Unbound: A Journal of Digital Scholarship
type: channel
description: Unbound: A Journal of Digital Scholarship is an open access, open peer-reviewed journal published by the Digital Cultural Studies Cooperative. Established 2019 ISSN 2687-9018 (online)
publisher: The Digital Cultural Studies Cooperative
language: en
publication name: Unbound: A Journal of Digital Scholarship
issn: 2687-9018
copyright: Unless otherwise specified by the author/s (because the work contains components to which the author/s do not hold copyright, e.g. licensed music/artwork), works are published using the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) license. Authors may also elect to license their works under more permissive terms at their discretion. Authors retain copyright and publishing rights of their work without restriction. We ask as a courtesy that republished works acknowledge Unbound as a previous venue of publication.
items: Front Matter and Table of Contents
items: Legacy Russell. Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto. Verso Books, 2020.
items: This is Fine
items: Personalizing Library Outreach with Google Scholar Alerts
items: Review: Desire After Dark
items: Space Cowboys and Alien Landscapes
items: Resisting Their Programming
items: Orders of Resistance
items: Containing the Canon
items: There is Power in the Past
items: Familiarity is the Path to the Dark Side
items: A Work-in-Progress: Behind the Silenced Gun Violence Series
items: Island of Migrants
items: Coding Apollo
items: A Case of Jekyll and Hub
items: Creating and Engaging a Sexuality and Gender Digital Collection
items: "Carrie Fisher Sent Me"
items: A Rogue By Any Other Name
items: "We're not marauders, we're allies"
items: The Power of Fan
items: “Enemies, but complicated enemies”
items: Realizing Resistance Through Scholarship and Beyond
items: Forced Creatures
items: "Rebellions are built on hope"
items: From Dark Helmet to Kylo Ren
items: Using the Force of Representation
items: Conference Abstracts
items: Syntonic Refuge
items: Buildings of Texas

Front Matter and Table of Contents
type: item
subject: Front Matter
  topic: section
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: i
ending page: ii

Legacy Russell. Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto. Verso Books, 2020.
type: item
subject: Reviews
  topic: section
creator: Sam Langsdale
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Sam Langsdale https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 46
ending page: 48
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.243

Front Matter and Table of Contents
type: item
subject: Front Matter
  topic: section
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 1
ending page: 3

This is Fine
type: item
subject: Front Matter
  topic: section
creator: Spencer Keralis
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Spencer Keralis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 4
ending page: 6
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.240

Personalizing Library Outreach with Google Scholar Alerts
type: item
description: This article describes an outreach initiative that uses Google Scholar Alerts to create a personal point of connection between the library liaison and departmental scholars that the liaison works with. The process of creating the program is discussed as well as a small assessment that was conducted about the efficacy of the program.
subject: Notes
  topic: section
subject: Outreach
  topic: keywords
subject: Google Scholar
  topic: keywords
subject: positive reinforcement
  topic: keywords
subject: academic libraries
  topic: keywords
subject: liaison
  topic: keywords
subject: subject librarians
  topic: keywords
creator: J. J. Pionke
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 J. J. Pionke https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 63
ending page: 68
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.241

Review: Desire After Dark
type: item
description: Review of Andrew J. Owens, Desire After Dark: Contemporary Queer Cultures and Occultly Marvelous Media.
subject: Reviews
  topic: section
creator: Cait Coker
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Cait Coker https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 69
ending page: 70
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.229

Space Cowboys and Alien Landscapes
type: item
description: As Star Wars women Rey, Jyn Erso, Ahsoka Tano, and others build on Leia’s legacy, it is also important to celebrate the mid-century science fiction writer who influenced Star Wars earlier on – Leigh Brackett, Queen of Space Opera. Brackett not only wrote the first draft of The Empire Strikes Back (1980) before her death, but she also influenced American film and sf in the decades before. She was an accomplished screenwriter when Lucas approached her for The Empire Strikes Back, having written Rio Bravo (1959) and co-written The Big Sleep (1946) with William Faulkner, for example. And her pulps and novels established her as an authority in the science fiction genre, as well. She was the first woman to be shortlisted for the Hugo Award for The Long Tomorrow (1955), a novel that denounces the toxic violence of militarized science and venerates resistance. Similarly, Brackett’s Shadow Over Mars (1944) condemns authoritarian exploitation and reveres rebellion. These familiar themes, of course, are also in The Empire Strikes Back. While some of her elements did not make it to the final film – the Luke-Leia-Han love triangle and Luke’s Jedi twin Nellith, for instance – her style of frontier anti-authoritarian Space Opera resistance comes through clearly. Resurrecting Brackett’s work on The Empire Strikes Back and analyzing the influence of her earlier work situates the Star Wars saga as a descendant of mid-century feminist sf as we simultaneously celebrate its more inclusive contemporary narratives.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Bridgitte Barclay
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Bridgitte Barclay https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 1
ending page: 5
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.220

