Typical Girls: Women in Punk/Post-Punk/Underground Music (Circa 1975-1980s)

[Judy Sisneros <judysis213 AT yahoo.com>]

Dina, Please remove me from this email list. I’ve been on it for a number of years and the new direction of discussions have straight from my original interests for receiving emails from this group. Thank you and good luck with everything you’re working on. Judy Sisneros judysis213 AT yahoo.com

Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone

On Tuesday, August 11, 2026, 9:42 AM, Dina Hornreich <hornreichdina AT gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Friends (new & old):

Since we now have ubiquitous terms like “fake news” readily available in our everyday conversations, I think it is now time for creating a better glossary for recognizing avenues towards shared understandings, common ground, and otherwise improving the overall nature of our exchanges. My goals still involve planning, managing, and constructing a comprehensive public education campaign, so I am actively seeking ways for validating how we seem to gratify our emotional needs, wants, and desires (and other “intrinsic” rewards) through sustainable consumption habits; because I still believe in supporting altruistic tendencies and otherwise offering opportunities for us to make meaningful societal contributions as citizens who coexist across organic, analog, and digital formats (despite the onslaught of blatant distortions that frequently beat us down until we succumb to digital resignation).

Obviously, I believe that our emerging socio-technological realities offer validation for those softer sensibilities which seem to invite adaptation, resistance, and eventually transformational opportunities for developing affective infrastructures that support social intuitionism; and otherwise promote becoming a more informed, engaged, and wise citizenry. Networks, channels, systems, and platforms for engaging in public discourse could be redesigned for promoting more cooperative habits (rather than competitive ones) and otherwise reducing the unnecessary occurrence of “chronic interpersonal trauma.” 

As such, we might consider the four principles described in this article on Designing for Networked Collaborative Discourse: An UnLMS Approach: <https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11528-018-0284-7>

1. Any web object can become an object of learning discourse. 

2. Instead of being trapped in silos, ideas can move across discourse spaces. 

3. The discourse, participated by learners with diverse interests has multiple entry points and is perceived to be coherent. 

4. Boundaries between different learning and discourse spaces (e.g., public vs. private, formal education vs. workplace learning) are to be crossed if not totally dissolved. 

These principles offer new ways for approaching governing rules, protocols, policies, procedures, norms that recognize our desires for promoting social responsibility as an effort toward measures of inclusive equitability. Political officials could address our need for public welfare services, policies, and overall safety by creating a localized network that moderates “prosumerist” communicative practices in order to address the emergence of a “second” digital divide. 

Humane practices should promote fairness, altruism, friendliness, generosity, caring, and kindness across micro, meso, and macro-level institutions. Furthermore, aggregating communal resources should invite strategies that are better able to accommodate the extraordinary composite of human orientations, modalities, preferences, aptitudes, styles, and other individual learner variations (that are now more explicit and identifiable than previously considered possible). 

Supporting humankind’s journeys toward self-actualization requires recognition of lifelong learners’ individual motivational aspects by nourishing our unique passions, intuitions, innocence, even empathy and humility within the micro-democratic and egalitarian atmosphere that can be fostered by the variety of opportunities, services, databases, events, programs, and other resources that libraries offer to various constituencies (i.e. internal and external stakeholders) and the greater communities at large. By actively promoting authenticity, safety, consistency, acceptance, comfort, and impartiality in our communicative exchanges across organic, analog, and digital networks, we should be able to better recognize lifelong learners’ intrinsic desires for becoming participants in a more informed, engaged, and wise citizenry individually, communally, and across the “metaverse.” 

This is an awareness that girls, women, and other “feminine” orientated individuals bring to light; and our current culture crash suggests reassessing gender essentialist practices in order to maintain the accomplishments of numerous civil rights movements including (but not limited to) sex/gender activism. The implications of Project 2025 rhetoric dismisses our needs, wants, and desires to retain those awarenesses that women’s/feminist work offers us. We will not go back to 19th Century approaches that lock us up in isolation which will drive us into madness (while staring into the mesmerizing yellow wallpaper)! 

