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FYSB 1738: Performing Publics and Political Activism

This guide accompanies Shayoni Mitra's class's visit to the Barnard Zine Library, in a session led by Zine Librarian Jenna Freedman

Radical Libraries & Archives

Author/Content

scan of page that reads, "BECAUSE us girls crave records and books and fanzines that speak to US that WE feel included in and can understand in our own ways. BECAUSE we wanna make it easier for girls to see/hear each other's work so that we can share strategies and criticize-applaud each other. BECAUSE we must take over the means of production in order to create our own meanings. BECAUSE viewing our work as being connected to our girlfriends-politics-real lives is essential if we are gonna figure out how we are doing impacts, reflects, perpetuates, or DISRUPTS the status quo. BECAUSE we recognize fantasies of Instant Macho Gun Revolution as impractical lies meant to keep us simply dreaming instead of becoming our dreams AND THUS seek to create revolution in our own lives every single day by envisioning and creating alternatives to the bullshit christian capitalist way of doing things. BECAUSE we want and need to encourage and be encouraged in the face of all our own insecurities, in the face of beergutboyrock that tells us we can't play our instruments, in the face of "authorities" who say our bands/zines/etc are the worst in the US and BECAUSE we don't wanna assimilate to someone else's (boy) standards of what is or isn't. BECAUSE we are unwilling to falter under claims that we are reactionary "reverse sexists" AND NOT THE TRUEPUNKROCKSOULCRUSADERS THAT WE KNOW we really are. BECAUSE we know that life is much more than physical survival and are patently aware that the punk rock "you can do anything" idea is crucial to the coming angry grrrl rock revolution which seeks to save the psychic and cultural lives of girls and women everywhere, according to their own terms, not ours. BECAUSE we are interested in creating non-heirarchical ways of being AND making music, friends, and scenes based on communication + understanding, instead of competition + good/bad categorizations. BECAUSE doing/reading/seeing/hearing cool things that validate and challenge us can help us gain the strength and sense of community that we need in order to figure out how bullshit like racism, able-bodieism, ageism, speciesism, classism, thinism, sexism, anti-semitism and heterosexism figures in our own lives. BECAUSE we see fostering and supporting girl scenes and girl artists of all kinds as integral to this process. BECAUSE we hate capitalism in all its forms and see our main goal as sharing information and staying alive, instead of making profits of being cool according to traditional standards. BECAUSE we are angry at a society that tells us Girl = Dumb, Girl = Bad, Girl = Weak. BECAUSE we are unwilling to let our real and valid anger be diffused and/or turned against us via the internalization of sexism as witnessed in girl/girl jealousism and self defeating girltype behaviors. BECAUSE I believe with my wholeheartmindbody that girls constitute a revolutionary soul force that can, and will change the world for real. "

Bikini Kill (Musical group), ed., Girl Power (Washington, D.C.: Bikini Kill, 1992). Zines B55g

Cataloging & Classification

cover of the zine Decolonizing Library Science. Photo of a Native Hawaiian person at a microphone with a raised fistCollecting zines for a library is radical. Paying for zines is radical (but shouldn't be).

Cataloging zines at all is radical. And now they're in WorldCat, which means they're also in Google Books. Cataloging zines takes a long time. Time is money. The Barnard Library is spending money supporting marginalized communities being seen.

Having a zine library is radical. Not assessing/weeding zines is radical.

Creating a space and collection that is

  • default queer
  • intentionally of color
  • gender expansive

is meant to help people who are normally othered feel centered.

Classification is anti-intersectional.

Let's look at some zine records in CLIO.

Kalani Adolpho, Decolonizing Library Science (Milwaukee, WI: the author, 2016). Zines A365d 2016