Greetings from a surprisingly snowy Boston!
You're getting this newsletter a day early this month because Boston is cleaning up from its third nor'easter in a fortnight and the Massachusetts Historical Society was closed yesterday and remains closed today. I took the opportunity of two days off in the middle of the week to dye my hair "virgin pink" (despite the fact that it may be impossible for dykes to "lose" their virginity and virginity is, in fact, a myth), did lot of quilting, finished The Wages of History: Emotional Labor on Public History's Front Lines, started Pennies for Heaven: The History of American Synagogues and Money, and bought a delightful romance novel on the recommendation of Cat Sebastian because she promised a naughty cat (spoiler: the cat is very naughty...but in a helpful way).
Image: Profile self portrait with pink hair taken this morning at milkweed cafe (Mission Hill, Boston).
My continued thanks to my fellow crafters, Mom and friend Molly, in contributing pieces to the #PersistentStitches project! Just yesterday we shot passed the $700.00 mark and are on course to make 50% of our 2018 goal -- raised from $1,000 to $2,000 -- by the end of March. It continues to be a a powerful antidote to the daily flood of wretched political news to know that I can put my hands to work creating beautiful things and raising money for those who do the labor of presistent resistance day in and day out. I have a number of commissions due by May 1st that might slow the creation of ready-made items at the Persistent Stitches page, but I promise to keep on creating -- and welcome any additional crafters who are interested in joining us.
Image: Embroidery by Molly Westerman reading "incensed feminist" with floral motif. This piece can be yours for a donation of $20 or more to Avenues for Homeless Youth! (Donate to the org, then email me proof of donation and your mailing address to claim this work.)
The past few weeks have contained unanticipated grieving as my friend Linda Sophia Smith -- diagnosed with colon cancer in January -- passed away on February 24th. She was seventy-nine years old and died at home in hospice care with her partner Denslow, her cats, and her community at Hawk Hill Land Trust in the Ozarks. She was a women's studies pioneer a founding member of Aradia, Inc., the lesbian feminist community that was the subject of my independent study research in undergrad. At the conclusion of my undergraduate studies, I spent a memorable month living with Linda and her partner Denslow in Missouri ostensibly helping Linda organize her personal papers (she was a prolific journaler) but mostly absorbing the possibility of living a lesbian life. Still identifying myself publicly as an ally, I was aware of my bisexual potential and having the example of women who has established lives together in community was instrumental in helping me take the leap of faith from ally to queer. I am grateful that she and Denslow welcomed me into their home and shared their stories.
Image: Denslow Brown, myself, and Linda Smith in June 2005.
This past Sunday, I formally joined the Arlington St. Church community. Readers of this newsletter will know that I have been participating in the ASC community since shortly after the November 2016 election. ASC is a Unitarian Universalist congregation which is a faith tradition rooted in two radical Protestant movements that began in Massachusetts (the Universalists of 1793 and the Unitarians of 1825) and formed a single "association" (the modern UUA) in 1961. The mentor of Arlington St. Church's current pastor, Rev. Kim Crawford-Harvie, Dana McLean Greeley, was actually the first president of the united UUA and served at Arlington St. Church for many years. One of the early ministers of the congregation, back when it was a Congregational church, was Massachusetts Historical Society founder Jeremy Belknap. The historian in me finds these religious genealogies comforting, tying the social justice work of Arlington's current parishoners to the past and future work of this community. The queer feminist in me enjoys the fact that Jeremy Belknap would probably be appalled that the congregation is now cared for by a lesbian Buddhist. I wrote at more length about my personal history with organized religion and my reasons for joining ASC here at the feminist librarian.
Image: On Sunday, I signed the current Arlington St. Church membership book at the pulpit (not currently in the sanctuary) used by James Freeman Clarke.
Next week I'll be heading to New Haven, Connecticut for the New England Archivists Spring 2018 Meeting, a joint program this year with the Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York. I've been invited to participate in a roundtable discussion about archives and political advocacy, and ... this is also my first meeting in three years at which I won't have board responsibilities and I am looking forward to soaking in the presentations of others, particularly my colleagues who are working on equity, inclusion, and social justice in our field. I'm thrilled that colleague Emily Drabinski will be one of the keynote speakers; her recent participation in a debate-style conference panel on libraries and the idea of neutrality yielded this piece that I really appreciated about libraries and the material reality of making choices about what users have access to. She is also a union activist and one of the colleagues I look to for important and ongoing work on librarianship as labor.
