activism
by Anne Pauwels
Abstract
This chapter of the Handbook for Gender and Language, written by Anne Pauwels, is relevant not just for its study of the gendered nature of language, but also for charting the rise of feminist linguistic activism. Its key argument is that language can and should be reformed, if we are to “challenge the hegemony of the meanings promoted and authorized by the dominant group or culture.”
Synopsis/annotations
This chapter of the Handbook for Gender and Language, written by Anne Pauwels, is relevant not just for its study of the gendered nature of language, but also for charting the rise of feminist linguistic activism. Its key argument is that language can and should be reformed, if we are to overturn the semantic asymmetry of the sexes.
The first section looks at the portrayal of women and men as language users and regulators. Until fairly recently, it is men who have carried the torch for and held authority over language. The historical exclusion of women from higher levels of education and professional life meant that it was men who became the norm-makers and codifiers of language. Even the dictionary-making process was one largely overseen by men. Examples don’t often get more concrete than that.
Fortunately, by the 1970s, feminists had begun to actively challenge male dominance in language regulation and planning. Linguistic criticism became a pillar of the movement. Gender bias was exposed in many of the linguistic rules we take for granted, like the use of the sex indefinite ‘he’ instead of ‘she’. As a first act of rebellion, some women began breaking these norms, in an attempt to leave behind the role of critic, and to become that of regulator. In proposing alternative uses of language, feminists were threatening men’s authority as norm-makers.
In the next section Pauwels takes a closer look at non-sexist language reform, and its manifestations through the years. To begin, Pauwels notes that many of the early feminist language campaigns and activities of the 1970s and 80s were largely ignored by mainstream literature. One of the first sociolinguistic explorations into the lexical representation of women and men revealed a fundamental concept common across the world: that male was regarded as the norm, and female, as the derivative. Pauwels’ analysis of its impact is remarkable: “The practice of considering the man/the male as the prototype for human representation reduces the woman/female to the status of the "subsumed," the "invisible," or the "marked" one.” Other expressions which reinforce women and men’s perceived value in society, are the lexical gaps in vocabulary to describe women in professional roles, and the more subtle “practice of semantic derogation which constantly reinforces the "generic man" and "sexual woman” portrayal.” It’s true that words to describe girls and women are astonishingly quick to turn sexual and abusive. And see what happens when you use certain ‘feminine’ qualities to describe men, and vice versa.
So how can we change language? At this point, Pauwels lists several strategies which lend themselves to both the creation of a woman-centered language, to the reformation of the “current language system to achieve a symmetrical and equitable representation of women and men.” These include language disruption (the insertion of new words, and alternative spellings to call attention to what Sara Ahmed might call the ‘brick walls’ of language, like ‘herstory’ or ‘wimmin’), and experiments in creative writing (écriture feminine).
In these campaigns, a crucial dilemma for feminists is the question of neutralization or feminization. Should we abolish condescending female versions of words, and use actor instead of actress, chairperson instead of chairwoman, flight attendant instead of hostess? In English, gender-neutralization of this kind has been the principal strategy in promoting linguistic equality. Though some consider this the most ‘viable’ strategy, I’m not so sure that it creates the right effect. Especially not if they use the existing masculine form as the new generic form. I’m inclined to agree with the feminization supporters, who “respond that it is better to be named and to be visible in language.”
The last section of Pauwels’ text deals with the implementation and effectiveness of the proposed changes. In this, we are faced with another ‘brick wall’, in the form of linguistic institutions, which are not traditionally open or gender-inclusive spaces. “In many forms of corpus planning (e.g. orthographic reform) implementation is top-down with language academies and other authoritative language bodies leading, and educational authorities facilitating the implementation process,” writes Pauwels. It’s also worth noting that the gender gap is similarly problematic in the media industries, whether it be print, television or web. As such the creation and promotion of a more equitable, female-oriented language has been the work of individuals, who make changes in their personal language patterns.
