No Gender: Reflections on the Life \u0026 Work of kari edwards by Julian Talamantez Brolaski


No Gender: Reflections on the Life \u0026 Work of kari edwards
Title : No Gender: Reflections on the Life \u0026 Work of kari edwards
Author :
Rating :
ISBN : 0981931014
ISBN-10 : 9780981931012
Language : English
Format Type : Paperback
Number of Pages : 208
Publication : First published January 1, 2009

"kari's authorial 'signature' undoes the authorial body in favor of a visible obfuscation-strikethru: kari never just signed, but rather crossed out hir name and wrote 'NO GENDER.' The erasure--well no, the palimpsestic remaking of the name into a symbol for the dismantling of enforced gender codes is a profound and provocative gesture--the name is still visible behind the NO GENDER, as if behind bars ... kari's genius moved others to their own words, art, action--following a mandate of reclaiming the very words we speak and write--writing our selves, our other(ed) bodies, into a foundational post-gender post-genre state. This book is the start of what hopefully will be a much longer conversation."--from the introduction by Julian T. Brolaski & erica kaufman.

No Gender: Reflections on the Life \u0026 Work of kari edwards Reviews

  • Justin Goodman

    Something of a Greek chorus where the individuals artists peer out from behind the masks of lamentation to celebrate, in the avant-garde spirit of kari edwards' life and legacy, the act of dis-identifying with culture. The seeming contradiction of "dis-" "with" is the sum of the struggle, as the editor's note reflects: "to literally not be recognized by the state, to be a body unclassifiable, a place where no thing in the mainstream discourse can stand in for on." This is a pitch perfect note for contextualizing this life & legacy. also note how the editor's note is in the singular, despite this book having three editors.

    Swirling around in this book is the futurity-oriented politics that seems to be central to edwards own writing, where the individual embodies an absolute refusal to be subjected - to be controlled, to be made a subject. This is seen in edwards'
    dôNrm’-lä-püsl: from the Joan of Arc project, where the Joan-of-Arc-like protagonist says "it wasn’t me, it was my voice, it was me, it was my voice, it was the voice that was me that had come to me to let me know time was critical." It's a recommended read. But this refusal is better summed up in the very refusal from which this book gets its name.

    When signing hir name, what she'd leave behind: kari edwards NO GENDER

  • C.A.

    I'm NOT just saying this because I'm in this book, it's marvelous! Poems, essays on kari and gender and on teaching kari, close readings of kari's work: this is a study of resistance to cultural dictates, a real live struggling, wriggling atmosphere takes shape while you read this history we cannot live without!

    The (Soma)tic Poetry Exercise that I created to write my piece included in the book can be found here:
    http://somaticpoetryexercises.blogspo...

    CAConrad

    http://CAConrad.blogspot.com







  • David Wolach

    tidbit review on my blog--stunning book, intimate yet unsentimentally so: intimately informed & a also primer for anyone interested in edwards' work - activism AND poetry-art (how even to separate these things--"there is an autopsy mortgage on demarcations," as edwards writes in Iduna.