Conclusion
Considering the critical readings of my archive above, when doing queer archival work in digital visual studies, researchers must be highly conscious of the archives they produce and the circulation of images and possible consequences that their archives might promote. Upon first glance, this archive indicates that the fight for same-sex marriage, as reflected in the evolution of the Obama Hope image’s design, is a productive narrative of progress. This archive can thus be interpreted as playing a small, but important role in documenting a part of U.S. history that often goes untold. By infiltrating these images and texts into the Pinterest universe, this queer archival practice centers LGBT concerns and makes them visible for public consideration. Both such rhetorical efforts are essential to queer rhetoric, in that, as Alexander and Rhodes argue, they help cultivate a broader sense of humanity and citizenship for typically underrepresented people. Scholars such as Rawson and Morris have argued for the importance of accessible of queer archives because they allow people to find themselves in history, as well as aid in the transmission of intergenerational knowledge to be passed down within queer communities. Additionally, as Rawson has argued, digital technologies presents ample opportunities for queer archives to not only be created but reach queer communities who may have trouble accessing materially based archives.
Despite the progress represented in the archive, as my readings of the archive suggests, not all progress is created equal, however, and the same can be said for Pinterest as an archival tool. Pinterest is an efficient and easy-to-use interface with the ability to collect, exhibit, curate, and share personal archives. As such, its potential for producing queer archives is technologically quite useful. However, as numerous authors have pointed out, Pinterest often upholds less savory things such as capitalism and traditional gender norms. Additionally, as I discovered in the engagement with my own archive, the visual emphasis enabled by Pinterest can highlight and reveal aspects of the LGB experience that are incredibly hetero and homonormative, as well as perpetuate a lack of intersectionality in relation to LGB identities. While Pinterest as an archival tool is useful for its ability to facilitate pattern recognition, it, like most academic tools of inquiry, does not preclude problematic archival practices. Despite many positive revelations, “The Evolution of Obama Pride” reveals how rhetorical undercuts often function in visual research processes to perpetuate already existing problematic representations.
While such rhetorical undercuts ought to be avoided, I am not arguing that Pinterest be dismissed as a productive digital archival tool. Instead, I am suggesting that we approach Pinterest and its affordances as an impure platform. As Phaedra Pezzullo argues with her conceptualization of impure politics, activist and resistance tactics can never be wholly pure, and, consequently, scholars must always consider how these tactics enable democratic social relationships. Pezzulo’s argument reinforces Peel and Harding's call for us to move beyond the "pro" and "con" arguments that make up so much of the discourse surrounding same-sex marriage in academic discourses and allow for same-sex marriage to be both assimilationist and transformative. By classifying Pinterest (and "The Evolution of Obama Pride") as impure, we acknowledge both its capitalistic, assimilationist and homonormative leanings and its ability to help accomplish more transformative work. We acknowledge, in other words, that despite the archive itself potentially upholding oppressive ideologies, Pinterest as a tool can help broaden audience access to LGBTQ history and break down some accessibility barriers present in more traditional archives, affordances that can have positive social impacts for this historically underrepresented community. For example, the suicide rate among gay youth dropped when marriage equality was passed (Raifman et al.). This is a tangible result of queer youth seeing themselves and their futures represented in the media. Pinterest can aid in allowing queer communities to access their history and see themselves as having a significant place in society and culture. If we as researchers can remain mindful of the impure nature of both our archives, as well as the tools we use to build them, then digital technologies such as Pinterest can aid us in not only collecting and curating visual data but also in the circulation of visual histories that are often not only overlooked but at risk of being forgotten.
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