{"pk":43127,"title":"Affective Chemistries of Care: Slow Activism and the Limits of the Molecular in Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We Are Briefly Gorgeous","subtitle":null,"abstract":"In this article, I explore care work outlined and performed as emotional and erotic support labor in Ocean Vuong’s novel, \nOn Earth We Are Briefly Gorgeous\n (2019). The illnesses around which Vuong stages salient scenes of care work are not those easily addressed by surgery or a course of antibiotics. Instead, the novel focalizes those who are “[sick] in the brains” (122)— formally diagnosed with a mood disorder like bipolar, observed for behaviors of PTSD, addicted to narcotics, or grieving the loss of a body part. The unique contribution of Vuong’s novel to those interested in health and environmental humanities, disability studies, and reproductive labor, I argue, requires noticing that its portraits of care work come interleaved with its depictions of atmospheric dangers. Those atmospheric dangers include weather effects as well as sequelae from military weapons deployment and the un(der)regulated circulation of slowly violating chemicals. In relation to the theme of molecular intimacies, I introduce several heuristic terms: \nmolecular entreaty\n, \naffective chemistries of care\n, \nhypo-interventions\n and \nintimate\n or \nslow activism\n, the latter two building on the work of science and technology scholars. Drawing out \nOn Earth’\ns focalization of irruptions of care in atmospheres dense with chemistry, this essay both models a humanistic, decolonial and intersectional method that (re)values crip practical knowledge, and limns the novel’s provocation as to the political limits of queer interracial intimacy.","language":"en","license":{"name":"Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives  4.0","short_name":"CC BY-NC-ND 4.0","text":"Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.\n\nNonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes.\n\nNoDerivatives — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.\n\nNo additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0"},"keywords":[{"word":"Care Work"},{"word":"crip knowledge"},{"word":"On Earth We are Briefly Gorgeous"},{"word":"Disability Studies"},{"word":"affective chemistries of care"},{"word":"hypo-interventions"},{"word":"intimate activism"},{"word":"slow activism"},{"word":"Ocean Vuong"},{"word":"Science and Technology Studies"},{"word":"Transnational American Studies"}],"section":"Special Forum on The Molecular Intimacies of Empire","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8xn505w4","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Rachel","middle_name":"","last_name":"Lee","name_suffix":"","institution":"UCLA","department":"None"}],"date_submitted":"2022-08-25T01:19:24+02:00","date_accepted":"2022-08-25T01:19:24+02:00","date_published":"2022-08-25T01:30:41+02:00","render_galley":null,"galleys":[{"label":"","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/jtas/article/43127/galley/32131/download/"}]}