Membra(I)nes as Resonance Bodies of Refusal. A Speculative Resounding of Vulnerable Stress Performances in the University

Stress is an intimate and familiar concept, yet it is often hard to address and deal with in practice. This article focuses on the autobiographical writings of recurring stress in the university that were produced by a group of gender studies students using the method of memory work. It explores stress as a potentially injurious and wounding force as well as possible ways of collectively responding to and “caring with” stress. Drawing on historical and early psychoanalytical work on nervous exhaustion and the role of mucous membranes, the author examines stress in relation to the concept of membra(I)nes, arguing that this concept presents a new starting point for listening to the students’ writings about stress. Here, stress is audible as a form of nervous muscular agitation that affects different parts of the body and the gut. Read with feminist theory, the act of refusal becomes one potent concept in the students’ regeneration of power. The author also explores the stomach growl, or borborygami, and the underlying intersection between the brain and the digestive system, in borborygami’s potential for care and collective response.