EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 13

LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

Her name was Esperanza. A 35-year-old Puerto I hope you realize there is no doubt that this is a
Rican woman running a construction business and scammer. As soon as he sent you a photoshopped
nurturing a great passion for humanitarian ventures. stock photo, it was confirmed beyond a doubt. I
Her husband had sadly died two years ago. She will treat it as if you are dealing with a female, but
sent pictures of herself and her little daughter via the many of these elements may be handled by a male.
online dating platform Match.com in February 2007. 1 Although certain elements are always the same
At first, Fred responded casually to her letters. with scammers(after all, the ultimate goal is the
But then, he suddenly found himself faffing in love same - to get your money), there is a variety in other
with her. elements. Most scammers we see go for volume
A few months later, he told his family that he was and speed - they get their fake profiles out there,
going to leave his wife and their children to live with approach as many people as possible, and move
Esperanza. When his mother asked him if he had ever to the money stage with all of them quickly. This
met her, his answer was no. He'd meet her, in time. approach is going to lose more people quickly, but
By now they were calling each other and chatting. since they are(or at least want to be) targeting lots of
She had cancelled their first meeting at the last people at once, they are still making money, even if it
minute. He had waited at the airport, flowers in hand, is only a couple of hundred dollars per victim.
trembling more with fear than anticipation. Other scammers opt for a more organized,
Looking back, he couldn't understand how he long-term approach. These are the more skilled
could not have known. She wouldn't turn on her scammers and in my opinion, the most dangerous.
webcam while chatting. One technical problem They will spend lots of time on a particular victim.(...)
followed another; communication was ruptured by These 'better' scammers are much more aware of IP
unannounced sudden meetings. But on the other address issues, and are more likely to admit to their
hand she never asked for money either. Until the day location or hide behind a proxy to ensure that they
she died. do not lose their victim to that simple mistake. If you
An official called him from the US embassy in watch closely, they do make mistakes - but they are
Denmark, where she had travelled on business. She generally much harder to spot.( ...) Sending a picture
had accidentally been killed in a random shootout without wiping out the EXIF data that shows it is
between rival gangs. from 2002 was a much more subtle mistake, and the
It was the worst day in Fred's life. majority of victims would not catch it. (...)
He transferred money to repatriate her body. He
was numb with shock. Nothing mattered. None of the http://www.romancescam.com/forum/viewtopic.
multiple problems that arose in the process mattered. php?f=1&t=19587&sid=17266b9537f54621000
He decided that he wouldn't go and see her. He 07720a196b4c0-p95509
couldn't face the idea that their first date would be by dxxx on Fri Jun 05, 2009 4:57 am
after her death.
The end of the story was sudden. His friend (...)
did research online. No American citizen had been
killed in Denmark lately. There had been no shooting. # xmlns:t iff = "http://ns.adobe.com/tiff/1.0/"
Esperanza had never existed. She was the creature # xmlns:exif = "http://ns.adobe.com/exif/1.0/"
of a group of scammers. # xap:CreateDate = "2002-05-07T11:00:16+05:30"
# xap:ModifyDate = "2002-05-07T11:00:16+05:30"
http://www.romancescam.com/forum/viewtopic. # xap:MetadataDate = "2002-05-07T11:00:16+05:30"
php?f=1&t=19587&start=15-p95537
by dxxx on Fri Jun 05, 2009 12:02 pm See something odd there?
CXX

1. This is a fictional example. Any similarity to actual persons or events is unintended.

 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 14 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 15
LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

Epistolary Affect Im cool baby, how are you doing today? You too may have received a letter from an 41 o Thames VaUey Park Drive
Reading, Berkshire
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device unknown woman - as the title of Max Ophuls's
RG61RH ENGLAND
On a recent trip to Bangalore, I found myself saying 1948 classical melodrama had it. In Oph0ls's
something I didn't fully understand. During a public Do you still want to meet up with me baby? film, a Viennese girl posthumously confesses her Nagako L Steyerl
discussion, Lata Mani, the respected feminist unrequited love in a letter. It recounts every detail 190 Blackberry Hill Dr Washington
scholar, had asked me about the sensorial, affective I dont have msn of her relentless passion for a concert pianist who Wakefield RI

