On writing together with primary texts

Abstract

This paper is born of a now years-long text message conversation and commitment to social learning during an otherwise forced distance education. We thought we would write a paper about care, co-working, and carpool lanes. Instead, this is some writing about contingencies, COVID-19, crises, and the uncomfortable limits of critical theories. We invite readers into an otherwise private (and still ongoing) snippet of our primary texts: a stream-of-consciousness, erratic, always already temporally punctuated, and immediate-yet-delayed process of text messaging. Though our daily text message conversation has lasted years and spanned uncountable topics and immense word counts, the passage we share relates specifically to identity politics. If all objects are relational, we are still two people who share an interest in how to study the object.