Celebrate zines.
Happy Wednesday, and welcome back! Today we're looking at the original newsletters as part of Ida's ongoing series of investing in new media. If you subscribed to 28 Days of Black History, you may have read the history of the Negro History Bulletin, which served a similar purpose decades ago.
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Nicole
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TAKE ACTION
Support the work of BIPOC zinesters by donating to community projects like POC Zine Project and Brown & Proud Press.
Check out the zines featured in the electronic archives of the Barnard Zine Library and the Sherwood Forest Zine Library. Read through some that speak to you. If the zine’s author(s) have an online presence, write to them to thank them for their work.
Make your own zine about something that you are passionate about and share it with your community.
Check out your local bookstore’s zine collection & buy a zine to support the bookstore and the zine’s author(s)! (Women & Children First in Chicago, IL and Trident Booksellers & Cafe in Boston, MA are only two of many indie bookstores that sell amazing, self-published zines!)
GET EDUCATED
By Ida Yalzadeh (she/her)
In a previous newsletter, I wrote about the pros and cons of using new media as a way to imagine and organize around collective change and liberation. Despite the fast and global reach of these digital tools, there is also something to be said about distributing knowledge through a more low-tech option: the zine.
Zines (pronounced “zeen,” like “magazine”) are low-budget, independently produced publications, often made up of sheets of paper xeroxed, folded, and stapled together. Their content can encompass anything from fiction and poetry to art, photography, personal narratives, interviews, how-to guides, manifestos, and so much more. These publications have a small distribution run due to their DIY nature, usually not going outside of the authors’ own networks. Most importantly, zines have a tradition of operating outside of mainstream publication channels, and by doing so, creating tight-knit communities among its readers (Barnard College).
This practice of zine-making began with science fiction magazine readers who created their own self-published fanzines from mimeographs (The Creative Independent). In the 1970s, the tradition of the DIY spirit picked up; zines were used in the punk scene to promote underground bands(The Public). In the 1980s and 1990s, zines would again be central to the Queercore and Riot Grrrl movements. These “zinesters”—producers and/or readers of zines—wrote about their personal experiences with gender formation and sexual identity, and distributed their work to other fellow zinesters who also were thinking about the same questions (From Codex to Hypertext).
In addition to these uses, zines have a long history in political movements and activism, both within and outside of the United States. Zines’ low barriers to entry—publishing and distributing a publication only requires office supplies and a copy machine—contributed to their popularity. Zines allowed people without much power or capital to distribute information about U.S. systems of imperial oppression and domestic racial discrimination, as well as how these marginalized communities were resisting such systems.
Particularly in the mid-twentieth century United States, during the Civil Rights and Third Worldist movements, communities fighting for social change would use zines to distribute information about their anti-imperial and cross-coalitional work (Third World Studies). La Raza, a bilingual publication that ran from the late 1960s to the late 1970s, emerged out of Los Angeles’ Chicano movement and was critical to the wider recognition of the Chicano struggle for social justice at the time (Autry Museum of the American West). During the same period, from 1969 to 1974, Asian American students at UCLA wrote and produced the monthly zine, Gidra, which became known to many as the “voice of the Asian American movement” (Densho).
Bearing in mind these broader purposes of social justice and political change, many of today’s zine collectives honor the traditions of previous zine movements in their own publications and collection practices. Fifty years after its initial publication, Asian American and Mixed Asian students from UCLA and USC came together to restart the work of Gidra’s first iteration and translate its purpose to the twenty-first century (Gidra Media). POC Zine Project is only one example of a number of online venues that have been working toward collecting, archiving, and distributing zines for other like-minded individuals to find. Collectives such as the Queer Zine Archive Project and Printed Matter, Inc. are also doing the work of amplifying publications that speak to marginalized perspectives. Moreover, these digital spaces have created communities for zinesters to gather and read work with similar political and intellectual projects to their own.
While zines may not have the same potential of going viral as a social media or blog post, their ability to form tightly networked collectives and communities are historically embedded within their primary purpose. The zines’ low barriers to entry, moreover, allows for information to be produced and distributed without the need for mainstream approval. By forging strong community networks and giving greater informational access to marginalized folks, zines continue to be an option for slow-form communication among advocates and activists for political and social change.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Zines have a tradition of operating outside of mainstream publication channels, and in doing so, forge closely networked communities with those who find connection with its contents.
During the Civil Rights and Third Worldist movements of the mid-twentieth century, zines’ low barriers to entry contributed to their popularity for distributing information about U.S. systems of imperial oppression and domestic racial discrimination, as well as how these marginalized communities were resisting such systems.
Many of today’s zine collectives honor the traditions of previous zine movements in their own publications and collection practices.
RELATED ISSUES
1/21/2021 | Invest in new media.
6/15/2020 | Diversify your media consumption.
8/3/2020 | Stay awake.
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