Collectivity

In honor of the journal’s fortieth anniversary, this special issue of Camera Obscura considers theories and practices of collectivity. Camera Obscura has operated through a feminist editorial collective since its beginnings in the 1970s, a time when many forms of cooperative action proliferated. In the last ten to fifteen years, a new constellation of collectives, many international, has emerged in response to new social, economic, and technological conditions. This issue explores the potentials and challenges of collectivity through pieces—both full-length analyses and short-form reflections—that address such topics as collaboration in photography, cinema, and video; utopias and dystopias; history and memory; modes of “singleness” and of togetherness; technology, embodiment, and intimacy; and feminist and queer collective practices in media and activism in various times and places.