The Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies

The Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies issue #2 — “Mediations” finally arrived in the mail the other day (a bit late for Fall 2002, but these things happen). It includes the START HERE> project that I curated along with Joe Tabbi, Michelle Citron, Niki Nolin, Rob Wittig, Andrew Stern, and Kurt Heintz. The issue itself has a good variety of material, including an interview with Kate Hayles, and essays by Shelley Jackson, Michael Joyce, Mark Poster and others. Worth the $10 cover price. Subscription information is available online.

The editor's announcement:

This special issue of the Iowa Journal of Cultural Studies focuses on the effects of media technologies from the typewriter and the photograph to hypertext and the World Wide Web, and it offers a wide variety of approaches to understanding the ways in which texts are influenced by the material conditions of their production and distribution.  Contributors include prominent cultural critics, such as N. Katherine Hayles, Mark Poster, and Lisa Nakamura, as well as a variety of writers, filmmakers, and computer programmers.  A large section of this issue is devoted specifically to the history and future of electronic writing, including contributions from two of the most well-known hypertext writers, Michael Joyce and Shelley Jackson, who take a retrospective look at their careers and address some of the fears and anxieties that critics have voiced concerning hypertext.  This section also includes excerpts from the “START HERE>” project, a gallery of new electronic writing produced for the Version>02 Festival in April 2002 at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.

It's kind of strange thinking that the MCA show was only 15 months back. In some ways, it feels like a lifetime ago.