Resisting Their Programming
type: item
description: Interrogating the biopolitical logics governing life in the Star Wars universe, I use The Clone Wars (2008-2014; 2020) to consider how the franchise challenges the devaluation of some lives while simultaneously marking others as disposable. The most explicit way The Clone Wars deals with questions of expendability is through the clones. Many clone-centric stories center on clones questioning their status as cannon fodder. Using the clones Cut Lawquane, 99, Gregor, and Fives, I argue that the show promotes the idea of resisting one’s biopolitical fate—but only within limited parameters. Some clones can rise above their status as replaceable bodies; others can’t. As only some clones are able to claim full rights to life, the show’s exploration of the ethical dilemmas of war becomes diluted by a continual devaluing of those lives that are hidden behind masks and designations rather than faces and names. To that end, I also examine how droids serve as counterparts to the clones: in a narrative universe where droids are often given personalities, some droids are valued as “living” beings while others can be killed without remorse. Yet, it isn’t a droid’s proximity to a human appearance that determines their status; rather, like the clones, it is the degree to which they have clearly distinguishable “human” identities. Thus, not only do both clones and droids serve as expendable weapons, but they also end up in the same unending state of exception that only a select few can ever escape.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Chera Kee
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Chera Kee https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 6
ending page: 13
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.219

Orders of Resistance
type: item
description: Despite narrative world-building that serves to exploit and expand “gaps and fissures in temporal continuity,” the Star Wars franchise features numerous instances of ‘galactic hauntology,’ wherein particular forms, objects, characters, themes, and other narratological elements occur and inevitably reoccur in a science fiction timeline spanning thousands of years. Entries in the original film trilogy (Episodes IV–VI), renowned for their performance of postmodern anachronism and Jameson’s nostalgia mode, rely on consistent and dominant motifs to ground the audience in a suspended, otherwise dehistoricised, spatio-temporal placement “a long time ago in a galaxy, far, far, away…” In the prequel and sequel trilogies (Episodes I–III; VII–IX), this effect is further complicated by a transition from postmodern Jamesonian ontology to a turn-of-the-millennium hauntology as diagnosed by Fisher through Derrida. This galactic hauntology grasps at spectral figures of the original trilogy’s canonical spatio-temporality in an attempt to mourn and move past the franchise’s recognition of its own lost futures. By interrogating the “persistences, repetitions, [and] prefigurations” of galactic hauntology, we argue that this iterative, cumulative, and self-referential effect produces a ‘force of recognition’ in the viewer, one that is ontologically distinct from postmodern modes of nostalgia, homage, and pastiche. Recognition of these galactic hauntological elements within a given film entry and the larger franchise generates orders of resistance within the text as a necessary condition for engaging with Star Wars as a multi-generational cultural phenomenon.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Owen Morawitz
creator: Nick van Buuren
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Owen Morawitz, Nick van Buuren https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 32
ending page: 39
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.218

Containing the Canon
type: item
description: Ever since Star Wars became a franchise -- immediately after the release of A New Hope - -there have been a wide variety of efforts to structure, explain, and systematize its ever-expanding narrative universe. Going under various names, including the "Extended Universe," the Star Wars franchise beyond the core films has always been somewhat contentious, both as markers of fan knowledge and as potential for nearly endless corporate profit. What was originally kept in a vast archive of narrative data at Lucasfilm led to a hierarchy of canons and canonicity, which was distributed back to fans via elaborate reference books and contained within Star Wars plots as holocrons kept as lore in Jedi and Sith temples. This paper examines the fate of that canonicity in the wake of the 2012 purchase of Lucasfilm by Disney, exploring how various aspects of these already commodified franchise elements have been contained and redeployed as Disney both continued the Skywalker saga of films and elaborated the Star Wars franchise in new ways.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Shawn Gilmore
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Shawn Gilmore https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 40
ending page: 45
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.217

