An academic talk, I assume, will have a standard format: “Here’s what I’m going to do, here’s me doing it, here’s what I did, questions?†The do/did/done is usually particular research, lots of (beautiful) jargon (#HomoNationalism, #Schizoanalysis, #FungibilityAndAccumulation), and a take away that blows something (my mind, not something (just blows), etc.). I am used to this format. This format gives me comfort. There is a certain formula/art, if you will, to the standard talk.
When the normal academic talk is disrupted, however, by queer-black-dance identity, I know this talk isn’t just an art form but art itself. Here are some signs:
1. There is a Wii controller that, when it moves, adjusts sounds that I’ve never heard before–whirrs and chants and whizzes and vhroooooongs.
2. Every so often the mouse on screen ventures into the unknown, seemingly jumping from the screen onto the board to drag another window (invisible) into plain sight. As if all computer windows are always open but invisible to the naked eye, all information like atoms, tucked away into the smallest depths of reality, the mouse dragged j-stepping videos into plain sight. J-step over here and over there, and all of a sudden the talk stopped to only watch a video (all with accompanying Wii controller controlled sound).
3. Before long all windows flashed away from the screen and a lone Word document lay in our midst. The cursor blinks in a terrifyingly regular way, more steady than my own heart or the internal metronome keeping the Wii controller controlled. Words, fragments, phrases, and identities appear. Are corrected. Disappear. Move on.
4. There is silence. Between words, sentences, remarks, sounds. He stares back at our staring eyes.
Some talks have audio-visual components, but again–â€I’m playing this for you, here it is, wow, I just played that–cool.†“OH MY, I’m going to play this video for you, BAM, here it is, AH! it just played.â€
This academic talk was less talk more performance art. Hinging on creative interests and experiences as an artist, dancer, queer person of color, it was no surprise that Tomm(ie/y) would disrupt our notions of an academic talk to center himself along the edges, cracks, and space in order to create something that was original and unique. Something that wouldn’t just talk about “Dancing [Black|Queer] Diasporas†but be dancing, black, queer diasporas.
Blackness and Queerness disrupt most things in civil society, if not all things. In my experience they (it, since I identify as Queer) do so in a beautiful way by allowing for more possibilities than first realized.
The talk finished, the questions answered, and then we danced.
We were to dance Black dance insofar as Black dance is an aesthetic style appropriated by some, embodied by some, and rendered (un)intelligible by some. The beat to 212 (by, yes, Azealia Banks) started to play and I knew that this was some pivotal moment in my life. We were beckoned to stand up (if able) and an individual led us through several dance moves that involved hip and bum movement, dropping it low, and sidestepping. We laughed and danced and became community all while the beat beat beat beat beat.
Coming back to campus, coming (back) to academia, and coming back to beloved spaces, it was nice to have a Monday night interrupted with dance, art, performance art, and a big queer audience of which to be a part.
The world said “welcome back†to Ann Arbor and we replied “I guess that . . . gettin eatin.â€
Author: Taylor
The art of knowing myself
Each semester at University has had its distinct theme:
Fall 2011: HOLY SHIT THIS IS COLLEGE. THIS IS WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE GAY, TO FAIL, TO PUT MYSELF OUT THERE, TO NEVER SLEEP, AND TO NEVER STOP DANCING.
Winter 2012: Oh, this is what it’s like to never see the sun and to never stop reading and to lose my eyesight and myself.
Fall 2012: This is what love feels like, this is what it’s like to have people who get you and are there for you, this is what experience feels like.
Winter 2012: Things fall apart, things will be ok, the world doesn’t exist but it’s prettier that way.
Fall 2013: Summer can last into fall but winter comes quick and this is what it’s like to dive into a snowbank of knowledge and feels and space.
Winter 2013: I know myself and I love myself. I will fall I will cry I will learn I will grow I will succeed and I will become closer to myself.
After 6 (woah!) semesters I can firmly say that I am closer to knowing myself than ever before. I have changed so much and I will continue to change but I finally feel like I’m am reaching a comfortable plateau of selfhood.
I realize that I have people who are there for me. My family has grown out from the same house to inhabit two states thousands of miles away and somedays I only love technology to hear their voices. I am so happy that I live with a great friend and that I am only minutes and miles away from others. I am so blessed to have a network that believe in the same things I do and that, no matter what, they will be there to keep me rooted and keep me challenged so I can continue to grow. My network remains friendly, leftist, queer, and anti-society, and they let me know that my feelings are always valid.
But outside of the family I have and have created there are days where I seem to disappear. I float between walls and windows and lose myself to others and to clouds. But I remain trapped within the world and reality and I know my limits and know my comfort. I can feel a landslide and can feel destruction and that feeling morphs into self-care that I have finally honed.
University has taught me so much. I have taught myself so much. I am being taught everyday. Knowledge has gained an immense value this semester because it comes in the form of classes, groups, friends, parties, clubs, reading groups, books, music, and the sun. Knowing that knowing comes from everything in my life is comforting.
