Zines as Vehicles for Critical Pedagogypresented by Jenna Freedman

College Book Art Association Annual Meeting

Yale University, January 2012

Critical Pedagogy

"Habits of thought, reading, writing, and speaking which go beneath surface meaning, first impressions, dominant myths, official pronouncements, traditional clichés, received wisdom, and mere opinions, to understand the deep meaning, root causes, social context, ideology, and personal consequences of any action, event, object, process, organization, experience, text, subject matter, policy, mass media, or discourse."

Shor, Ira. (1992). Empowering education: Critical teaching for social change. Chicago, The University of Chicago Press.

Zines

Derived from the words "magazine" and "fanzine," zines are usually low-budget self-distributed self-publications, motivated by a desire for self-expression, not for profit. They are generally informed by anarcho-punk politics and aesthetics.

Danger! Hole #2 by Lucy Doyle.August 2007. Lincoln Park, NJ.Zines D695d

Cover image used with permission.

Queerean by Yumi. December 2000. Cambridge, MA.

Zines Y85q

Cover image used with permission.

Empower: a Young Mama’s Guide to Taking Control, edited by Allison Crews. 2001? Zines C749e

Editor deceased. Statement in zine encourages reproduction. (Ha ha.)

Evolution of a Race Riot by Mimi Thi Nguyen.1997. Berkeley, CA.Zines N584e

Cover image used with permission.

Cupsize, #5 by Sasha Cagen and Tara Needham. New York, NY. 1996. Zines C75

Page image used with permission.

• Approximately one million zine topics not discussed in the five examples, including– fat empowerment– women's self-defense– sex work– teen rights– Palestine– radical mental health– personal issues

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Other women’s zine collections• Duke University:

Sallie Bingham Center for Women’sHistory and Culture

• London Metropolitan University: The Women’s Library

• Smith College: Sophia Smith Collection• Tulane University:

Newcomb College Center for Research on Women

Image from Sallie Bingham Center website

Archivists as activists• How do collections of radical materials come

to exist?• Archivists as creators/facilitators• Archivists making collections accessible

(archival research is hard!)• Administrators and grant writers finding us

the $

Contacts & credits• http://zines.barnard.edu• zines@barnard.edu• http://lowereastsidelibrarian.info/talks/2013/

bookart

• Barnard Zine Library banner section of Rock Out: Ideas on Booking DIY Shows zine cover. Used with permission.