The effectiveness of these efforts are hard to judge, since studies on this topic are still in its infancy. Though people are more aware of gender bias in language, its more difficult to measure how much this is changing the way they think of women’s role in society. Pauwels asks, “Does change spread from public forms of written discourse to public speech? Which sector of the community leads the change and how does it spread from this group to other groups in the community?” The writers’ own study of pronoun uses by academics in 2000 suggest that it is women, not surprisingly, who lead the adoption of non-sexist alternative to the generic ‘he’. So if we want to accelerate this reform, we’ll have to address the representation of women in academia, and indeed in all fields of knowledge production.
In closing, Pauwels is cautiously optimistic. I share her attitude that we should keep chipping away. By challenging language, that most basic component of human culture, we are “challenging the hegemony of the meanings promoted and authorized by the dominant group, in this case men.”
Windows and Mirrors
by Jay David Bolter and Diane Gromala
Abstract
Windows and Mirrors is a book by Jay Bolter and Diane Gromala exploring the digital medium and its capacity to both reflect and obscure “a world of information”. In this extract, they question the history of transparency in interface design, and call for a more critical approach to what we hide and what we make visible online.
Synopsis/annotations
To understand how biases are reproduced from era to era, print to pixel, we have to look at both the content as well as design of the medium. In this chapter of the book Windows and Mirrors, we are introduced to the history of transparency in interface design. Here, transparency is not meant in the sense of openness and explicitness of processes. Bolter and Gromala use it to describe a deeply-entrenched attitude in digital culture, that of upholding the illusion of transparency – in other words, designing interfaces which present themselves as ‘transparent windows onto a world of information’. The danger in this, is when it conceals the constructed-ness of information and serves it up as truth.
It’s fascinating to me that the modern computer, in all its capacity to connect and empower, can also become traps of self-referentiality. As technology becomes more seamless and ‘user-friendly’, it becomes essential that we all learn how to navigate digital spaces, to become search-engine literate, and interface-conscious.
In this section Bolter and Gromala chart in more detail the origins of our desire for transparency, taking us back to the naming of the computer window, a metaphor of “vast cultural significance”. Today, the ‘myth of transparency’ is the dominant narrative in digital culture and complex processes are made to appear simple. We lose sight of what and how decisions are being made – when information is ordered online, when books are categorized in digital libaries, or when our data is being mined. In this way, software recedes further away from hardware, and algorithms gather in black boxes. My question is, what alternatives are there for designing online spaces which challenge the status quo? Can better, more inclusive interfaces change what we read online and the way we do it?
Performative Materiality and Theoretical Approaches to Interface
by Johanna Drucker
Abstract
With the problems exposed, the last section in this reader deals with potential alternatives and challenges to the status quo. If the content of the books we scan are exclusive and incomplete, how can we ensure that they are at least distributed and treated as such? The desire for seamlessness, efficiency and marketability has made most online spaces more opaque and self-referential. Search engines become echo chambers of what we already know, while websites become black boxes of code which we don’t. This article outlines a critical framework for a theory of performative materiality and its potential application to interface design from a humanistic perspective. Performative materiality is based on the conviction that a system should be understood by what it does, not only how it is structured.
Synopsis/annotations
Following Bolter and Gromala’s critique on the computer as a medium, this piece by Johanna Drucker examines the materiality of digital artifacts and systems, and offers up new frameworks for a humanistic approach to interface design.
First, Drucker calls to attention the literal, physical and networked qualities of digital media. She then introduces the concept of performative materiality: defined as the enacted and event-based character of digital activity supported by those physical conditions. Drucker’s thesis is based on the conviction that a system should be understood by what it does, and not only how it is structured. As such, the way we design interfaces should also reflect their interpretive and relative dimension. ‘Objects exist in the world but their meaning and value are the result of a performative act of interpretation provoked by their specific qualities.’
