infobong.com

Some readers may remember I published a 'zine called Au Jus when I was an undergrad. Written and edited by the pseudonymous Sass A. Frass, the "little magazine" featured the expected rants, vegetarian recipes, and images of aliens smoking blunts. I surreptiously duplicated the book at my part-time job editing math textbooks, and, accordingly, I made sure to include some math humor in each issue. I don't think an issue ever reached a reader outside of Norman or Tulsa, but I had a lovely time publishing Au Jus, which eventually became a Web-only project.

I remain interested in 'zines both from a personal and scholarly perspective, but, sadly, 'zines appear to be waning in importance among youth and underground cultures. According to this computer-generated graphic, 'zines are a relatively rare stated interest on the 'ziney LiveJournal. Anyway, I was pleased to see this essay, "The Photocopied Self: Perzines, Self-Construction, and The Postmodern Identity Crisis" by Steve Bailey and Anita Michel posted on the cultstud list today. Like academic writing on scrapbooks, I think much of the discussion of 'zines as exercises in identity construction is applicable to blogs, and, if you can't tell, I'm posting this link here for my own future reference.