There is Power in the Past
type: item
description: Heritage (and by extension, archaeology) is an important part of the Star Wars universe. Both the Jedi and the Sith share teachings revolving around sites and artifacts important to their heritage and identities, and archaeologists like Dr. Chelli Aphra have played important roles in the development and maintenance of such heritage. However, the politicization of sites and artifacts by many groups and individuals has also served as motivation behind significant schisms, battles, imperialism, and resistance. As professional archaeologists, we have become familiar with the ways these themes are also appearing within our real-world discipline. This paper will broadly examine the roles that archaeology and heritage play in the Star Wars universe. Using examples from both canon media and expanded universe (now referred to as Legends) lore, this paper will explore the ways in which political factions manipulate and weaponize heritage and archaeology to their benefit. These examples will then be discussed within real world contexts to illustrate how Star Wars is ultimately a perfect encapsulation of the political powers inherent in archaeology and heritage studies, and the resistance to the manipulation of these fields.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: Star Wars
  topic: keywords
subject: Heritage
  topic: keywords
subject: Archaeology
  topic: keywords
subject: Pseudoarchaeology
  topic: keywords
subject: Nationalism
  topic: keywords
subject: Alt-Right
  topic: keywords
creator: Stephanie Halmhofer
creator: Alex Fitzpatrick
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Stephanie Halmhofer, Alex Fitzpatrick https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 14
ending page: 23
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.216

Familiarity is the Path to the Dark Side
type: item
description: This paper considers depictions of politicians as servants of the Dark Side in political cartoons and political satire comic books from 2015-2020. Particular attention is given to images of Donald Trump as Darth Vader. The use of such pop culture references provides what Morris (1993) called “domestication” – the conversion of abstract ideas into concrete ones, unfamiliar people to familiar ones, and/or distant events to close ones. Guided by the interaction view of metaphor offered by the philosopher Max Black, this paper will discuss how different audiences may decode Dark Side allusions in political satire differently and, significantly, how the domestication of public figures like Donald Trump as Darth Vader and Darth Sidious may result in greater public acceptance of egregious political acts.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: satire
  topic: keywords
subject: political cartoons
  topic: keywords
subject: parody
  topic: keywords
subject: rhetoric
  topic: keywords
subject: metaphor
  topic: keywords
creator: Christina Knopf
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Christina Knopf https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-05-01
publication date: 2023-05-01
starting page: 24
ending page: 31
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v3i1.215

A Work-in-Progress: Behind the Silenced Gun Violence Series
type: item
description: My participation in the conference was a studio visit of sorts (my own version of Marcel Duchamp’s Boîte-en-valise— if you are familiar with that work— Atelier-en-valise. my studio in a suitcase). It is a peek into the development of a series in progress “Silenced” from 2018 onward. The series was inspired by a one-off installation I created for the 2013 Contain It! exhibit at the Dunedin Fine Art Center in Florida, Do You Know Where Your Guns Are? featuring “Missing Gun” posters based on reports of guns stolen from private homes and vehicles. I moved on to other projects, but the headlines kept coming. More mass shootings, more stolen guns, more incidents of domestic gun violence. “Community members shocked over rare murder-suicide.” “Domestic Shooting Leaves Woman Dead in Shreveport.” Headlines led me to statistical research in an attempt to gain insight into actual numbers of deaths and injuries, and what patterns emerge. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report one set of statistics and advocacy groups promoting or opposing gun control measures offer different sets, but few offer a comprehensive look beyond numbers. The non-profit Gun Violence Archive attempts to fill this void, collecting news and police reports in real time for free online public access. While the spreadsheets, charts, and maps are useful, it is the incident reports that provide the most detail with locations, participants, notes, and source links. For the Silenced: Records Series, I use the Gun Violence Archive information to create temporal data portraits in a series of mixed-media drawings. The Records Series are not just data visualization but also performative drawings—experiencing the loss and suffering in a ritualistic practice. In 2019, I returned to the headlines to dissect and interrogate how news media and government agencies tell the stories of gun-related domestic violence incidents. Silenced: Domestic Report (this is an isolated incident with no threat to the public)…
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Jennie Fleming
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Jennie Fleming https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 25
ending page: 33
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.120

