New Monographs
Intimate Ephemera
Intimate Ephemera cover

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 book files are provided
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Intimate Ephemera is available as both an e-book (downloadable PDF files) or a d-book (print-on-demand). Both versions are available for online purchase at the MUP e-store.

Chapter Synopses

  

Introduction

Introduction to the personal zine as a site of autobiographical writing which offers unique insights into the lives and experiences of young people and an overview of the features of zines and zine culture in the Australian context.

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Chapter 1: Rethinking Resistance, Authenticity and Autobiography

This chapter situates existing scholarly work on zine culture, arguing that an emphasis on the political and subcultural formations informing their production has resulted in zine writing being read merely as evidence of such practices.

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Chapter 2: Zines Making Zinesters

Using theories of reader-response and auto/biography studies, this chapter examines how the narrative strategies of editorials and introductions to personal zines deploy the discourse of DIY to encourage the reader to become a zine maker, but also often foreground the anxiety felt by the zine-maker as they ‘go public with private stories’

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Chapter 3: Narrating and (Re)Figuring the Bedroom

 

Continuing an emphasis on close, situated reading of zine narratives, this chapter explores a variety of narrative strategies used to figure and present the bedroom.

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Chapter 4: Consuming Selves

Beginning with a discussion of the use of cut’n’paste collage, this chapter examines how personal zine-makers deploy collage and appropriation of commercial media to narrate and explore the highly personal desires and anxieties solicited by consumer capitalism.

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Chapter 5: ‘Singing Hollow Winds’: Narratives of Depression

A vast number of personal zines make reference to experiences of depression, and this chapter positions this predominance through an analysis of the unique reader-writer relations in performed zine culture, and by examining the narrative strategies used to present them.

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Chapter 6: Materialising Intimacy: Reading the Perzine as Autobiographical Object

Personal zines announce their status as handmade objects through a wide variety of means. This chapter considers some material strategies deployed in personal zines—the inclusion of original photographic prints, manipulation of scale and the use of a range of technologies, most notably the photocopier—in the production and distribution of life writing.

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Conclusion

This chapter discusses the different approaches taken to the process of moving narratives from handmade texts into professionally produced and standardized books, arguing that the very different approaches taken in each exemplify the diversity of writing and material practices in contemporary Australian zine culture.

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