Notes
Art by Paperhand artists.
Current life goals: 1. Finish this gd comps chapter 2. Catch up on @_alexrowland’s & @MaryRobinette’s novels. (Sff authors with knowledge of historical fashion just make me happy, ‘kay?)
I love this. My friend Alana & I used to hear some Eisley lyrics as “rose-and-mermaid-entwined shrubbery” and it felt so magical. The real lyrics are “rows of mermaid-entwined shrubbery.” Still magical, but less so.
Another misheard Eisley lyric: I thought it was “Ca-Ca-Ca-Cassandra you’ve grown up really crazy. Have I been too denying of you?” which as a Classicist, felt perfect, but it’s actually “Golly, Sandra.” Less fitting.
I haven’t listened, only skimmed the transcript, but @flourish & @elizabethminkel point out that public humanities & social sciences are behind natural sciences when it comes to science communication & hi, I’m Kimberly & if you want to hire someone to fix this, I’m interested.
[This note led to a really rich discussion on Twitter that I’m hoping will be successfully backfed into the comments here, so please be sure to take a look at the comments! I’m also working on collecting links directly to all the different offshoots on Twitter and will post those here when I can.]
Two dissertation-related things I’ve been working on simultaneously: my final chapter of comps, which I’m writing about affinity space ethnography/connective ethnography, and engaging more systematically with cosplayers. I went to Greensboro Comicon this weekend and actually interacted with cosplayers a little more than I have in the past, and now I’m exploring all the different ways cosplayers find each other.
(I’ve been a casual/closet cosplayer for many years, but never really connected with other cosplayers before.)
When I started my comps I wasn’t sure what data sources I would use to explore how cosplayers exhibit collective intelligence online, but now I’m realizing that Twitch & Discord may be where it’s at. As far as online research goes I think looking at those is fairly cutting edge stuff, and I think they’re great examples of what Lammers, Curwood, and Magnifico talk about when they say that researchers need to engage on multiple platforms if they’re going to understand the way practices move across an affinity space.
My brain’s awhirl with questions about the ethics of research on Twitch and Discord, now. Also, I’m feeling a bit reinvigorated with respect to my work, and that’s great.
The scholarly endeavor is an inherently creative endeavor. And I’m going to explore the relationship between creativity and scholarship more on my blog moving forward. Stay tuned.
The kid just told me he wants his third birthday party to have a Buffy theme, so I guess I’ve achieved all my parenting goals?
A conversation with @marijel_melo confirmed a suspicion I had that to a non-cosplayer, saying you were a “closet cosplayer” sounded like you were saying you were a cosplayer on the DL, “in the closet” about your cosplaying, as it were.
Closet cosplay is, rather, a term of art referring to “using what you have from your closet, with maybe a couple cheap store-bought items put together” according to Asta Young in this PopSugar piece. I use it to mean that I’m wearing things that weren’t built explicitly for cosplay, like the Coldwater Creek dress I used for River tam, the thrifted top I used to be Mrs. Lovett, the Old Navy dress I used to be the Fruity Oaty Bar Octopus Lady, the LL Bean pajamas I used to be Jess Day, or the Victorian Gothic getup from Retroscope Fashions (RIP but still on Etsy I guess?) that, yes, I just had hanging in my closet, and also used to be Shojo Loki.
I’m still working out what cosplay-related content will go here at kimberlyhirsh.com vs what belongs to Luna Wednesday, obviously.
So, um, I have a not-remotely-secret cosplay alias now…
Fell down a @tiktok_us cosplay hole thanks to @BrichibiTweets sharing this Ursula video from @MidnightPursona & may never return. IT’S RESEARCH, Y’ALL.
See this is what you miss when you don’t follow me on tiktok: pic.twitter.com/0wJRMYAHV2
— MidnitePur ? Sabakon (@MidnightPursona) August 25, 2019
Is metascholarship a thing? Like, a field of study? Sometimes (often) I find myself more interested in research design and writing processes than in, y’know, research itself.
I can cook all manner of foods, fashion clothing from yarn or fabric and thread, build furniture, and make props, but I can’t for the life of me make anything recognizable using a 3Doodler.
I ran across Dr. Naomi Civins’s dissertation while citation chaining works about connective ethnography, via Google Scholar. I read the title and thought, “Wait, that’s me! I’m a Domain Grrl!” Then I checked the text for a definition to be sure:
“Domain Grrls were girls who created personal homepages during the late 1990s and early 2000s and built meaningful social relationships in the process.”
Yes, that’s me!
Based on some quick research, Dr. Civins’s coined term “Domain Grrl” hasn’t had broad reach, which kind of makes sense because Domain Grrls aren’t really a thing anymore and she didn’t coin it until 2016. But I’m excited to read her dissertation later.
Hormones have got my brain going “Understanding cyberethnographic redefinitions of traditional ethnographic methodological concerns? NOT TODAY, KIMBERLY!” So it’s a citation-chaining kinda day, I guess.
My kid loves to know who’s singing the music we’re listening to so this morning when he asked who sings “Everything Is Awesome!” I told him @teganandsara and @thelonelyisland. He asked, “Is The Lonely Island lonely?” and I said, “I don’t think so, because it’s three friends.” Then he said, “What do they do?” and I tried to explain fake emcees to my toddler.
Kid at library (playing at train table): It’s Utopia! It’s disaster!
Librarian: But utopia is a good thing!
Kid: No it’s not! It’s evil!
Me: is impressed by kid’s perceptiveness
The longer I live, the more I begin to believe that My Actual People are only a very small subset of any apparent group of My People.
Skimming the headlines for The Ringer’s ‘99 Music Week really brings home for me the fact that I spent most of 1999 listening to movie and Broadway soundtracks that originated from 1986 - 1991. (Honorable mention to Dido’s “No Angel,” though.)
