02 - October 2026
Anti-languages
Claire Heggen and Yves Marc, Tant que la tête est sur le cou, Théâtre du Mouvement, 1978. / Photo: Anne Nordmann / G. Delahaye.
In sociolinguistics, an anti-language refers to a form of communication developed by marginalized groups to recognize one another, protect themselves, and remain unintelligible to outsiders. But linguistic resistance goes beyond clandestine languages. In this thematic dossier, we explore practices that subvert dominant norms, invent their own rules, and reject the obligation to make themselves understood. Language is far from neutral territory. Its history is shaped by power relations, colonization, and assimilation, but also by struggles and resistance.
Rina Kenović“The conflation of language and motherhood is no coincidence: it is an ideological construct directly tied to political discourses and processes of nation-building.”
Articles
CONVERSATION WITH RINA KENOVIĆ : PALESTINIAN MAGICAL REALISM AND THE POLITICS OF IMAGINATION
READ NOW
Mexican-Bosnian researcher, poet, performer, and translator Rina Kenović explores forms of expression that resist linguistic conventions. From experimental poetry to the myths surrounding the mother tongue, this conversation questions our need to understand everything, the power relations that determine what deserves to be translated, and the political possibilities of opacity. But where do we draw the line between resisting the demand to make oneself understood and elitism? What happens when a language refuses to be understood, when a poem defies translation, when words come undone and sounds take precedence over meaning?
FOOTNOTE
IS THE MOTHER TONGUE A NATIONAL FICTION?
(Soon)
The term “mother tongue” suggests a natural connection between our birth, our family, and our national belonging. In this Footnote, Isabella Utria Mago traces the political origins of this idea, showing how the myth of a single language has accompanied the formation of nation-states, the erasure of minoritized languages, and policies of assimilation. An invitation to rethink our linguistic identities beyond the borders and lineages imposed upon us.
COMPOST
ENCRYPTING POEMS WITH AMANDA BERENGUER
(Soon)
In 1966, Uruguayan poet Amanda Berenguer developed a singular theory she called “kinetic poetry,” in which words no longer simply convey meaning but become movement, rhythm, and sensory experience. A few years later, she took her experiments further, creating a cryptic form of writing as Uruguay descended into dictatorship. For this Compost, we publish “Kinetic Poetry,” a text translated into French by Rina Kenović, taken from the French edition of Composition d’un lieu.
For generations, assimilation policies have denied peoples the right to learn to read and write in their own languages. Even today, Indigenous languages almost always have to pass through a dominant language to be published. This text, whose origins we are keeping secret for now, is about rejecting this hierarchy, reclaiming spaces for speaking and writing, and defending the right to address one's own community without constantly having to translate oneself for others. Because it should not be up to minoritized languages to make themselves intelligible to those who have historically silenced them.
Every dossier leaves behind threads to follow, references, or stories only briefly touched upon. Web-Weaving picks up these loose ends. To close this dossier on anti-languages, we’ve chosen two examples that show how marginalized communities have developed their own ways of speaking to communicate with one another, recognize each other, and evade surveillance and dominant norms.
WEB-WEAVING
(Soon)
New Sections
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Interviews with people whose research, ideas, or experiences shed light on the themes explored by CENSORED.
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A selection of references recommended by the interviewee to extend the conversation through books, texts, films, images, and other resources.
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Visual essays that start from an image to explore what it tells, what it makes visible, and the cultural narratives it carries.
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Texts, images, archives, and other finds unearthed in the depths of the internet or elsewhere, brought back into circulation.
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Web-Weaving brings together the CENSORED team’s research for each dossier: references, links, archives, podcasts, articles and other discoveries. A way to make our research process visible.
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Because ideas should not stop at the borders of language, CENSORED translates and republishes articles from a feminist, queer, or independent media outlet somewhere in the world.
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Unexpected stories, overlooked connections and little-known histories from the worlds of culture, art and ideas.
We’ve conceived the new sections as a toolbox: each month, we select the formats best suited to exploring the theme from different perspectives. Here’s an introduction to each of them.
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CENSORED is an independent media platform dedicated to art, culture, and feminist and queer ideas. Each month, we explore a theme through a dossier that brings together conversations, articles, artworks, archives, and references.
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The sections are not fixed: they are chosen according to each theme and what it calls for. Conversations, articles, archives, images, references, and discoveries can take different forms from one dossier to the next. The aim is to create connections between the contents rather than fit them into a predefined framework.
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