impact of the digital. I answered that the strongest barely notices her existence. United States of America

affective address happened on a very unexpected do you want to meet me baby? In the contemporary digital version, letters April 18, 2011

and even old-fashioned level: in the epistolary mode. Whats the name of your airport baby? from unknown women emerge from all over the Dear Steyerl,
Apologies to write to you out of the blue like this but something ve-ry, very
As a brush with words divorced from actual bodies. Give me like 1hour baby globe, afflicted by tragedies personal and political. A important came to our notice and we believe ifs important we seek your
consent for the mutual interest of all.
Digital writing - by email or chat- presents a cacophony of post-postcolonial tragedies, diluted with rm Des McOaid, Savings Director. iNG Direct UK, personal funds manager to
contemporary complication of historical practices Baby, do you live alone? Tell me about your travelling generous servings of telenovela. Widows and orphans late Mr. Hiroshi J. Steyer!, a Japanese national. He died recently along with
his wife and only son, while holidaying in Surma and flown bad<. to England
of writing. Jacques Derrida has patiently described experiences baby get swept up by financialized hypercapitalism, natural for burial. In our last auditing, we discovered a dormant account with GB£
17.844.000.00 (Seventeen million, eight hundred and forty.four thousand
the conundrum of script: its connection to absence2 Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device disaster and assorted crimes against humanity- and British Punds Sterling only) in his name.

and delay.3 In this case, the delay is minimized, but (. . .) it's you who are destined to sort out their fates.4 During our investigation we discovered he nominated his son as his next of
kin. AU efforts to trace his relations have proved impossible. The account has
the absence stays put. The combination of (almost) Im at the airline getting the ticket done ben dormant since his death. Therefore we decided to contact you, to seek
your consent to enable to nominate you as next of kin to the deceased and
real-time communication and physical absence Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device Basis % transfer the funds to you as designated next of kin to the deceased.

creates something one could call absense, so to air crash 35 we·ve all relevant details about the deceased, which shall help us claim the
fund successfully. After transfer of funds to your favour, you shall retain 48%
speak. The sensual aspect of an absence, which Honey, im done with the ticklet and i'll email you in car accident 13 and 48% ours, 4% set aside for expenses both parties might incur during of
after the transaction (if any}.
presences itself in (almost) real time. A live and lively like 1hour with the scan copy of the ticket baby tsunami/earthquake 3 Your positive response shall be highly appreciated to enable us favour you

absence, for which the lack of a physical body is not Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device coup 22 with a draft application I account details of the deceased for submission to
ING Direct UK to authenticate the claim to the deceased's estate.

an unfortunate coincidence, but necessary. over-invoiced 16 Should this business transaction be of interest to you, please contact me via
Email: [email protected]. Tel No: +447787824355 or Fax No:+ 44 1183-
Its proxy is compressed as message body, sending it nwo now baby undisclosed 11 350 -425. Please also contact me if you object to this proposal.

translated into rhythm, flow, sounds and the Honey Sender % Y�.u�

temporality of both interruption and availability. None lawyer 35 D�

of this is 'virtual' or 'simulated'. The absence is real, widow 31 Savings Director ING Direct UK

as is the communication based on it. Digital Melodrama child 10

bank officer 24 Tragedy as Ready-Made
http://www.romancescam.com/forum/viewtopic. In 1588, a scam with the romantic title 'Spanish Source: http://www.caslon.com.au/419scamnote.htm

