In preparation for “Intimate Measures,” a conversation between scholar Amy Herzog and gastroenterologist and writer Nitin Ahuja, we’d like to share some suggested readings. Through two parallel tracks, the conversation will consider discourses and practices of intimate self-management in relation to the growing interest in intestinal health and digital mediations of intimacy, self-care, and caring labor.
Included are two essays by Ahuja about the microbiome and ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response) videos, which seek to produce a tingling sensation in the listener’s body, usually through acts of ‘tender personal attention’; artist Tasha Bjelic’s essay on ASMR; and Herzog’s analysis of affective labor, corporeality, and consumption in the film Under the Skin.
READINGS
Nitin Ahuja, “Softer Than Softcore,” The New Inquiry, 2014.
Nitin Ahuja, “The Eaten World,” The New Inquiry, 2014.
Tasha Bjelic, “Digital Care,” Women & Performance Ampersand, 2016.
Amy Herzog, “Star vehicle: labor and corporeal traffic in Under the Skin,” Jump Cut: A Review of Contemporary Media, 2016.