The construction of “confessional” spaces needs to be a reconfigured landscape in hopes to develop new vocabulary around the visibility held by queer and trans. From this point on I will refer to this form as an autobiographical space. The representation of the spectrum of gender is minimal to non-existent in media- YouTube is a medium that allows this expanse to be held. These videos are a movement in the documentation of the transgender context through this gender revolution. It is important to demonstrate this as a form of activism that is needed to bring awareness to trans issues.
The subject position is a destabilized one as it is the perspective of viewing the other. Allen Feldman discussed in his lecture at CalArts how we are trained as people to disembody ourselves theoretically and analytically-, which creates a tension between our own perspectives of self and the other. How do we begin to understand this? I believe that we are not getting any closer to this reconnection by creating autobiographical/therapeutic videos on a public website. The understanding of hyper- individualism that is constantly recreated through the use of YouTube, by identifying oneself in reflection of the other, begins to erase the auto understanding of self-identification. Do these spaces create a visibility for critical discourse to then be made in progress to the political movement? Or rather make this THE political movement?
FTM Fuck Fest And Developmental Emotional Complexity is the beginning to a documentary that structures the autobiographical spaces that female-to-male transsexuals hold on a web based video site. I have begun to create a narrative of these autobiographical spaces by weeding through many and editing each one to the exact line(s) that tell the story/facts I am developing. When one types in “FTM passing” on YouTube and retrieves hundreds of videos of ftm’s discussing passing and what that experience has been like for them, a narrative is created about that topic. I am structuring these categories (ftm passing, ftm pumping, ftm girlfriends, ftm body transition, ftm emotional transition, etc.) into chapters that are illustrated through these video clips of dialogue- in hopes to create conversation outside the space within which these videos originally exist. On a much bigger level this piece is a new media study that is being channeled through the research of ftm trans spaces. Improving upon this medium allows otherwise marginalized communities to have dialogue.
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