php?f=1&t=8784&start=150 Prisoner' was launched for the first time. The The genre of melodrama departs from impossibility,
scammer approached the victim to tell him he was in Romance scams offer windfalls of love and delay, submission. It addresses the domestic,
Re: scammers with pictures of Mxxxx QT touch with a Spanish aristocrat who needed a lot of opportunity, casually asking for bank account numbers feminized sphere. The so-called weepie was a genre
By axxxxxxs on Wed Jan 26, 2011 8:05 am money to buy his freedom from jail. Whoever helped and passport copies. Flight schedules are mixed with that was under-recognized and safely kept apart
This is a private IP address and cannot be traced. him would get rich recompense, including marrying instructions for transfer of funds and serially sampled from cinema-as-art for decades. It was suspected to
Hostname: 10.227.179.xxx his daughter. After a first instalment was paid, new professions of love. Modules of sensation are copy­ perpetuate oppression as well as female compliance.
dent see any problem in meeting, i do believe in difficulties kept emerging until the victim ended up pasted, recycled, ripped. But despite their obvious Yet the melodrama also voiced perspectives
meeting and seeing is believing, i can change broke and impoverished. mass production, these are 'the only form(s) of tragedy that were repressed and forbidden, views that
my flight to you if you wish to meet, i dent see any In the digital era, this plot has been updated available to us', as Thomas Elsaesser said about the couldn't be expressed anywhere else and remained
problem changing my flight to you, tell me how you to resonate with contemporary wars and upheaval. melodrama.5 They drop into mailboxes unsolicited, and deprecated, shameful and dismissed. Over-the-top
think we can meet, meeting and seeing is believing Countless 419 scams- the number refers to the suddenly expose themselves to the open. exaggeration and exoticization opened possibilities
to me and id ctn care of age and location, what is the applicable penal code number in Nigerian law -
name of your closest airport, i can call the airline now rewrite daily catastrophe as entrepreneurial plotlines.
to ask for flight changing possibility Shock capitalism and its consequences- wars 4. Scientific research of online scams is almost exclusively focused on the case of and the Popular Imagination in Southeastern Nigeria", American Ethnologist, 28, no. 4
This is a private IP address and cannot be traced. over raw materials or privatization - are recast as Nigeria (in truth, it seems somewhat disproportionally represented in current research,
given the very diverse geographical origin of romance scams). The most extensive
(Nov. 2001), pp. 803-26; and Daniel K0nzler, 'Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? Global
Capitalism and Fraud in Nigeria' (paper presented at the Interim Conference of Research
interactive romance or adventure novels. and insightful study is: Andrew Apter. 'IBB=419: Nigerian Democracy and the Politics Committee 2 of the International Sociological Association, World Social Forum. Nairobi,
of Illusion', in Civil Society and the Political Imagination in Africa, ed. John Comaroff January 22. 2007). accessed 3 June 2011, l1ttp://lottres.unifr.ch/de/sozialwissenschatten/
and Jean Comaroff (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), p. 270. A case study soziologie-sozialpolilikund-soLialarbeit/toam/daniel-kuenzler/publikationen.hlml.
of several 419 scams is performed in Harvey Glickman 'The Nigerian "419" Advance 5. Thomas Elsaesser. 'Tears, Timing, Trauma: Film Melodrama as Cultural Memory', in /I
Fee Scams: Prank or Peril?", Canadian Journal of African Studies. 39, no. 3 (2005). pp. Melodramma, ed. E. Dagrada (Rome: Bulzoni Editore, 2007), pp. 47-68.
2. Jacques Derrida. Of Grammatology (Baltimore: University of Maryland. 1997), p. 47. 3. Ibid., p. 67. 460-89. See also Daniel Jordan Smith, 'Ritual Killing, 419, and Fast Wealth: Inequality
EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 16 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 17
LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