Healthy families, neighborhoods, communities, etc. require solidarity which can be engineered as a more deliberate kind of “cultural homogeneity” without sacrificing the benefits of heterogeneous relationships. We can redefine how we identify, measure, and assess our demographic variables in order to more reasonably accommodate our individual modalities, orientations, preferences, styles, aptitudes, and overall dispositional traits. (And that’s exactly how we shall pursue liberty and justice for all!) As such, the question remains: “Can we create collaborative discourse networks that recognize tribal tendencies and other strategies for lifelong goal attainments with a healthier “gloCalized” approach given an awareness of prosumerist communicative practices?” 

Because there is no “severance package” for cancel culture! I think communities can support immunity under a holistic wellness approach that supports integrative recovery and overall more sustainable wellbeing; but first we have to agree to wise up! This isn’t just another manufactured dystopia based on values implicated by marketing strategists, it is an effort to more equitably aggregate our scarce resources which better supports social intuitionism and wisdom attainment and is understood as a lifelong pursuit. After all, feminism is for everybody; and we all can be deplorables (which means we are all looking for a balance of care throughout such tumultuous periods of time). 

If we are striving to “mend divisions” then the many lessons for rebuilding civilization invoke numerous stories as lifelong learners who are seeking to become a more informed, engaged, and wise participatory democracy. By exploiting our moral injuries under this corporate tyranny of greed, violence, and misogyny; we fall victim to the values of commercialism which undermines the universal concepts espoused by the major religious groups including (but not limited to) Armenians, Muslims, Christians, and Jews. Conceivability suggests possibility; so it often just seems easier not to fight the utilitarian benefits offered by monistic values. 

The existence of conceptual polarities, binaries, and dualities offers us structures to help us navigate the extremes of the human lifecycle. Despite what Cartesian dualism suggests: We don’t just think, we also feel, act, in order to become ourselves; because we are all members of the human race (making us “deplorables” who rely on trial-and-error heuristics to survive). Overcomplicated avoidance tactics do not typically hold up as long-term solutions given various circumstantial issues which is why they become unhealthy long-term coping strategies; furthermore, expecting them to transfer into healthy lifelong behavioral patterns can be counterproductive.

Of course, that doesn't mean we don’t need all the tools available in our collective toolboxes: Everything has its utility and anything can become toxic, but everybody has something to teach us! It’s a complex journey that recognizes the negotiations between self and other which reinforces basic elements of civilization (e.g. the “golden” rule, Ten Commandments, etc.). This should offer us something interesting to ponder this year as we observe The International Day of Peace (i.e. "World Peace Day") on September 21. As such, I would like to introduce you to the three dialectics of “racial capitalism” (i.e. slavery) according to this particular social science article: <https://doi.org/10.1017/S1742058X22000212>

1. The peripheral/marginalized vs. the central/dominant

2. The “everyday” populace vs. the academic/scholarly “elite”

3. The particular concept itself vs. its wider/problematic context involving “linked questions” (and other interdependent variables)

Many seem to avoid healthier approaches by attempting to mask the numerous historic transgressions (i.e. slavery and genocide) that are fostered by overcomplicated avoidance tactics including “false alliances” (i.e. performative allyship) amongst those who are morally injured which is merely trauma-bonding. 

As such, many remain incapable of comprehending, let alone justifying, ongoing morally unconscionable actions (e.g. suicide bombers). Certain groups seem more vulnerable to rigid imperialist mindsets because it’s a very common response to trauma. It would serve us better to recognize that tendency before we become overwhelmed by the harsh criticisms of those who set us up to fail from the beginning! 

