Resistance in the Materials

 I attended the event called “Resistance in the Materials” on Zoom, where I was able to learn a lot about printing and print history. 

The first thing that I learned about was how the choice of which publishers to use can be seen as a “resistance to white dominance.” The speaker from the Zoom talked about how a poet named Brooks published with a black publishing company in order to stay committed to the black community because before then, her poems had been viewed only with white editors, publishers, and readers. 

I also thought it was interesting to look at different examples of some printed materials. The speaker showed transparencies and how it related to being able to see the text bleeding on through the paper, and I learned about this term known as palimpsest, which I did not know about before. There was also an example of some pieces of paper that were put together in a layering way, and there were holes in the paper to reveal more words. I think the paper said “You are a contribution to state workforce needs,” but then after including the words from the holes, it says “You are more than your contribution to state workforce needs.”

It was also interesting to learn about how another speaker got into the field of printing since his grandparents owned a printing press that was eventually sold as the Josten’s graduation company. Then, his grandparents got involved with Paradise Press later on. It was also interesting to learn about the Wisconsin Idea in which the university should touch the lives of all families in the state.

It was a very informative event, and I did not know that so much went into printing.