Island of Migrants
type: item
description: Christmas Island is a tiny island in the Indian Ocean, a few hundred miles off the coast of Java. The island is small, with a population of less than 2000. Yet in spite of, or maybe because of, its isolation, the island is a site of incredible movement. Every wet season, millions of endemic red crabs descend from the jungles in what is one of the most spectacular animal migrations in the world. In October or November, the crabs begin a long journey from the jungles down to the coast to breed, continuing an annual life cycle. The crab migration intersects the island’s main roads and has resulted in a series of inventive tunnels, bridges, and fences which both protect the crabs from traffic and draw tourists from around the world.[1] Another important population crosses Christmas Island on its migration journey, with considerably less luck. In 2007, construction was completed on an Immigration Reception and Processing Centre to temporarily detain asylum seekers from neighboring islands. In response to the 2001 Pacific Solution in which “4000 islands were excised from Australia’s migration zone,” Christmas Island became a temporary holding center for boat-bound asylum seekers from Indonesia, eventually transitioning to becoming an isolated site for long-term detention.[2] The center on Christmas Island is one of the largest in Australia’s onshore detention center network, which continues to operate today. For both animal and human populations, Christmas Island is the site of incredible movement. However, these two migrating populations are governed in very different ways. “Island of Migrants”[3] is a 19-minute podcast episode that examines the ways in which red crab migration and asylum seeker migration are treated differently despite their close physical proximity on the island, and what this difference in their treatment reflects about who is considered worthy of protection. The podcast is a result of both anthropological and journalistic methods as well as a 2-month…
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Stephanie Niu
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Stephanie Niu https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 56
ending page: 62
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.104

Coding Apollo
type: item
description: An evocative image of Margaret Hamilton was the impetus: foregrounding the leader of a team that wrote the code; highlighting the connection between labor and the journey to the moon; a visualization of the product of labor that made that journey possible. This project connects the code and planning documents that animated the Apollo mission to audio and video of the event, creating a unique time-based public interactive installation. It questions the distinction between “software” and “hardware”, asserting the mutual and inextricable entanglement between the two factors. It highlights the industrial efforts and scientific techniques required to produce a single event. It produces an experience of infrastructural intelligibility, highlighting the connections amongst diverse elements required to bring the experience of the lunar landing to fruition.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: infrastructural intelligibility
  topic: keywords
subject: algorithmic cinema
  topic: keywords
subject: apollo program
  topic: keywords
subject: software studies
  topic: keywords
subject: public interactives
  topic: keywords
subject: expanded cinema
  topic: keywords
subject: multichannel video
  topic: keywords
subject: found footage
  topic: keywords
creator: Sean Landers
creator: Murilo Paiva Homsi
creator: Leticia Ferreira
creator: Beth Hinners
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Sean Landers, Murilo Paiva Homsi, Leticia Ferreira, Beth Hinners https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 37
ending page: 39
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.121

A Case of Jekyll and Hub
type: item
description: This is a story about a staff member, a librarian-mentor, and a failure-turned success. It is a story about a learning process to pick the right digital tool during a short affair with digital humanities. In the effort to create a digital annoated bibliography, the librarian-staff collaborators decided to experiment with GitHub and Jekyll, two systems that they were both unfamilar with. The presentation focused on the challenges faced by the collaborators, the lesson they learned, and how the managed to finish the project in a short period of time with the intention to coummincate the importance of sharing failures as well as success at conferences. This script was presented at Digtial Fronties 2019 Conference at the University of Texas at Austin in Austin, TX on September 27, 2019. The original title of this presentation was “GitAnnotated: Creating a Digital Annotated Bibliography on GitHub.”
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: GitHub
  topic: keywords
subject: Jekyll
  topic: keywords
creator: Brea Henson
creator: Pamela Andrews
rights: Copyright (c) 2021 Brea, Pamela Andrews https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 50
ending page: 55
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.87

