Digital Intimacies

10 years of Digital Intimacies Symposia, or Digital Intimacies X

December 4, 5 & 6 - Monash University, Caulfield campus + Livestream

The Digital Intimacies symposia have for 10 years now been a place for sharing research on all the ways intimate lives are mediated digitally. From public grief and trauma gone viral on YouTube and TikTok, to hook-up and dating apps like Grindr and Tinder, to daily documentations on Facebook of meals, coffees, dreams, births, deaths, new relationships, breakups, and much more, intimate lives are being played out, recorded, commodified, and constituted through social media.

What can Digital Intimacies teach us about X?

Sometimes questions like this are asked, Lauren Berlant and Michael Warner (1995) note, when there is a real sense of political urgency. Theory, like queer theory, is asked to respond to problems, to have a program; to provide a working description of the world from which actions can be taken. 

Asked for these reasons, the question of x is both a challenge and a hope. And it is a hard question (Berlant and Warner, 1995, 348).

1. X marks the spot; maybe your spot on a spatially-striated map, where you might find treasure or where ‘you may, must, or cannot live or move’ (Lugones 2003).  
2. X is a proxy; if you are an X, you may be likened to a Y, or a Z. You may be indefinable, but still calculable.
3. X is indeterminate, ‘unspecified’; your passport, if you have one, may have an ‘X’ in it. 
4. X is incomplete, to-be-done, yet to be confirmed, waiting for you to finish it off; the place where writing should be, insert XXX here.
5. X is a multiplier, a mashup (this x that), brands cross-fertilising; the X-factor that draws attention, circulation, monetisation.
6. X is the past, the former, the outer; an ex-lover, an expatriate.
7. X, when tripled, is extreme, ecstatic, sometimes excluded; XXX, Not Safe For Work.
8. X is a brand, a mistake, a complication, a site of corporate disruption of existing communities that are queer, black, alt, global, local, and activist.
9. X is a platform, a standpoint, a terrain.
10. X when next to an O is a kiss next to a hug.

X is open to interpretation. What has Digital Intimacies taught you about X?

In this 10th year of Digital Intimacies, #DIX, we welcome submissions on the theme of X:

-   Traditional paper format
-   Workshops
-   Fishbowl sessions
-   Pre/post-conference events

Respect and inclusion

This conference has a proud tradition of fostering a welcoming space for new research and diverse researchers. All attendees, remote and in person, are expected to contribute to a supportive and collegial environment for presenters of all genders, sexual orientations, ages, abilities, and ethnicities. In this vein, parents are welcome to bring children and carers along to the event.

Digital Intimacies permits explicit, political, and confronting material as part of presentations, but asks that presenters be respectful of a diverse audience, and disclose any potentially upsetting content at the beginning of their contribution.

Please let us know if you have any queries about the accessibility of this event.

Hybrid

We will have a limited number of online presenting places in order to ensure the quality of discussion and feedback for conference attendees. We will work with presenters to make accommodations to increase accessibility wherever possible. 

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