Steampunk debate

[alias_sqbr]

Confidential note to strangedave, since you were also wishing for more discussion of such things: steampunkdebate, a community for discussing steampunk including class/race/gender etc issues.

EDIT: Oh, and apparently the reason it was created was because a post on steamfashion poking at the subtext of steampunk was unexpectedly deleted. And then they deleted the first post promoting the new comm as a place to continue the conversation for not being sufficiently fashion related :/

Comments

[havocthecat]

oooh. steampunkdebate sounds GREAT to join. thanks!

[ataxi.livejournal.com]

Looks like the discussion will still mostly be about the "punk" and not the "steam".

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

Joined.

[aris-tgd.livejournal.com]

Woah, this looks cool.

Also makes me want to break out my photo book on the Chinese community of Stockton in the 1800s and scan some of the pictures, just from some of the discussion.

[alias_sqbr]

I think that's a reaction to the reverse bias in most steampunk :)

[alias_sqbr]

And now you have to write long interesting posts to it I can ponder about :D

[alias_sqbr]

That would be cool!

I've recently been reading a very little about the history of Chinese Australians in the 19th century(*) and it's this whole thing that never gets talked about, really challenges my mental images of the past. And that sort of expectation plays into steampunk a lot too.

(*)Pre 1788 Asian Australian history being a totally different ballgame!

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

Ditto. I saw a local history about Toowong, a suburb I knew had an Asian connection because it's near the university and popular with Asian students. But it had a significant chinese community in the 1800s. And that does not get talked about much.

[aris-tgd.livejournal.com]

I found the book, and it turns out that most of the photos are actually from the 1930s and on. Bah! I think there are more gold-rush era photos in some of their other books, but I don't have any others. I should try and track some more down.

[alias_sqbr]

I think the fact that there were any chinese australians pre 1975ish is pretty much never talked about, with the odd exception of the goldrush.

[alias_sqbr]

the 1930s would be interesting too, if less steampunky.

[aris-tgd.livejournal.com]

From a local history perspective it's absolutely fascinating. And yeah, it's awesome to think about what could be done with history that doesn't get talked about and Steampunk--using the genre to subvert the conventions of the Victorian era theme.