Creating and Engaging a Sexuality and Gender Digital Collection
type: item
description: As a queer early career librarian, coming into the digital collections space at Grand Valley State University (GVSU) and not being able to see a very important part of myself reflected within the digital collection spurred me to think about ways in which I could make people like me more visible within it. Thus, for one of my early projects as the new Digital Scholarship Librarian at GVSU, I digitized the event archives from the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies department, the Milton E. Ford LGBT Resource Center, and the Gayle R. Davis Center for Women and Gender Equity. With this material I planned to create a sexuality and gender digital collection, with multiple objectives: to include a queer perspective within the digital collections, to raise awareness of what these physical places offer students within the digital space, and to allow easier access to the archives with the hopes of attracting people who may not have been looking specifically at what physical archives have to offer. I want the digital to break through to the physical and encourage people to go to the events and classes offered by the centers and the department. I also want to encourage students as well as people outside of academia to develop an interest working with archives in different ways. There is a need for more varied voices within the library profession as a whole, and increasing access to archival material can create interest for more LGBTQ+ people to professionally work in libraries. This project is one way I hope to spark interest in future librarians and archivists. The poster will outline the overall process this project took, and highlight the challenges and the lessons learned. Attendees will walk away with tools to start their own conversations and create digital collections alongside different departments, learn the benefits and drawbacks of working with different departments in an archival project which makes underrepresented communities more visible, and take a closer look…
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: digital collections
  topic: keywords
subject: archives
  topic: keywords
subject: digital curation
  topic: keywords
subject: LGBT
  topic: keywords
creator: Melina Zavala
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Melina Zavala https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 42
ending page: 44
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.118

"Carrie Fisher Sent Me"
type: item
description: No abstract
subject: Articles
  topic: section
subject: Star Wars
  topic: keywords
subject: Resistance
  topic: keywords
subject: Women's March
  topic: keywords
creator: Christina M. Knopf
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Christina M. Knopf
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.103

A Rogue By Any Other Name
type: item
description: No abstract
subject: Articles
  topic: section
creator: John Edward Martin
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 John Edward Martin
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.105

"We're not marauders, we're allies"
type: item
description: No abstract.
subject: Articles
  topic: section
subject: Star Wars
  topic: keywords
subject: Feminism
  topic: keywords
subject: Intersectionality
  topic: keywords
creator: Samantha Langsdale
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Samantha Langsdale
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.98

The Power of Fan
type: item
description: The latest Star Wars film, The Last Jedi (2017), unflinchingly embraces tragedy and the nobility of failure – themes and values that resonate with traditional East Asian thought, especially Daoism. This is what makes it, along with The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), among the most spiritually mature and philosophically consistent chapters of the series. These films celebrate the (not unlimited) power of the feminine, the hidden, the receptive, and the organic — in a word, what traditional East Asian thought names as y?n ? — in ways that help the warmed-over cafeteria Zen Buddhism/Daoism that is George Lucas’ Jedi mumbo-jumbo to actually hold together and work to provide a meaningful worldview. If these movies work as art — as opposed to fun action fantasy or fanboy service — then they do so as y?n tragedies. If their protagonists function as authentic heroes – as opposed to adolescent wish-fulfillment or mere signifiers of hegemonic power – then they do so with y?n nobility. That is, they acknowledge and embrace the realities of weakness, obscurity, vulnerability, and fragility in order to discover and develop the virtues of adaptability, resilience, transformation, and growth. The Daoist concept of f?n ? – which combines the meanings of “reversal,” “rebellion,” and “return” – not only helps explain the power of the best Star Wars films, but also explains why some audience members have reacted so negatively and violently to the evolving saga.
subject: Articles
  topic: section
subject: daoism
  topic: keywords
subject: taoism
  topic: keywords
subject: daoist
  topic: keywords
subject: taoist
  topic: keywords
subject: star wars
  topic: keywords
subject: feminism
  topic: keywords
subject: gender
  topic: keywords
subject: yinyang
  topic: keywords
subject: thelastjedi
  topic: keywords
subject: theforceawakens
  topic: keywords
subject: rogueone
  topic: keywords
subject: theempirestrikesback
  topic: keywords
subject: chinesephilosophy
  topic: keywords
subject: orientalism
  topic: keywords
subject: toxicmasculinity
  topic: keywords
creator: Jeffrey Richey
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Jeffrey Richey
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.59