Image: Logo for Dósis 1.1: sickness and health in the era of Trump.
On February 21st, Hanna and I joined our colleague Brandy Schillace in launching the first issue of a new online magazine Dósis: medical humanities + social justice that grew out of Brandy's longtime blog MedHum | Daily Dose. You can read our first issue Dósis 1.1: sickness and health in the era of Trump online for free! We have essays on women's health, sex work, the global gag rule, and "madness in maddening times," as well as book reviews and a call for pitches to our second issue!.
Time for cats.
Image: Christopher is still working on the concept of naps. Christopher stands on the arm of our couch with two paws on a pillow on Mommy Hanna's lap, tipping his head back as she scratches behind his ears.
Image: Teazle, on the other hand, knows exactly what laps are for. Teazle lounges on Mommy Hanna's lap.
Image: An in-progress quilted piece in periwinkle blue and sunny yellow with gold "lazy daisy" embroidery as quilting.
I'll end this month's newsletter with two thought-provoking reads from this past month: "Technocratic Vistas: The Long Con of Neolibralism," which I found because it was referenced on the intellectual history podcast Trotsky and the Wild Orchids (episodes 5 and 8 are on the concept of neolibralism and I highly recommend them if you -- like me -- need a refresher on its origins and some context for current usage).
The other piece, "The Male Glance," I found thanks to journalist and scholar Anne Helen Peterson (you should follow her on Twitter and/or subscribe to her TinyLetter). "Glance," by Lili Loofbourow, argues that we have learned to treat cultural work by women with a cursory glance:
You're getting this newsletter a day early this month because Boston is cleaning up from its third nor'easter in a fortnight and the Massachusetts Historical Society was closed yesterday and remains closed today. I took the opportunity of two days off in the middle of the week to dye my hair "virgin pink" (despite the fact that it may be impossible for dykes to "lose" their virginity and virginity is, in fact, a myth), did lot of quilting, finished The Wages of History: Emotional Labor on Public History's Front Lines, started Pennies for Heaven: The History of American Synagogues and Money, and bought a delightful romance novel on the recommendation of Cat Sebastian because she promised a naughty cat (spoiler: the cat is very naughty...but in a helpful way).
Image: Profile self portrait with pink hair taken this morning at milkweed cafe (Mission Hill, Boston).
My continued thanks to my fellow crafters, Mom and friend Molly, in contributing pieces to the #PersistentStitches project! Just yesterday we shot passed the $700.00 mark and are on course to make 50% of our 2018 goal -- raised from $1,000 to $2,000 -- by the end of March. It continues to be a a powerful antidote to the daily flood of wretched political news to know that I can put my hands to work creating beautiful things and raising money for those who do the labor of presistent resistance day in and day out. I have a number of commissions due by May 1st that might slow the creation of ready-made items at the Persistent Stitches page, but I promise to keep on creating -- and welcome any additional crafters who are interested in joining us.
Image: Embroidery by Molly Westerman reading "incensed feminist" with floral motif. This piece can be yours for a donation of $20 or more to Avenues for Homeless Youth! (Donate to the org, then email me proof of donation and your mailing address to claim this work.)
The past few weeks have contained unanticipated grieving as my friend Linda Sophia Smith -- diagnosed with colon cancer in January -- passed away on February 24th. She was seventy-nine years old and died at home in hospice care with her partner Denslow, her cats, and her community at Hawk Hill Land Trust in the Ozarks. She was a women's studies pioneer a founding member of Aradia, Inc., the lesbian feminist community that was the subject of my independent study research in undergrad. At the conclusion of my undergraduate studies, I spent a memorable month living with Linda and her partner Denslow in Missouri ostensibly helping Linda organize her personal papers (she was a prolific journaler) but mostly absorbing the possibility of living a lesbian life. Still identifying myself publicly as an ally, I was aware of my bisexual potential and having the example of women who has established lives together in community was instrumental in helping me take the leap of faith from ally to queer. I am grateful that she and Denslow welcomed me into their home and shared their stories.
Image: Denslow Brown, myself, and Linda Smith in June 2005.
