Glitch is a flaw in the system, a form of refusal, a strategy of non-fulfillment. “We must welcome the glitch with open arms to overcome binaries and limitations that define gender, ethnicity, and sexuality.”1 writes Legacy L. Russell in the manifesto Glitch Feminism. In this sense, the glitch aims to celebrate what causes discomfort. The glitch – originally a term for a digital-technical error—needs to be rethought and transferred to the real world of AFK (away from keyboard). The digital world becomes the medium for speculative creativity. New ideas and resources emerge for the permanent (r)evolution of bodies that change faster than the societies that produce them, and to which we are at the mercy of 'offline'. We need to encourage being wrong in a system that is not designed for all of us. We need to encourage experimentation, with the opportunity to thrive in failure. To disrupt patriarchy, we need to receive the glitch as something that is learned as a mistake in our Western European society, but can be a fundamental approach for change in intersectional feminism. tear it all open! usurp the body! be the glitch!
- Russell, Legacy. Glitch Feminism: A Manifesto. London and New York: Verso, 2020. ↩