“Enemies, but complicated enemies”
type: item
description: The Last Jedi has been criticised by some feminist fans for Rey and Kylo Ren’s storyline. Through Rey, the film asks us to sympathize with Kylo, and some fans argue that the film is telling us to excuse Kylo’s actions, in the same way we are told domestic abusers and mass shooters are actually good people. If The Last Jedi tells us to have the same response to a fictionalized neo-Nazi, it perpetuates real harms. However, The Last Jedi is actually critical of this phenomenon. It’s true that we are often asked to sympathize with young, violent white men, but what we are really being told is that being sympathetic excuses wrongdoing. The Last Jedi, by contrast, fleshes out Kylo Ren’s sympathetic character, but refuses to excuse his actions because of these qualities. In this paper, I track Rey and Kylo’s relationship, looking at how Kylo is an unreliable narrator, how Rey responds to what she learns from Kylo and Luke, and how the lessons Rey learns parallel the lessons learned by the other protagonists. Like The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi positions Kylo as being like violent men in real life. Rey’s response to him is important, therefore, because she is teaching young women how to respond to their friends, family, or boyfriends. Like them, Kylo Ren may have good qualities, but he shows no signs of moral improvement. Rey may affirm Kylo Ren’s humanity, but she does not fail to see him as an enemy to be fought.
subject: Articles
  topic: section
creator: Matthew Hoffman
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Matthew Hoffman
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.60

Realizing Resistance Through Scholarship and Beyond
type: item
description: No abstract.
subject: Editorials
  topic: section
creator: Samantha Langsdale
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Samantha Langsdale
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.99

Forced Creatures
type: item
description: Non-sentient animals have appeared in the Star Wars universe in roles both integral and decorative since A New Hope premiered in 1977. From beasts of burden like the dewbacks and banthas of Tatooine and the Gungans’ kaadu, to monsters like the wampa, rathtar, and dianoga; to the myriad of critters large and small that inhabit interstellar environments, animals are as much a part of the fabric of the Star Wars tapestry as the various non-human sentient species. In some cases, these creatures are mainly exotic window dressing, but in other instances, these animals are used instrumentally to advance larger narratives. To frame my examination of the use of animals in Star Wars, I borrow performance studies scholar Una Chaudhuri’s useful neologism “zooësis.” Coined by Chaudhuri to articulate “the way culture makes art and meaning with the figure and body of the animal,” encompasses the feelings that animals inspire, and so the affect of animals is an important part of understanding the place of the animal in the Star Wars universe (1). Ezra Bridger’s interaction with animals to explore the Force and to aid the Rebellion in Star Wars Rebels offers one example of how animals are instrumentalized, and Ezra’s affective response to “the figure and body” of these creatures – affection, awe, revulsion, or horror – are fairly straightforward. But the lowly porg from The Last Jedi inspires different feelings: the complex affect of cuteness, combined with the desire to consume and devour the bodies of these animals. In what follows I invite my reader to consider the use of animals in Star Wars, and to question how agency is granted and denied to non-human animals in these narratives.
subject: Articles
  topic: section
subject: Star Wars Rebels
  topic: keywords
subject: Critical Animal Studies
  topic: keywords
subject: Star Wars: The Last Jedi
  topic: keywords
creator: Spencer Keralis
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Spencer Keralis
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.100

"Rebellions are built on hope"
type: item
description: No abstract
subject: Articles
  topic: section
creator: Bridgitte Barclay
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Bridgitte Barclay
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.106

From Dark Helmet to Kylo Ren
type: item
description: This essay examines the culture circulating around late twentieth century and early twenty-first century media franchising with special emphasis on the Star Wars film canon. It charts the emergence of fan studies as one way in which scholars may assess, investigate, and theorize about audience responses to film franchises like Star Wars. It places special emphasis on anti-fan behaviors, introducing the dualistic terms fascistic fandom and franchise fascism as ways to denote the increased intensity of industry practices and fan resistance. Ultimately, I contend that parodic entertainments like Mel Brooks's satirical sci-fi features Spaceballs use the lens of comedy to accurately predict the zealous movement of large Hollywood studios toward a franchise-based distribution model. Furthermore, Disney's acquisition and subsequent mass distribution of Star Wars as an inclusive and ongoing transmedia global franchise presents a twenty-first century case study in understanding franchise fascism as an important primer to anti-fan behaviors.
subject: Articles
  topic: section
creator: Garret Castleberry
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Garret Castleberry
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.107

