Liz Henry : MyBlogHer Profile

Contact: lizhenry@gmail.com

I'm a writer, literary translator, and long-time computer geek. I'll be writing here to give BlogHer readers an idea of what's happening in the women's blogosphere around the world; to cover technology events in relation to women in tech; and to highlight interesting bloggers in our publishing network.

Badgermama is my personal and mommyblog, where I often talk about being an "alternative parent". I blog on feminism, literature, and computer/internet stuff at Composite, and on the group blog at Feminist Science Fiction. You can buy my latest book, The WisCon Chronicles: Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction, from Aqueduct Press.  Some of my other published writing and translations are available in free downloads from bookmaniac.org.

You can contact me at: liz@bookmaniac.net .

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Two quotes from "New World Border" by Guillermo Gómez-Peña. One to be avoided, the other aspired to.

"Transculture" and hybridity have different connotations for a person of color than for an Anglo American. In the conflictive history of the North/South dialogue and the multicultural debate, Americans and Europeans have often performed involuntary colonialist roles. In their desire to help, they often unknowingly become ventriloquists, impresarios, flaneurs, messiahs, or cultural transvestites. Though painful, these forms of benign colonialism must be discussed openly..."

"An ability to understand the hybrid nature of culture develops from an experience of dealing with a dominant culture from the outside. The artist who understands and practices hybridity in this way can be at the same time an insider and an outsider, an expert in border crossings, a temporary member of multiple communities, a citizen of two or more nations. S/he performs multiple roles in multiple contexts. At times s/he can operate as a cross-cultural diplomat, as an intellectual coyote (smuggler of ideas) or a media pirate. At other times s/he assumes the role of nomadic chronicler, intercultural translators, or political trickster. S/he speaks from more than one perspective, to more than one community, about more than one reality. His/her job is to trespass, bridge, interconnect, reinterpret, remap, and redefine; to find the outer limits of his/her culture and cross them."