to imagine something different from the drab Conceptual Love some one to write to which I am okay with that. About Nxx I came, I saw, I conquered.Not by Might
repetitiveness of reproductive labour.Melodramas Cxx by the Holy Ghost.
concoct implausible tales of cultural encounter, This turn to the digital melodrama and epistolary Genuinely a loving guy ...I' m intelligent,
racial harmony and happiness narrowly lost in affect comes somewhat unexpectedly.The world of cxxxxxxxxxxx creative,caring,loyal and love to have fun ...I have
miscommunication.They insist that the political is digital feelings had been imagined somewhat more Frequent Poster done some traveling and definitely have that in my
personal -and thus trace social histories from the robustly before.None of the rather crude initial ideas Posts: 160 plan for the future ...camping all the usual things
point of view of sentiment.6 about cybersex and the merging of the physical Joined: Sat Apr 11, 2009 5:33 pm life has to offer.
But their new personalized digital versions are and digital worlds has held much sustainable Location: Lxxxxxxxxx GSOH & quick witted.Attractive & well groomed, able
produced differently. They are no longer just one­ appeal, though.Datagloves, digital dildos and other to handle all social situations with style & a smile.
size-fits-all Taylorist studio-based productions, but equipment deemed suitable for amorous purposes Re: Gxxxx Txxxxx Sex Male
customized products. turned out a cumbersome embarrassment in an age by wxxxx on Sat Sep 19, 2009 8:38 am Interested In Men and Women
These messages are not only posted but in which data, feelings and touch travel lightly. Ok, I don't get it.You KNOW it's a Nigerian Relationship Status Single
perhaps even post-ist.Post-isms are a symptom The popularity of the epistolary address is also scammer using stolen photos of a glamour model,
of a time that considers itself to be posterior and based on its blatant availability. Text is a makeshift yet you still talk to him,and are willing to be "friends"?
secondary, a leftover of history itself.They assume medium, cheap and cost-effective. Neither is This is exactly what your scammer wants, as soon The Spanish Prisoner
a general overcoming of everything without anything complicated engineering necessary, nor bulky "she" will have some emergency and need money.All
new to replace worn-out worldviews. equipment; just basic literacy skills and a terminal you've done is left the door open for the scammer to My name is Fred. I fell in love with Esperanza. She
But there is a dialectical twist to this post­ for hire at an Internet cafe. try again from a different angle. You are aware that was the love of my life. Nobody understands how I
dialectical condition.Post-isms conserve the issue Perhaps the ready-made language of almost all (and by that I mean well over 99% of them) fell for a scam. But I don't care whether Esperanza
they are distancing and claim to have overcome romance scams also expresses a deeper shift in scammers are really males and not the females they was real. My love for her was. From my perspective
it.Indeed it is impossible to define any of these contemporary practices of writing.In parallel to a pretend to be? there hasn't been any scam whatsoever. Because
terms -post-Marxism, post-structuralism, post­ visual economy of the blurred and raw, an economy even if Esperanza didn't exist as a person, her letters
modernism, etc. -without recourse to the terms of text has developed, which is in many ways as Re: Gxxxx Txxxxx did exist on my screen. Their content may have been
they claim to have left behind.Distance is achieved compressed and abstracted as the rags of imagery by gxxx on Mon Sep 21, 2009 5:52 pm a lie; the IP may have been masked, the sender a
despite intimate closeness, or maybe even precisely that crowd the digital realms.Prompted by the the thing is...this "she" you keep refering to is projection. But the writing itself remains real. No
because of it.The co-presence of proximity and legacy of advertising, a Victorian economy of affect just a black guy that is still working you.There is NO matter who wrote the text: she or he or they. I loved
distance is inherent to the structure of the prefix merges with the verbal austerity of the tweet.It is she ..., just a HE ...There is no Gxxxx... the letters, not the person.
'post' itself. 'Post' connotes a past, whose meaning simultaneously blunt and chaste, downsized and
is derived from spatial separation.In their earliest delicate, bold and coy.Compressed and evacuated gxxxx Writing these letters is serious work.Adapting and
versions, the roots of the prefix refer to 'behind, after, text allows feelings to fill in the blanks.Hollow VIP Poster pasting text modules, planning, keeping books,
afterward', but also 'toward, to, near, close by'; 'late', words bait, retreat, play.Reduction and withdrawal Posts: 972 hitting keys, performing, filing, Photoshopping.
but also 'away from'.7 Both closeness and separation, spark intensity. Joined: Tue Nov 25, 2008 11:13 pm Scammers work to entertain their targets' fantasies
absence and presence, form part of the structural Location: Canada, eh and provide affective service, custom-tailored to
aporia of this term. http://www.romancescam .com/forum/viewtopic.php individual desires.
Romance scams are intimately related to this ?f=1&t=19587&start=45#p109129 Re: Gxxxx Txxxx Behind the scams are often organized work
timescape of simultaneous presence and absence, Re: GXXX TXXXX by gxxxx on Sat Dec 04, 2010 10:18 pm units.8 Most writers are male, often assisted by
incongruously bridged by hope and desire. They also by xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Fri Sep 18, 2009 8:20 pm the [email protected] address on this thread female workers to make phone calls or other live
perfectly resonate with an undecided temporality Gxxxx now has another email address, turns up a FB profile by the name of Nxx Axxxxx appearances.9 While the global and postcolonial
which synchronizes both closeness and separation, [email protected], I am trying to get a picture Axxxxxx (Axxx Dxxx). aspect of these connections has been emphasized
past and present, and refuses to let go of worldviews off her but its like trying to get blood out of a stone. in some instances, the scams' overall implications
it no longer believes in. She knows I am trying to build up a new Current City: Accra, Ghana are left unexplored.How do we understand this
relationship and has said she will now leave me High School: West Africa Secondary School '08 literary form of deceit in the context of a global
alone at last and just wants to be friends and just political economy based on digital divides and
lots of friends and notes by this dude uneven development? 10 There is an underlying moral