It’s also important here to place algorithms in context. Who is writing them, for whom and with what values? Programming is a field which relies heavily on its community. Codes are written, shared, then reused again and again through libraries and repositories. This is how you’ll find the same data sets and training models reproduced the world over. Of course, this is also how biases and conventions can become so deeply embedded (and well hidden) in digital processes.
In this part of her essay, Drucker lays out the discourse on materiality and compares several key perspectives which developed over the last few decades. Literal approaches, like forensic materiality, are modeled on a mechanistic approach that presumes objects of perception are self-identical and observer-independent. This feels old-fashioned, and is definitely out of touch with my understanding of situatedness. Distributed materiality is more expansive, focusing on the complex relationships between software, hardware, network, servers and users. Performative reality takes a step further away from the literal, and emphasizes meaning which is produced by an event or provoked by code. As Drucker calls it, it is the integration of engineering and humanistic thought. To return to the context of the book scanner, I find myself questioning the performance of reading, the physical act of reproduction. Is it a matter of mirroring, disrupting, creating, poaching?
Non-representational approaches are worth noting because they force us to break apart signifiers from the signified. Through this lens, we are reminded that language in itself is a technology, and as Steve Rushton likes to say, alphabets are in themselves a kind of software. We learn to read, but also to interpret. As a feminist, theories of enunciation are particularly interesting to me. Enunciative approaches are all about power relations, the tension between subject and object. It is why, for example, the interview will always be a loaded format when seen from a feminist perspective.
With the understanding that digital media has a vast performative potential, Drucker proposes a new framework for approaching interface design. The main question now is: how to bring these conceptions of materiality back into the design process? To answer, she turns her attention to an analysis of three concrete examples: Google search, the Chicago Encyclopedia and Stanford’s Spatial History Project site. Over the next few paragraphs she will compare and contrast not just how these online spaces are structured, but how they perform, what human actions they provoke and what meanings they (re)produce.
Just like the desire for transparency, the idea that user-centered, task-driven and goal-oriented approaches are best is a cultural and social construct. Digital experiences do not have to be about functionality and efficiency, or entertainment. Google Books does not have to operate with the user-as-consumer model. Google Search does not have to focus on personalization. Ultimately, I like Drucker’s idea of having more nuanced design principles, which are less governed by market forces, more open to ‘content modeling, intellectual argument and rhetorical engagement.’
In this section Drucker suggests alternative approaches to each of the three previously mentioned web applications. The main goal is to imagine interfaces which ‘supports acts of interpretation rather than simply returning selected results from a pre-existing data set.’ Looking at the forensic profile Google Search for example, Drucker suggests a move away from seamlessness, and towards chattiness. Exposing us to the history of other user trails, past searches, reactions and comments might lead to ‘interesting interventions.’ At the very least, it makes Google’s processes more visible and tangible.
Hugely relevant questions here on the politics of seamlessness: ‘Google’s offered ranking and ordering of results reveals only the tip of the machinations at work... What are the contrasts? Alternatives? Terms?’ and ‘What contingencies shape the display, integration, operations?’ The potential for engagement is huge. And yet the reality is, Google is so opaque with so many of their processes and policies that we don’t even know where their book scanning facilities are located. And we sure don’t know what they’re doing with their data sets. See Reader #5 to read more about the role of databases in today’s information landscape.
I want to stress Drucker’s point here that interfaces instruct actions. In many ways, this is grounded in each site’s agenda, and is a manifestation of their ideology. ‘Graphical languages build on familiar sidebar navigation and menu structures, as if gender, cultural codes, metaphoric use of terms and tropes, and their capacity to spin the message on the page were value neutral. But in fact, the graphical expressions organize hierarchy and structure dynamic relations. In the Google page, the flatfooted appearance belies its formal sophistication.’ Again, the illusion of transparency is promoted.
Again, enunciative dimensions bring us back to the context of feminism. ‘Who speaks for whom where and how in these graphical and textual expressions? What is not able to be said in their forms and formats? What is excluded, impossible, not present, not able to be articulated given these structures?’ How are things classified, and by which conditions? Who does it serve when the popular results get more popular and the others become invisible? Can we move away from aggregative approaches to agonistic models? If we were ever to achieve the dream of a Digital Universal Library, how can we ensure a truly inclusive and open interface for it? Drucker’s suggestions for more ‘constellationary’ and ‘polyvocal’ digital spaces might be a good start.
