Author: Eileen Joy

Figure 1. Tianjin Binhai Library, Tianjin, China In June 2018, punctum and 4 other open-access book publishers in Europe (Mattering Press, meson press, Open Book Publishers, and Open Humanities Press) formed the ScholarLed collective: The aim of the collective is to explore the potential of working together. This includes developing systems and practices that allow presses[...]

by Eileen A. Joy and Vincent W.J. van Gerven Oei …it’s dark in here…can someone turn on the lights…is it still the Dark Ages? “I can no longer participate in nor support the International Congress on Medieval Studies, [at] Kalamazoo. While performing a seemingly virtuous commitment to academic freedom, the actions of this organization’s leadership[...]

by EILEEN A. JOY Caring for [ourselves] is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation and that is an act of political warfare. ~ Audre Lorde But we can’t (and we won’t!) continue to be administered by a ruthless regime of technocrats that wants to turn everyone and everything into bodiless data, into sermons sent over the[...]

by Eileen Joy In the spirit of Open Access also (ideally) meaning transparency of the data of open-access publishing, here are some figures from punctum books, followed by a plea. Ever since launching our Graduated Open Access platform at the beginning of this year (whereby PDFs of each of our titles are available for $5.00[...]

photo by Quinn Norton, taken on Feb. 9, 2008 There is no justice in following unjust laws. It’s time to come into the light and, in the grand tradition of civil disobedience, declare our opposition to this private theft of public culture. ~Aaron Swartz (1986–2013) … open-access publishing is a brilliant way around the failure[...]

by Eileen Joy Responses to the website of prominent Anglo-Saxonist Allen Frantzen (Loyola University, Emeritus) have generated a wide conversation, centering especially on the need for what we might call ‘truth and reconciliation’ in the field of academic medieval studies, conducted in person, by phone, and on social media (which was also partly sparked by[...]

by EILEEN JOY I am recently returned from the annual convention of the Modern Language Association in Austin, Texas, accompanied by one of my co-Directors Chris Piuma, and I have to say that it was the most exhilarating, inspiring, galvanzing event I have ever attended, and for reasons that had practically zilch to do with[...]

Open Letter to Rosemary Feal, Kathleen Fitzpatrick, and the Modern Language Association by Eileen A. Joy *initially written for Facebook, 14 December 2015 (and slightly expanded here / to help me make this letter better and to point out its weaknesses and to help me emend/correct anything, please visit the Discussion Session built around the[...]

Someone, or some distributive collectives of someones, needs to take responsibility for securing the [necessary] freedom for the greatest number of persons possible who want to participate in intellectual-cultural life, and for enabling the greatest possible number of forms of such life, thereby also ensuring the creative robustness of the larger social systems within which[...]

Figure 1. still image from Woody Allen’s Everyone Says I Love You (1996) by EILEEN JOY I am recently returned from the 4th Biennial Meeting of the BABEL Working Group, held at the University of Toronto (Oct. 9-11; see full program HERE), where I participated as a speaker on a session co-organized by Craig Dionne[...]

On the occasion of the publication by punctum of feminist philosopher Katerina Kolozova’s much awaited new book, Toward a Radical Metaphysics of Socialism: Marx and Laruelle, the Associate Editor and Designer for Katerina’s book, Troy O’Neill (a student in liberal arts at The New School, NYC), interviewed Katerina about this new work but also about[...]

It’s a brand new world, this, where academics finally agree to stand in solidarity with the workers who keep their enterprise running, hopefully in terms shorn of the usual affective talk about the sheer saltiness and heroism of “ordinary workers” that is cringe-inducing, counterproductive, condescending, and anti-intellectual.  The Subconference committee members I spoke to are[...]