Last weekend I attended WisCon, an annual feminist science fiction convention held in Madison, Wisconsin. Along with my friend Gretchen, I ran the now-annual WisCon Vid Party. We showed five hours of fan-made video, including an hour on the theme “vids with a message”, an hour of premieres and nearly new vids (released since the start of this year), and an hour of singalong vids with subtitles. Two of my vids, which I’ve previously posted here, were shown: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (women in historical dramas) and So What (Sherlock Holmes 2009 movie).
I’ve posted our playlists: Premieres and nearly new, and the rest. All the vids we showed are available for download and/or streaming online. If you only watch one vid, watch the one that opened our Premieres show, Charmax’s “Space Girl”:
(If you’re reading this on Facebook you may have to click through to infotrope.net to see the embed.)
Charmax’s vid is a celebration of women in science fiction as well as a criticism of their portrayal. “My momma told me I should never venture into space, but I did, I did, I did.” By the end, our heroine finds her superman — and it is herself. It was amazing to see this vid play live, for the first time, in a group of feminist (and mostly female) science fiction fans, and I’m sure we’ll be playing it again next year.
If anyone is interested in participating in next year’s vid party at WisCon (as an attendee, volunteer, or vidder), I encourage you to follow the Dreamwidth community where we post announcements and information throughout the year. It’s available via RSS, but if you’d like a Dreamwidth account I have a bunch of invite codes at present, so leave your email address and I can send you one.