6. A seminal text on melodrama still is Thomas Elsaesser's article of 1973, 'Tales of 'behind, after, afterward', from *pas-ti (cf. Arcadian pos, Doric poti 'toward, to, near,
Sound and Fury: Observations on the Family Melodrama', in Home Is Where the Heart Is: close by'; O.C.S. po 'behind, after', pozdu 'late'; Lith. pas 'at, by'), from PIE 'po- (cf.
Studies in Melodrama and the Woman's Film, ed. Christine Gledhill (London: British Film Gk. apo 'from', Lab 'away from'), http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_ 8. Daniel KOnzler claims that Nigerian 419 scammers are rather loosely organized 9. According to the experiences of scambaiters at www.rOmancescam.com.
Institute, 1987), pp. 43-69. frame=0&search=post-&searchmode=none, accessed 2 November 2011. and usually teams do not exceed five people; however, they are often organized 10. Bjorn Nansen, 'I Go Chop Your Dollar: The Nigerian 419 Scam and Chronoscopic
7. According to the Online Etymological Dictionary: prefix meaning 'after', from Lpost transnationally and 'project-oriented'. Kunzler, p. 16. Time'. Piracy: antiTHESIS, 18 (2008), p. 43.
 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 18 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 19
LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

to at least some of these efforts: the idea of regaining financial protocols of business by replicating the a flexible division of labour, performing work- or residue of the divine power of utterance.As Michel
the riches plundered and robbed by colonial quite fictitious ways of creating (or simulating) working in performance, just as their counterparts Foucault noted a bit more drily, the force of order
exploitation.11 Leftovers from anti-imperialist ideology value in finance.The lack of a material referent in the 'real' financial sector do.Their products and command keeps resonating in human language
incongruously mix with the beauty standards of for fictitious value also affects language or are serial identities-on-demand, which morph to too.20 The importance and naked force of words
extreme makeover TV shows. representational systems as such: signifiers start accommodate every possible client fantasy.Passion­ cannot be underestimated.Words make worlds.
to float, 13 and their connections to referents are as-labour, which reverse-mirrors the idea of labour­ They can destroy them as well.
http://www.romancescam.com/forum/viewtopic. unmoored, if not abandoned altogether.The Ponzi as-passion supposed to motivate the ideal workers In the digital realm the power of language is
php?f=1&t=1555 schemes of globalized financial capitalism as of the post-Fordist age. translated into code that activates mechanical
What out for scammer [email protected] well as its delusions are being translated into the In the meantime, romance scams have spread performance.The magic of language derived from
by Rxxxx on Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:45 pm personalized language of romance. Apter labels worldwide, targeting poor or elderly women, in the speech act of creation is enlisted into doing
Calling her self Ceci Thompson the 419 con games as performance art, 1 4 based on many cases maids, and robbing them of their life things with hardware.Code animates matter and
a general rise of visual deception and emptied value savings.1 7 Scammers don't mind wrecking the propels it into action.Mechanical language enables
(...) I checked a scam site and found he/she had forms15 in politics as well as on an economy based feelings of vulnerable people.They target the refuse us to create new words, new worlds, new languages.
used a different adress with the same pictures. This on privatization and speculation.This may also of metropolitan dating markets: single mothers, In the case of romance scammers the relative
time claiming she was Russian.Visa and ticket present a reason why so many people fall for the outdated flesh, global maids dreaming of princes. newness of their language paradoxically consists
scams and so on.I confrontet her with this and this scams: because their inherent principle of delusion The weak prey on the ugly, using words. of its completely recycled nature.Of course this