Ultimately, addressing the reproduction of bias on the web is a complex task that needs to be approached on at least two levels. First, in terms of content: what knowledge is being produced, what books are being scanned, which data is being recorded? Second, in terms of materiality: what interpretation does the interface allow? What does the surface reveal, and what does it hide? As Drucker so eloquently notes: ‘Veils of maya are replaced with other veils of maya, we know this, but at the very least, acknowledging that creates a restless engagement with the act of knowing.’
A Phenomological Practice, in On Being Included
by Sara Ahmed
Abstract
In this section of her 2012 book, On Being Included, feminist Sara Ahmed reflects on the experience of racism and sexism in institutional culture, and offers a critique of what happens when diversity is offered as a solution. She also suggests viewing diversity work as a practice of reorientation: that which generates knowledge of institutions and reveals their ‘brick walls’ through the very attempt of transforming them.
Synopsis/annotations
In her 2012 book On Being Included, Sara Ahmed examines how diversity operates in the modern world, and reflects on the experience of racism and sexism in institutional culture. In the last chapter, entitled A Phenomological Practice, she offers a new way of thinking about diversity work. Instead of viewing it as a praxis, or a “reflection upon the world in order to transform it,” she presents a reversal: “transformation, as a form of practical labor, leads to knowledge.” It is in moving the needle, that we get to know it.
To think of diversity as a phenomonological practice, is to frame it as an act of reorientation. In challenging attitudes of exclusion – or as Ahmed calls it, ‘stranger-making’ – diversity work is not only about looking at what is missing from view. It is also about acquiring a critical knowledge of the ‘brick wall’, the sedimentation of history which determines who belongs and who does not get across. Ahmed writes, “Only the practical labor of ‘coming up against’ the institution allows this wall to become apparent. To those who do not come up against it, the wall does not appear – the institution is lived and experienced as being open, committed and diverse.” In our context of digital media, where software is opaque and algorithms reside within black boxes, this wall is particularly elusive. As such, it becomes even more important that we “generate knowledge not only of what institutions are like, but of how they can reproduce themselves, how they become like and keep becoming alike.”
Ahmed expands her argument to address the many different kinds of diversity work. It can refer to work that has the explicit aim to transform an institution, such as Wikipedia’s efforts to close the gender gap in its editors. It can also be what we do when we find ourselves outside a category of privilege, the strategies and tactics we amass when we are “stopped or held up by how we inhabit what we inhabit.” It can take form of a description, of how we experience life inside an institution which does not give you residence. In many of these encounters, for example when as a woman of color, you are not afforded the same professional courtesy as your white male counterpart, you have to decide whether to let the moment pass or take on the emotional labor of insisting on belonging.
Following this, Ahmed points out that collecting these accounts of countering and recountering resistence, should be seen as beneficial, because they expose the system. Of her own experience, she writes that, “Over and over again, it is revealed to me: this institutional lesson, which is also a life lesson, of coming up against a category in the very attempt to make the restrictions more explicit. How many times have I had male colleagues defending all-male reading lists, all-male speaker lists, all-male reference lists? To give an account of these defenses is to give an account of how worlds are reproduced.” The tendency to defend the status quo, to paint the critic as the problem, the feminist as the killjoy, adds another layer of complexity.
The last section of the chapter deals with what happens when diversity is offered as a solution. Ahmed warns us how “even the language of inclusion and repair makes those who are to be included into the problem.” It even suggests that those who are already holding place in institutions, are the ones who can solve the problem. “Whiteness recedes when diversity becomes a solution to whiteness.” So it is important for us not only to emphasize and critique what the surface hides, but also how things surface, and “how not to reproduce what the we inherit.”