Another way to look at it might be: If you appreciate Jewish humor, can you recognize all the pain and suffering it has helped us overcome? Or if you enjoy soul music, do you understand its predecessors in the folk songs of enslaved African Americans? When we can’t see the forest or the trees (and it is not readily clear what values or principles are used for “willingly” participating in these egregious acts of extremism) then we might be willing to recognize that this is very different from the ongoing covert/microaggressive resistance that Americans continue to experience; since attempting to abolish slavery with the passage of the emancipation proclamation (an event that we observe every Juneteenth in order to prevent erasure of the difficult lessons that history teaches us) and otherwise explore efforts in welcoming new immigrants and refugees (who may be seeking asylum from life threatening political situations; including the threat of genocide).

Dreamers, visionaries, oracles, resisters, and other world-changers help motivate us to pursue progress in the aftermath of these historic atrocities. Recovery is yet another attempt to achieve holistic wellbeing and otherwise develop more integrated awarenesses. After all, history doesn’t repeat itself; but it rhymes! Transformation suggests processes involving both adaptation and resistance; and that is not a linear progression. 

Heuristics typically involve both trial and error; and that necessitates a healthy learning curve for all of us! Prioritizing social intuitionism could offer better recognition for the moral discernments that comprise wisdom attainment. As such, I continue to ponder how we can usher in a conceptual age in order to become more cooperative as an informed, engaged, and wise participatory democracy who can live, learn, grow, create, play, work, and lead across organic, analog, and digital communication systems, channels, networks, and platforms. 

According to current research examining religion’s “evolutionary landscape” <https://doi:10.1017/S0140525X04000172>, there is an apparent framework for different interpretations of cultural lore supporting its tremendous social power given how it often invokes a kind of religious fervor:

1. Widespread counterfactual and counterintuitive beliefs in supernatural agents (gods, ghosts, goblins, etc.).

2. Hard-to-fake public expressions of costly material commitments to supernatural agents involving offerings and sacrifice (goods, property, time, life).

3. Mastering by supernatural agents of people’s existential anxieties (death, deception, disease, catastrophe, pain, loneliness, injustice, want, loss) in order to develop compassion for self and others.

4. Ritualized, rhythmic sensory coordination of the counterintuitive, committed, and compassionate to achieve a state of communion (congregation, intimate fellowship, etc.).

The distance between religion and philosophy that is inhabited by the social sciences can help us with better identifying individual dispositions as it offers new language for negotiating variations in thinking, feeling, being, and doing. When developing shared accountabilities for our ongoing efforts in living, learning, growing, playing, creating, working, and leading across organic, analog, and digital realities, we might try using that higher level of awareness to organize and distribute resources because our current approaches remain counterintuitive, at best. 

In the 90s, we frequently used the language of bands, labels, albums, and lyrics to negotiate social dynamics; but notions of credibility were based on subjective and fleeting criteria that favored the structures that indie/punk was initially claiming to disavow. Nowadays, our newly emerging “connected worlds” offer new ways to network with other people using these artefacts in order to become more successful with personal and professional efforts and other resources needed for lifelong goal attainment. Since the level of analysis of these conversations varied greatly, and frequently relied on individual dispositional traits for approval, most pronouncements were precarious endorsements of quality. 

Moreover, if we understand how generations identify with different pop culture trends; then it becomes obvious how each generation succeeds in building solidarity around that identity. Many people continue to become annoyed by the ways that I try to negotiate this constellation of variables; mainly because it isn’t an easy undertaking! Regardless of their misgivings, we should now be better able to consider those efforts (strengths and weaknesses) in order to aggregate our resources for rebuilding culturally, socially, economically, politically, etc. as an informed, engaged, and wise participatory citizenry. 

This could better support the development of new criteria in the stewardship of IMT artefacts that better recognize “prosumerist” communicative practices (including the Creative Commons model) in order to prevent unhealthy habits/addictions and otherwise better address harmful behavioral patterns. And it is something that I have been attempting to articulate as I am still processing recent tributes to Lou Reed that inspired by Laurie Anderson (hardly that stereotypically “controversial” grieving rock’n roll widow) to portray herself differently than Yoko Ono or even Courtney Love (who have been routinely skewered by the mass media as distracting “influences” in their artistic “unions”). 