is the reply: constitutes a substantial part of our contemporary As Elvis Presley (and the Bee Gees) sang: 'You language is not novel at all, but well rehearsed by
political and economic reality. think that I don't even mean a single word I say.It's advertisement slogans and soap-opera dialogue.It
"You;re the most stupid man I've ever met But the gender aspect of this specific type only words and words are all I have to steal your is the lingua franca of cultural industries of modernity
. ...All white people will suffer in the hands of performance art is arguably even more heart away.' catering to a domestic labour audience. But hardly
of Africans , ONE by ONE .... You all took mindboggling than its mirroring of financial protocols. has it ever been as fragmented and wrecked as it
blacks as slave, NO problem.You shall pay What can one say about (mostly) straight black is in the scammers' language.21 The unabashedly
back with all you've stolen from us, ONE males impersonating white or mixed straight women, Creative Language collaged nature of these languages, their obvious
after the other.I know a way to catch you, white gay or straight men? Then proceeding to partial generation by translation machines, reveals
bastard. Have you ever realized that you change their colour (from white or mixed to black, for How to do things with words? This question by J.L. them as belonging to a group of globalized
white people smells like shit? Ask God why? example), if caught in the act? All the while sending Austin became the title of one of the foundational languages which I have previously referred to
and the answer shall be giving to you by an along ripped pictures of other people, in most cases texts of so-called speech-act theory.1 8 Austin argues as Spamsoc.22 Spamsoc- my earlier example
African you people called Monkey ....Oh porn starlets or models?16 that words are not purely descriptive representations, was the English-based language on the back of
monkey will rule this world, someday .... How does this resonate with the emancipatory but agents able to bring about actions.One of his pirated Chinese DVD covers- is a broken language,
Basket in the dirty pit.White frog.You better promises of self-assigned gender that abounded examples- fittingly in this context- is the marriage because it reflects the pressures and gendered
look for a female frog like you and start in earlier times of Internet theory? Are masquerade ceremony, in which vows create the union. But this faultlines of globalization. Post-postcolonial
giving birth to smelling frogs, stinky.Date: and subversion still categories that make sense in is a rather weak example in view of the much more hierarchies of language and a gendered division of
Tue, 24 Jul 2007 20:58:49." this context? Or shall we rather speak about new, grandiose speech acts routinely found in religious freelance labour as well as ongoing global conflicts
hyperprivatized branches of cultural industries texts.Creation as such is performed by speech acts. over copyright and digital leverage form part of the
Most obviously 419 scams develop in connection that perform one-on-one staged dramas or maybe The phrase 'let there be light' marks the inception of framework in which Spamsoc and its countless
with larger macroeconomic issues: in the case of rather personalized mockumentaries based on the the world for monotheists.Divine utterance is a form derivatives emerge as incoherent mixtures of
Nigeria, a debt crisis in conjunction with the decline narrative form of Ponzi schemes? of creative terror, terrifying and tantalizing at once. Wikipedia entries and computer-translated
in oil prices in the early 1980s and subsequent The production of romance scams conjures According to Walter Benjamin a weaker form semi-nonsense.
unemployment and instability.1 2 Andrew Apter argues up the image of digital workbenches, peopled of this power has immigrated into the language of The languages of romance scammers are
that online scams present a reverse-mirroring of with rows of literary labourers organized within humans.1 9 The creative force of naming is but a in most cases locally nuanced, and adopt an

