“LADY U SEND ME YR MOVIE:” constructing Joanie 4 Jackie’s feminist distribution network

ABSTRACT

Joanie 4 Jackie was a U.S.-based women’s video distribution network begun by artist Miranda July that operated from 1995 to 2007. Every woman who submitted to the network would be included on a 10-video compilation VHS that was sent back to each participant, along with a zine listing filmmaker statements and contact information. This article focuses on this distribution model as a site for understanding how media distribution is tied to feminist community-building. I first show the ways that Joanie 4 Jackie drew on the distribution infrastructure of feminist punk subculture riot grrrl — including robust systems for the circulation of music and zines — to jumpstart this video network. I discuss the ways that Joanie 4 Jackie enacted a feminist distributive imagination, creating inventive modes of distribution to counteract unequally distributed money, power, technology, and visibility in filmmaking along gendered lines. In turn, I argue for a consideration of a feminist distributive imaginary, or the hopeful possibilities for both self and community that Joanie 4 Jackie’s modes of distribution prompted–whether or not one submitted a video for distribution.

KEYWORDS:

• Media distribution
• riot grrrl
• video
• alternative media
• zines

Acknowledgments

This article has greatly benefitted from the comments and encouragement of Christina Dunbar-Hester, Henry Jenkins, Josh Kun, and Alessandro Lomi, as well as from the two anonymous reviewers. The research would not have been possible without the work of the archivists at the Getty Research Institute and those who constructed the Joanie 4 Jackie digital archive.

Disclosure statement

The author declares no conflict of interest.

Notes

1. Today, Miranda July is a well-known filmmaker, artist, and writer whose projects includes the Camera D’Or winning film Me and You and Everyone We Know (July 2005) as well as the novel The First Bad Man (July 2015). Her work, while wide-ranging, regularly explores the tensions between women’s personal worlds and the public expectations put upon them, often through themes of longing and connection.

2. To protect privacy, I have abbreviated the last names of correspondents who have not been interviewed on the Joanie 4 Jackie website.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Frances Corry

Frances Corry is a PhD candidate in communication at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism. Her research is concerned with technological pasts, addressing the social histories of media technologies as well as topics related to digital technology, memory, and archiving. E-mail: [email protected]