A Manifesto in Defence of Trash

We LOVE big, bold, garish colours that s c r e a m

• And we love to wear big hoop earrings.
• And watch Love Island.
• All while drinking Echo Falls.

I hope that doesn’t offend anyone.

Right now, we SHOULD be living in a world where this isn’t so d-i-v-i-s-i-v-e.

Where I won’t be ambushed by suits and skirts telling me that I really shouldn’t be filling my head with such ^rubbish – with such TRASH.

(This text is a bit strange, what happened to good old Times New Roman in a 12pt font?)

But it’s my our head to fill, and I WE choose to fill it with trash.

(Hey, maybe I like trash, I’m from Essex after all.)

I really should be doing something more valuable with my time. Well, it’s my time, and I choose to spend it sitting in sparkly Primark clothes and listening to Taylor Swift.

Our lives are already serious enough. Between waking up to have a healthy, nutritious breakfast of limp cornflakes (because you really shouldn’t be eating Maltesers first thing in the morning), and getting the bus to attend your morning seminar, to sitting up straight and looking very focussed and asking very important adult questions because what you are doing is very IMPORTANT, is there no room for a little bit of the unimportant stuff?

What is the ‘unimportant stuff’?

Maybe you don’t want to wear a ironed blouse and pencil skirt to work today, perhaps a comfy pair of jogging bottoms are your style. Maybe on your break you don’t really want to read that ever so clever book by that ever so clever author in a tie with big round glasses talking about philosophy or the meaning of life. Perhaps the meaning of life is best described to you during a really exciting episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians.

It’s time to throw away those matching monochrome outfits and the expensive glass of champagne that you don’t really want to drink but you know makes you look proper fancy.

It’s time to be unapologetically yourself.

Review of Small Press Publishing Projects

Here is what I noted about the Small Press Publishing Projects that we looked at during the Week 1 workshop

The project On the Flip Side I found was a really interesting way to connect the form of the publication (an accordion fold with both sides written on), to the subject to actually enhance what the content is trying to convey. In marrying these two pieces together, the publication has a unique coherency, and the overall message (the dangers of travelling) is enhanced by this visual aid.

Embody also utilised the physicality of the publication to make the content more powerful. In writing about eating disorders, while also binding the book to a block of wood to give it literal heft, it allows us to understand and actually feel the issues discussed in the publication without even having to necessarily read it all.

Finally, Objectification, a feminist text about the strengths and struggles of women, actually implemented into their publication a kind of feminist activism. At the start of the publication, it was noted that the hand-sewn binding was an imitation of the bookbinding that Chinese women had been doing for centuries, even though it is commonly thought that men throughout history have had the dominant control of the process of publishing. In paying homage to this method, the publishers were exercising the same appreciation of women that they advocated in the content.