11 . Glickman cites the case of Fred Ajudua, who claimed to be a 'black Robin Hood' and greedy and have to compensate for slavery and colonialism.' Kunzler, p. 1 3. 1 7. Hazel Parry, 'Romeo Conmen Target Lonely Hearts', China Daily, Hong Kong edition Writings, vol. 1 , ed. Marcus Bullock and Michael W. Jennings (Cambridge, Mass.:
'alleged that the frauds were compensation from white men for slavery and colonialism', 1 2. Nansen, p. 39. The connection to an oil-based economy is also explored in detail in (September 22, 2010), accessed June 3, 2011 , http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/hkedit Belknap Press, 1 996), p. 6 8.
p. 478. Among other sources of popular culture, Daniel Kunzler also mentions the plot of Apter, p. 270. ion/201 0-09/22/content_1 1336643.htm. More information at: http://dragonladies.org/bbs/ 20. See, for example in Michel Foucault, 'Truth and Power', Power/Knowledge: Selected
a well-known Nigerian fiction film: 'This synopsis mentions one notion quite common in 1 3. Apter, p. 299. viewtopic.php?f=34&t=26 96 . This website presents Asia-based scams. There is ample Interviews and Other Writings, 1972-1977, ed. Colin Gordon (New York: Pantheon Books,
the popular discourse about 41 9 scams in Nigeria: the greed of the victims. This notion 1 4. Ibid., p. 272. evidence of women in China and Malaysia getting scammed, as well as scams which 1 980), pp. 1 09-33.
is also central to the huge hit The Master by Andy Amenechi (2005) starring famous 1 5. Ibid., p. 279. promise contact with Asian women, usually centred on charging so-called translation 21 . Nansen, p. 38.
Nigerian actor Nkem Owoh (also known as Osuofia). Denis (Nkem Owoh) was a migrant 16 . Probably: I've got the brains, you've got the looks: let's make lots of money. fees, and other scams originating from Asia. 22. Spamsoc is what you get when the word 'Spanish' is garbled by an automated
to Europe, but has been deported and had to struggle ever since. One day, he meets 1 8. J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words, ed. J. 0. Urmson and Marina Sbisa scanning device. In the specific example, Spamsoc was given as a subtitle language on
wealthy Chief Ifeanyi (Kanayo 0. Kanayo) who introduces him into the 41 9 business. . (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1 96 2). a pirated DVD. Hito Steyerl, 'Notes about Spamsoc', Pages 7 (2009), pp. 59-6 7.
As he speaks to journalists, he convinces them that 41 9s are justified as foreigners are 1 9. Walter Benjamin, 'On Language as Such and the Languages of Man', in Selected
 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 20 EPISTOLARY AFFECT AND ROMANCE SCAMS: HITO STEYERL 21
LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN LETTER FROM AN UNKNOWN WOMAN