Using the Force of Representation
type: item
description: This paper explores how the most recent Star Wars films released after Disney's acquisition of Lucasfilm, Episode VII: The Force Awakens and Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, serve as a fertile discursive space for the growing anxieties over the rise of the white nationalist movement in the United States over the last decade. Unlike previous Star Wars trilogies, Episodes VII and VIII foreground the "Other" in juxtaposition to the whiteness that the Empire and First Order represent both figuratively and literally. By incorporating a more diverse array of characters, such as people of color, women, and immigrants, the Resistance is juxtaposed against the mostly white, mostly male First Order in these films. This has led to the First Order being read by many as a symbol of the white nationalism movement, as it strives to maintain its own perceived superiority over the resistance of "Others."
subject: Articles
  topic: section
subject: Exceptionalism
  topic: keywords
subject: White nationalism
  topic: keywords
subject: Chosen one
  topic: keywords
subject: Neo-nationalism
  topic: keywords
subject: Alt-right
  topic: keywords
subject: Representation
  topic: keywords
subject: Other
  topic: keywords
subject: Whiteness
  topic: keywords
creator: Casey Walker
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Casey Walker
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.57

Conference Abstracts
type: item
description: Abstracts in PDF.
subject: Abstracts
  topic: section
creator: Realizing Resistance: A Star Wars Conference
rights: Copyright (c) 2019 Realizing Resistance: A Star Wars Conference
date: 2019-12-18
publication date: 2019-12-18
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v1i1.108

Syntonic Refuge
type: item
description: In community, people find and offer refuge by coming together in common practices such as hugging and holding hands. The space between our bodies co-regulates our embodied reactions, thus cultivating a sense of peace amid stress or fear. People are syntonic, harmoniously responsive to the changing needs of the situation. Through close human interaction, Syntonic Refuge discloses the heartbeats of two people who wrap themselves in the embrace of a shawl, which represents both care of the individual, and a shelter for shared experiences. Syntonic Refuge is a social engagement that explores the importance of refuge for survivors and the act of surviving. Syntonic Refuge discloses ways that bodies harmonize with the environment and co-regulate heartbeats. While we are ideologically aligned with the insurrectionary language of the call, “Tear Down the Walls,” our project is a quiet meditation on connections between survivors and the refuge we can create between our bodies in the aftermath of division or trauma. As barriers divide people, this project requires collaboration . The shawl is a bridge for bodies negotiating space. Syntonic Refuge asks participants to come closer. Consider our common experience of survivorship, especially when we are remembering, and continue to witness, the enormity of human suffering through global atrocities, and share refuge in the heart.
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
subject: art
  topic: keywords
subject: engagement
  topic: keywords
subject: wearables
  topic: keywords
subject: textiles
  topic: keywords
subject: LED
  topic: keywords
subject: sensor
  topic: keywords
subject: refuge
  topic: keywords
creator: xtine burrough
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 LabSynthE https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 34
ending page: 36
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.96

Buildings of Texas
type: item
description: This note describes an ongoing project at the University of Texas Libraries (UTL) that is transforming the way we think about place, people, and events in managing archival collections. This project was developed around a dataset donated by architectural historians, Gerald Moorhead and Mario Sánchez to the Alexander Architectural Archives. This dataset was collected by a team of researchers studying architecturally significant buildings for the two-volume publication, Buildings of Texas. Our team at UT Libraries has used it as a test-bed for geolocating built works in Texas and mapping our Architectural collections. This dataset presented a clear opportunity to develop map-based digital exhibitions and finding aids for archival material, but also posed several challenges due to naming ambiguities, vague building location descriptions, and repeated references to people and architectural firms that were difficult to disambiguate and interconnect. In an attempt to overcome these challenges and develop a set of methods for dealing with similar and related collections, our cross-disciplinary team is evaluating ways to develop a flat spreadsheet into a collection of inter-related datasets. Our goal was a system that could be managed more flexibly, be easily represented through spatial and non-spatial visualizations, and—crucially—contain references to concepts and typologies defined in widely-used ontologies. We have also sought ways to contribute our data as a local authority to both the Getty vocabularies and Wikidata, as a means to broaden representation and allow for multivocality and multiplicity. We have found unique advantages to a team-approach to the cleaning and data normalization process that transformed a single spreadsheet into a graph database. Our experimentation in this process has facilitated our own visualization of the connections between places, people, and events and, in turn, has informed the way we will present this material in our online exhibition…
subject: Proceedings
  topic: section
creator: Michael Shensky
creator: Katie Pierce Meyer
creator: Josh Conrad
creator: Jessica Trelogan
rights: Copyright (c) 2023 Michael Shensky, Katie Pierce Meyer, Josh Conrad, Jessica Trelogan https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0
date: 2023-03-20
publication date: 2023-03-20
starting page: 45
ending page: 49
doi: 10.12794/journals.ujds.v2i1.95