super late introduction :)

hi, i’m jonathan. i’m from madison, wisconsin. i’m a junior at swarthmore college majoring in film and media studies and double minoring in asian studies and gender and sexuality studies. although a major-minor division marks the way my credits fell into place, i don’t consider any of these areas of study more or less important; i’m interested in the rich spaces of overlap between all these fields, and their relevance to one another. such diverse topics as “the” queer gaze(s), postcolonial cinemas in asia, and the ties between gendered subjectivity and technologies of perspective exemplify the abundant inquiries to be explored at the complex junctures of media, gender, and cultural history.

as far as opinions go, i’m coming from a strongly (if critically) third-wave feminist position informed by queer, trans, and postcolonial critiques. it should go without saying that the complexly-woven dominion of Western patriarchal global capitalism is my primary foe; however, i also make a conscious effort to critique and expose those facets of and trends within the feminist project which smuggle silent oppressions and marginalizations into their discourses of liberation.

at the moment i’m interested in the application of the deleuzean critique of subjectivity to feminist deconstructions of identity, and how such a critique might be formulated in the context of media/cinema.

i think this is going to be a wonderful class, and despite my late arrival, i am very happy and excited to be here!