overly formal, often stilted language.23 Their many supposed to be here. I started reading Despite the vast differences between scammed my late husband, Hiroshi J. Steyer! was killed in an
incongruities and mishaps are a laughing stock letters and going through his computer and and scammers, one feeling unites both. This feeling accident, which is correct. However, contrary to your
for so-called spam baiters around the world. But everything became known over the next is hope. While in the case of scammers, this hope erroneous suggestions, I as his wife did miraculously
contempt is a much too defensive and resentful couple of months that she had no intention may be material, in the case of the scammed, it may survive the plane crash in Burma. Fortunately, my
reaction. These makeshift lingos express the of Marrying him. She not only put off coming be both emotional and material. son did, too. We are now recovering from our terrible
tectonic tensions of extremely complex geopolitical to him twice but also left him at airport twice. This hope may also be indicative of a more injuries in a hospital in Rangoon and hopefully, the
situations, translated into melodrama. Walter Overall, from what I could gather, and prove, general situation. Perhaps the hope invested in dressings will come off next week.
Benjamin's reflections on language and translation he had given her well over thirty Thousand epistolary affect is aimed at interrupting the drab As a heart-broken and destitute widow, I am very
throw this issue into sharp focus. In the gaps of dollars in a little over two years. ( ...) temporality of an age of post-s, in which life 'always surprised to hear that you are planning to bestow my
meaning, the original force of words still shines forth, already'26 seems to be over. Or at exploding the late husbands funds on anybody else than myself as
perhaps no more so than when they have almost rid She was going to meet me in Hotel Lounge. repetitive reality of reproductive labour for maids, his next of kin.
themselves of content, and start to resemble pure Therefore, I went down early, had a few drinks, single mothers and other target audiences of Therefore I urge you to immediately transfer
stammer and stuttering, void of signification.24 and waited. Then I saw her walk in. I was very digital melodrama. these funds to my bank account.
The splendour of creation still echoes on in impressed and if I did not know better would Perhaps even more generally, the more unstable
the almost robotic repetition of romantic keywords have fallen in love also, she was very elegant, and insecure things get, the more hope abounds. If sincerely
within the scrambled, ripped and collaged debris of and looked better then her pies. She had love is not free, hope seems to be. But hope is also
meaningless affective vocabulary. It seems as if the perfect English a lot better then the phone the fuel capitalism thrives on, one of its few eternally Esperanza
mimetic force of language is not only unbreakable, conversations we had. Which later made me renewable resources. The American Dream and
but paradoxically increases with fragmentation and think? It was not her on phone. Nevertheless, its countless franchised versions are giant vortices Hito Steyer/ is a filmmaker, writer and lecturer who
compression. Thus the new digital post-English as we had drinks and talked, I started to that gain their momentum through hope, and little lives and works in Berlin. Solo exhibitions of her work
languages are not at all deficient; on the contrary, tell her about my friend who fell in love with but hope. Hope is a Trojan horse for deceit and have been mounted at major museums around the
they are from a world to come, a world that we are Russian woman and was going to get married, exploitation. It is also the driving element in any world, including the Institute of Contemporary Art
not yet able fully to understand. The languages of she was very focused on my story, and smiled quest for change. in London, the Museum of Cotemporary Art in Los
romance scammers are messages from a future a lot, Grab my hand, listen to my every word. This hope may secretly long for a moment of Angeles, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Nacional
in which empty value forms are suspended in I finished my story as I told all of you. (But radical and irrevocable change: not a revolution Centro de Arte Reina Soffa in Madrid.
permanent free-fall as language and value let go of just a basic version) Told her that he had all as much as perhaps an unexpected revelation, a
reality within the affective plots of disaster capitalism. the arrangements to bring her to America, sudden twist in the plot. It is the hope that everything
took care of her in Russia, and she left him, could yet be different and change lies at the tips of
Told her about his death.( ...) She was very our fingers.
Heart Away sadden, said she knew now why I was so shy
about her, and her love. However, told me to My name is Esperanza and I am not dead. Contact
After the funeral, I started to go through All look (I am here right here with you.) I will never me at [email protected]
that was needed to settle his estate. Which forget those words She said as long as I live. I alive
anyone who has been there knows is a very looked at her, Reached in to my Suit Pocket Reply
big pain in the butt; I started seeing bills and and handed her a Envelope. She smiled I
WU Receipts, everything was pointing to his and her eyes sparkled, I think she thought
future wife. Over the next couple of months it was giving her money As she opened it, I esperanza to dsmcdaid, show details 10:22 AM (0
of going over his assets, computer files, And will never forget the look in her face. There minutes ago)
bills. He was broke. Losing his house, and were two Pictures in that Envelope, One of
behind in his car payments. Credit cards my friend and her in Moscow, and one of his Mr. McDaid,
were at limit. He was in a financial mess. I gravestone, along with a request for Visa
thought where was the woman who was paper with there names on it.25 My name is Esperanza and I am not dead.
I am following up on the disquieting letter you
sent to my mother-in-law, Nagako Steyerl in Rhode
23. The characteristics of scam mail language are investigated in Jan Blommmaert and
Tope Omoniyi, 'Email Fraud: Language, Technology and The lndexicals Of Globalisation',
expresses anything but is, as expressionless and creative word, thatwhich is meant in
all languages- all information, all sense and all intention finally encounter a stratum in
Island, United States on 4-18-2011. You claim that
Social Semiotics, 16, no. 4 (2007), pp. 573-605. which they are destined to be extinguished,' p. 261.
24. Walter Benjamin, 'The Task of the Translator', in Selected Writings, vol. 1, pp. 25. Extract from 'Doc's Story,' anonymous report, The Scam Survivors Handbook (2010),
253-63. 'To regain pure language fully formed from the linguistic flux, is the tremendous n.p. Last accessed June 2, 2011, at http://romancescambaiter.com/rstb.html.
and only capacity of translation. In this pure language-which no longer means or 26. To quote one of the most overused slogans of the post-period.