Well, decision time, I guess. Here’s the last long-form post I’m going to use this Tumblog for, unless something else unexpected happens.

I was mulling what to do for a good while, and I thought I kinda had an (unsatisfactory) answer of what my own role could be – until I read Boima’s article on DJ’s and genre collecting again, and suddenly felt that perhaps anything I could possibly do would largely be negative. Boimas argument contains several more components (including a marxist critique that doesn’t apply here), but it presents three distinct challenges to the Approaches (#1 #2 #3 #4): 

• They’re inherently Othering – even the most benevolent of attempts to bring up something that’s been hidden is going to necessarily treat that thing as being an object, and the very fact that it’s valuing the act of “bringing out” implies that the Other is “untouched” from before. Even if the language does not claim “virgin resources”, the act immanently contains the idea (!).

• That (and I think this is possibly the most salient point) exposing music styles unasked, as if putting them under a “Western” loupe, not only is a very questionable act of power but an exploitative transgression as well. “How does mainstream exposure benefit a community unless they have total control, and the means to collectively capitalize on that exposure?” writes Boima. He argues that a lot of the styles prosper precisely because they exist in a community-internal safe space, that then acts as the launching pad if they, themselves want to eventually reach out.

• And finally, in what perhaps constitutes the main argument of the article, he compares two different styles of DJ:ing. One, as exemplified by Diplo, consists of acting from above and bringing musics from other parts of the world into western dance music, integrating them as if they were part of an immigration policy. The other, as exemplified by Venus X, consists of standing in the middle of it all, participating in cultural connections, speaking to a vast array of different marginalised groups of people. And haven’t all the different Approaches ended up in the first category?

You can see why I’ve felt that this tumblog ought to be doomed. It can easily be construed as trying to “bring out”, it hasn’t asked anyone anything (although go ahead and ask me anything). And to a certain extent, it’s posited itself as an aloof authority. 

But then I’ve thought a lot about Boima’s last argument again, and just lately it’s had such a resonance with me.

Partly because it sits so squarely with the fascinating cultural theories of Édouard Glissant and Gloria Anzaldúa, who speak of the radical power of relinkings and the uncertainty of marginalised borders. 

And partly because I think it points to something very important abut the nature of Tumblr, too. That realisation came just this week, when I had a discussion with a friend who’d just recently joined the site. We were talking about patterns of gender on Tumblr, what women (who constitute the vast majority of users here) generally seem to do differently than men. Men, within our patriarchal power system, seem often to use Tumblr like a megaphone, picking a subject and then authoritatively pontificating on it. “I talk about Menswear!” or whatever. Competing, hipster-wise, dick-measuring for the best links, the most reblogs, the smartest individual pieces. 

Whereas women, we agreed, often acted in a much more communitarian manner – as I guess the gender role dictates. They reblogged, they posted without pronouncement, they strung together dialectic narratives together accross their different identities. Whatever status competition exists is of a different kind, less rhetorical. And I think the fascinating thing is that the way Tumblr is set up seems to favour this latter approach. Credit for reblogs is shared accross groups. You can effortlessly bring together ideas from vastly different sources, some you may not even know. Ideas are created together. Masses of text (like this one!) are discouraged in favour of meaning constituted though intertext and juxtaposition. A lot more, quite simply, how Venus X DJs, and a lot less how Diplo does it.

Could I do that? Could I be a “female”-style tumblogger? I’m certainly male, white and privileged. And I’ve spent the time so far thinking digging and discovery, but you know what? To a certain extent Tumblr has been nudging me elsewhere. Random people keep reblogging me, from Guam to Indonesia to San Francisco. Whether I want to or not, I get pulled into the communit/ies. So what the heck, I’m going to try. To be a part, a conduit, a corner, a participant, a fellow subject. 

How do I practically plan to achieve this?

• Much as it pains me I’m going to drop writing little witty appreciations of everything. It slips too easily into the wrong language.
• Trying to be aware of my privilege, I’m going to try to focus on those who build connections elsewhere, those who provide radical inspiration through the borders. Less scenes to be exposed, more connections across them and to other things.
• Connections between and across posts internal to the blog in more ways. Tumblogging as communicative mixtape.
• A more open general topic, an atmosphere to be shared rather than a group of individual taste-making recommendations. Maybe not even just videos.

So right. Last text post = this. Please do call me out (preferably here) if you think I’m doing it wrong, still.