Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality,
and to see the links to virtual rooms.
Log in
Accepted Paper:
The rules of ‘no rules’: sticker tagging as a representation of subcultural power relations
Eberhard Wolff
(University of Zürich)
Paper short abstract:
The application of stickers and tags on public surfaces as a ‘no rules’ practice is discussed in respect of their power relations. Slapping stickers goes beyond an emancipatory resistance against a hegemonic system. It also represents a constant “flow” of spatial power within this subculture.
Paper long abstract:
From an activist perspective the ubiquitous ‘no rules’ practice of illegal application of stickers and tags on mostly urban public and private surfaces is not just a contribution to urban aesthetics but also a legitimate and emancipatory answer to the territorial dominance of capitalism (e.g. Drognitz 2019).
However, investigating concrete micro-practices of sticker slapping (as I will do on one example) shows a much more complicated landscape of power. These practices comprise a variety of entangled motives reaching from claiming territory up to commercial interests and thus go beyond an anarchistic and emancipatory resistance against a hegemonic system.
Even more, “wild” sticker tagging shows a second level of overt power structures: As sticker sites at attractive places are constantly pasted, tagged, written or painted over these surfaces themselves are a territory of contested power relations and a constant “flow” of power within this subculture.
Thus, sticker tagging sites are representations of subcultural power hierarchies and ideas of spatial justice or better: legitimacy.