Whereas divorce seems to represent differently than widowhood nowadays (cf: Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore) mainly because dominant narratives of the lifelong female experience minimally remain misogynistic; whether we are single, divorced, widowed, or otherwise committed to a romantic partner in a “binding” kind of arrangement. It makes aspects of data feminist principles seem extremely cogent epistemologically, ontologically, ethically, and politically. Meanwhile, feminism has become more socially acceptable than religious teachings; yet philosophical arguments and religious beliefs have never been separate inquiries! As a result, it is likely that the inclusion of girls, women, and other “feminine” oriented individuals offers the most hope for recognizing our deep spiritual “hungers.”

As I question social norms, I continue to ponder how we have redefined “coolness” when girls found a place in the mosh pits of our collective venues. As such, I think it can be “cool” to be female/feminine/feminist; but will it ever be cool to be wise?! Moreover, can we make it cool to be spiritual/religious (let alone Jewish)? In my recent explorations of the life and work of Lou Reed, I considered creativity via John Zorn; intelligence via Noam Chomsky; and wisdom via Reb Zalman Schachter Shalomi. 

Obviously, I am asking the same longitudinal questions about the life and works of these individuals across temporal and spatial dimensions because it makes more sense than what Michael Apted had attempted. (Bottom line: Was Dara Horn correct when she proclaimed that being Jewish isn’t cool?! If neither Lou Reed nor Bob Dylan succeeded in this effort, then who will help us redefine the dispositional traits that we find socially gratifying in order to feel more accepted?!)

Narrative medicinal practices offer one example of an emerging discipline in the healthcare field (which embraces medicine, psychoanalysis and literature) that demonstrates how storytelling is effectively used for assessing the impact of traumatic experiences as an expressive therapeutic outlet; but it also creates opportunities for more equitable practices given the potential of this work across micro, meso, and macro levels (cf: Rita Charon). 

These approaches are not exclusive to the work of medical care providers and/or their patients who are documenting and evaluating their encounters; but the meta-literacy awareness developed throughout the comprehension and production aspects of communicative competencies that comprise a “prosumerist economy” seem to better validate their conceptual interdependencies exchanges. In fact, Beth Simone Noveck has suggested six interconnected pathways as a comprehensive agenda for more democratic AI infrastructures:

1. Building public AI: creating democratic accountabilities for ensuring civic uses of universally accessible infrastructures 

2. Using procurement power: leveraging government resources to shape market developments using a checklist for “consensus-based recommendations for machine learning based science” (REFORMS)

3. Open data: using public datasets to drive AI toward democratic governance for outcomes that support civic engagement 

4. AI training & upskilling: preparing the workforce for becoming a more integrated citizenry of adaptive lifelong learners 

5. Democratic AI research: redirecting challenges to prioritize democratic processes that strengthen efforts in transparency, participation, and trust

6. Building AI with people (rather than on their behalf): ensuring communal involvement as a meaningful endeavor for redesigning participatory infrastructures supporting democratic efforts locally and statewide 

This ongoing desire for an improved sense of democratic governance offers opportunities for improvements across all our human interaction; and we can learn a lot through organic, analog, and digital exchanges. Furthermore, this will likely remain a matter of public interest across numerous disciplines. There are ample opportunities for this work; as I recently discovered a college course in communication at a local institution that recognizes how cultural values are disseminated and recognizes the ethical lapses that persist as result! Therefore, I remain encouraged by these pursuits. As the fall season approaches with many opportunities for new beginnings, I invite you to reflect on the past, as I have compiled key points from my updates in a Google doc that I called Project 2041.

As always, thank you for your interest and attention to my thoughts and otherwise giving your precious attention to these irregular updates; and (of course) please be well! 

-Dina

Dina L. Hornreich, MS, MLIS 

gofund.me/42ba6d296 

linkedin.com/in/dina-hornreich-113a79283

medium.com/@dina-hornreich

hornreichdina AT gmail.com