Open Call No. 4: Relationships
To love and be loved
– On Ancestry, Chains of Thought, Affinities, Kinships, Camaraderie, Values
This call invites contributions that explore the frictions and synergies of belonging – belonging, no matter how enduring or how intensely. We aim to move beyond static identities and fixed categories, viewing relationships as active, ever-evolving processes, between solidifying and melting into air.
Relationships are not goods to be accumulated to assess our value in life, or to nest in the face of fabricated scarcity. We, therefore, plead for confrontation instead of ghosting: how can we otherwise dismantle the structures of class, race, and gender that are embedded in relationships without ruining dinner? What practices of kinship can help us imagine new ways of relating to each other beyond vertical hierarchies? Is friend-zoning simply another name for interdependency, as we have yet to learn the labor of compenetration? Are you lonely, or do you just want to be alone?
To close the year, we turn inward to examine the bonds that shape our lives and social worlds. Some connections may not survive times of upheaval, requiring us to form new ones, drawing on quantum physics, psychology, attachment theory, and affect theory all while delving into indigenous forms of relating and entangling.
Topics:
- Bumbling, Tindering, Swiping for Erotic Fiction:
- Exploring the commodification of love, desire, and relationships in the era of the extreme self and how it shapes our emotional lives.
- Intimacy, Human and Non-human:
- How intimacy is experienced in collective settings – whether in activism, solidarity movements, and/or community spaces.
- Romanticizing the System:
- Critiquing how capitalist and heteronormative structures have influenced romanticized notions of love, marriage, and family.
- Solidarity as Care:
- The practice of solidarity and mutual care looking at how relationships, whether romantic or platonic, can serve as sites of resistance.
- Political Love:
- How do love, affection, and emotional connections play out within political movements – when do love and politics intertwine?
- Normativity Bending Relationships:
- Exploring alternative relationship structures, from polyamory to non-romantic forms of affection and commitment, and how they resist conventional norms.
- Intergenerational Bonds, Family Trees:
- The bonds and connections across generations – how do different age groups relate to one another in times of crisis or resistance?
- Criminalized Solidarities and Fugitive Kinships:
- On tracing how relationships formed under conditions of state violence and surveillance defy legibility. Drawing from abolitionist and sanctuary movements to clandestine networks of care and protection.
Formats:
- Personal Letters or Chats:
- Intimate reflections on relationships, love, and solidarity through letters or personal journals.
- Essays or Memoirs:
- Analytical pieces and critical reflections explore the intersection of politics, love, and relationships in contemporary life.
- Poetry and Fiction:
- Creative submissions that explore the nuances of love and connection in unconventional or political contexts.
- Visual Contributions:
- Artworks that hold the complexities of relationships, whether in intimate or collective settings.