ʇɹɐnɯɐ:joy
Content Warning: Some of these interviews contain references to sexual and physical assault, verbal and emotional abuse, homophobia, depression, racism, suicide attempts, and racialized trauma.
This project chronicles embodied experiences of joy and trauma, more specifically how our bodies ritualize and habitualize them. The past 3 years have been a true lesson in tightropes in which I have come to terms with my own embodied traumas, it is through this continued healing that I have come humbly to this project. The project consists of a video and 40 audio tracks from over 20 hours of conversations. After editing I reached out to folks to get their final consent.
I wanted to be in dialogue with all folks and bear witness to their testimonies of trauma and joy. Although each of us has unique trauma and joy stories there were undeniable threads in their stories and embodiments. If there is anything I have realized from this pandemic, it is the amount of invisible trauma we share collectively and the formidable culture of silence that keeps us from speaking. Similarly, I have understood the radical possibilities of joy and how truly enriching and liberating it is to articulate what sustains us. This project is a way for me to break those silences in communion with folks, and in this work, I was constantly reminded by the work of Black feminists bell hooks and Audre Lorde and their understanding of language and silence. In her essay The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action, Lorde stated a set of questions I ask myself daily “What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?” While we must commit ourselves to break both personal and shared silences, we also must understand what bell hooks articulates as “language as a place of struggle.” I intimately know the daunting feat of finding language for experiences that should remain shrouded in shame and fear. So when language fails us we must turn to the flesh, to our somatic responses, to our spirits, and hone in on more holistic ways of communicating.
Our bodies are bellwethers so when listening I ask that you reflect on your body’s response to every story and hold space to fully humanize each person’s testimonies. Each time you visit this page there will be a new order of the tracks, I wanted each listening experience to be user-generated and prompt you to see larger themes. In this work, I hope we can all parse out what it means for our body to ritualize and habitualize.
Incense was a crucial ritual to my research, it allowed me to stay grounded. I used it to center myself and cleanse the space before and after an interview. As we bear witness to some of the most tumultuous and triumphant moments of another person’s life we must attend to ourselves and set our boundaries. I urge you to ask yourself throughout the process how am I doing and where I am feeling it? I leave this video here so you may revisit it to cleanse your own spiritual space.
This project has been a true gift, I am deeply indebted to the folks who saw the passion I brought to it and reciprocated it by pouring themselves into the conversations. Thank you to James, Kim, Iris, Jared, Andres, Natalie, Hunter, Justin, Abby, and Maria. Like the healing process, this project does not feel done, and I hope to return to extend this over time.
Works Cited:
Lorde, Audre. (2017). The Transformation of Silence Into Language and Action. Retrieved December 07, 2020, from https://electricliterature.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/silenceintoaction.pdf
Hooks, Bell. “CHOOSING THE MARGIN AS A SPACE OF RADICAL OPENNESS.” Framework: The Journal of Cinema and Media, no. 36, 1989, pp. 15–23. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44111660. Accessed 7 Dec. 2020.