This past Sunday, I formally joined the Arlington St. Church community. Readers of this newsletter will know that I have been participating in the ASC community since shortly after the November 2016 election. ASC is a Unitarian Universalist congregation which is a faith tradition rooted in two radical Protestant movements that began in Massachusetts (the Universalists of 1793 and the Unitarians of 1825) and formed a single "association" (the modern UUA) in 1961. The mentor of Arlington St. Church's current pastor, Rev. Kim Crawford-Harvie, Dana McLean Greeley, was actually the first president of the united UUA and served at Arlington St. Church for many years. One of the early ministers of the congregation, back when it was a Congregational church, was Massachusetts Historical Society founder Jeremy Belknap. The historian in me finds these religious genealogies comforting, tying the social justice work of Arlington's current parishoners to the past and future work of this community. The queer feminist in me enjoys the fact that Jeremy Belknap would probably be appalled that the congregation is now cared for by a lesbian Buddhist. I wrote at more length about my personal history with organized religion and my reasons for joining ASC here at the feminist librarian.
Image: On Sunday, I signed the current Arlington St. Church membership book at the pulpit (not currently in the sanctuary) used by James Freeman Clarke.
Next week I'll be heading to New Haven, Connecticut for the New England Archivists Spring 2018 Meeting, a joint program this year with the Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York. I've been invited to participate in a roundtable discussion about archives and political advocacy, and ... this is also my first meeting in three years at which I won't have board responsibilities and I am looking forward to soaking in the presentations of others, particularly my colleagues who are working on equity, inclusion, and social justice in our field. I'm thrilled that colleague Emily Drabinski will be one of the keynote speakers; her recent participation in a debate-style conference panel on libraries and the idea of neutrality yielded this piece that I really appreciated about libraries and the material reality of making choices about what users have access to. She is also a union activist and one of the colleagues I look to for important and ongoing work on librarianship as labor.
Image: Logo for Dósis 1.1: sickness and health in the era of Trump.On February 21st, Hanna and I joined our colleague Brandy Schillace in launching the first issue of a new online magazine Dósis: medical humanities + social justice that grew out of Brandy's longtime blog MedHum | Daily Dose. You can read our first issue Dósis 1.1: sickness and health in the era of Trump online for free! We have essays on women's health, sex work, the global gag rule, and "madness in maddening times," as well as book reviews and a call for pitches to our second issue!.
Time for cats.
Image: Christopher is still working on the concept of naps. Christopher stands on the arm of our couch with two paws on a pillow on Mommy Hanna's lap, tipping his head back as she scratches behind his ears.
Image: Teazle, on the other hand, knows exactly what laps are for. Teazle lounges on Mommy Hanna's lap.
Image: An in-progress quilted piece in periwinkle blue and sunny yellow with gold "lazy daisy" embroidery as quilting.
I'll end this month's newsletter with two thought-provoking reads from this past month: "Technocratic Vistas: The Long Con of Neolibralism," which I found because it was referenced on the intellectual history podcast Trotsky and the Wild Orchids (episodes 5 and 8 are on the concept of neolibralism and I highly recommend them if you -- like me -- need a refresher on its origins and some context for current usage).
The other piece, "The Male Glance," I found thanks to journalist and scholar Anne Helen Peterson (you should follow her on Twitter and/or subscribe to her TinyLetter). "Glance," by Lili Loofbourow, argues that we have learned to treat cultural work by women with a cursory glance:
I'm still working over the "whither the f/f romance?" question that I wrote about last month and I think Loofbourow's piece intersects with that absence of women-partnered-women as the subjects of romance novel narratives. As I said on Twitter: "Women (even queer women) are taught from birth that the stories of boys are universal stories, that the stories of girls are only for girls. We are all (people of all genders) in the process of unlearning this natal training. Combine this with the near universal assumption in Western literature that a woman's life story is organized around a marriage (and babies) plot, and the exclusion of women whose lives are organized around other women from the romance plot comes into focus."Generations of forgetting to zoom into female experience aren’t easily shrugged off, however noble our intentions, and the upshot is that we still don’t expect female texts to have universal things to say. We imagine them as small and careful, or petty and domestic, or vain, or sassy, or confessional. We might expect them to be sentimental or melodramatic, or even—in the days of Transparent and I Love Dick and Girls—provocative, unflattering, and exhibitionist. But we don’t expect them to be experimental, and we don’t expect them to be great.
And with that ... I'll leave you with one final #BostonInWinter photo and look forward to writing again in April!
Image: Morning sun filtering through leafless trees onto snowy ground, the Fens (Boston).
Love to you all,
Anna