And after reaching this plateau I sometimes take excursions off the cliff and into the hidden depths of lakes and potholes that remain ever present. I let myself feel too much, I invest too much. And this surplus of trust that spills over into, now, ruin has helped me stay vulnerable. Vulnerability has been my biggest teacher this semester and that’s ok.
So at the end of the day, the end of the semester, and the end of winter I can say that I at least know and love myself. Some will enter my life and then leave, some will stay for a while and part ways, some will be taken from me. But there is a beautiful art to knowing myself and loving myself that I can finally say that I am starting to understand. And only in this position now can I say that I am so happy to continue to grow, to love, to learn, and to go blue.
queer love, rainbows, fire, and poetry.
until next semester,
taylor.
I am a professional.
I came to werq.
Cat eyes? Check. Heels? Check. Hair did? Check. Necklace? Check. Lipstick? Check. Bitch face? Check. Now I sat that Catwalk Extravaganza like I had got the day on to perform. Like I had planned the song, the mood, the scene. But baby that is next year’s tea.
There are a few things you learn at a drag show that you cannot learn anywhere else.
1) How to put it all out on the line: Wigs fly, nips slip, heels break, but you know what? That’s not the point. These ladies strut and vogue and break their ass till it can’t break no more. There is an air of confidence in whatever they do that I have not found anywhere else. There is fierceness in one twitch of the eye all the way done to the point of the toe. And I live and die for that one performance that takes your breath away.
2) How to fail in the right way: Lines get forgotten but faces never do. As long as she strikes a pose, no matter the length, the werq is being done. Every move counts and if things don’t work—and sometimes they don’t—who care? She still has the stage, she still has the audience, she still has the music. Just being with hundreds of people that support her is amazing. Time isn’t over until . . . it never stops. The curtain never falls. Because when it falls she’s done.
3) How to walk like a straight man: There is nothing more ridiculous than the girl that does not do. Her shoulders slump, her legs quake, and all of a sudden I feel like I’m watching hundreds of straight men walk around campus (the horror!). My average party trick is failing to walk in the straight way, honey, but it comes and it goes but it is at the drag show. It . . . can werq too. As long as you own it—success, failure, straight, camp, queen, diva. Plus, it allows for some great social commentary and analysis. The show is a show is show is a performance is theory is everything.
4) How to choose the right drag song: It. is. an. art. form. Science? It can’t be too fast because mmhmm legs do not gyrate well in 7-inch platform stilettos. No they don’t. Can’t be too slow, unless it’s meant to, because the vibrato jaw has to be practiced, there is no winging it ( . . . there’s tape for that . . . ). It can’t be too new because girl is not at Necto and she is definitely not country unless it’s Dolly and she can read poetry, she can just pose, she can dance in silence, but. There’s always one song where you wish you could just turn back time.
Drag shows at the U happen infrequently (cough cough @ the Catwalk Extravaganza, only?). This is a place for everyone. Inclusivity is where it’s at. Children, adults, students, teachers, the whole gamut shows up because entertainment happens at a drag show. It is a time and place to be ridiculous and fabulous and not give a care. Plus, there is some great dancing, lip-syncing, and (t)werqing that is not at the clubs nor the classroom nor the diag.
This is my type of cultural event. These are my people. This is it.
Death of the Meme
On Thursday night at the Michigan Difference Leadership Event there was a portion of the show dedicated to “dying memes and other cultural phenomena.â€
What does this even mean?
It was a montage of Honey Boo Boo–who I luckily avoided on my recent hiatus from tv/internet, the Harlem Shake–aka appropriative white people convulsing to a bastardized song, someone driving a car–sadly not Glozell, Taylor Swift–singing without goats (because that gem will never die), and others. Put to sad music we “mourned†this YouTube video while staring at a screen, in the union, in Ann Arbor: far away from anyone who is connected to these glimpses of “culture.†I felt like I was cheering for a cement wall so I decided to eat more cheese.
But these “cultural†phenomena won’t pass away. There will always be someone getting their own TV show for being “different,†white people will always be awkward and offensive, people will always drive (not me!), Taylor Swift will continue to age but sing for adolescent girls while she simultaneously shames their existence.
Even then, these “2012-2013†memes and videos will live on. Bon Qui Qui and Nyan Cat are still out there, Afrocircus? Still out there. As long as we have Internet we will always have our entertaining distractions.
That’s what fascinates me. Do things ever disappear from the Internet or get destroyed? Or do they stay on the web forever? Will we be able to access these things in years to come? Decades? Centuries?
New forms of art have a lifetime that is infinite and preservable. That awkward vlog you made will outlast you. That offensive tweet I tweeted will stay on twitter till it tweets its dying tweet. My rage toward the world on Facebook will be eternal rage. That’s badass.
So as I write my final papers, study for my last exams, drink pots of coffee, check the weather for NYC (and not Ann Arbor), dress inappropriately for the rain, accidentally leaves bits of clothing everywhere I visit, and eat carrots—that man’s abs I reblog that are “artsy†or that video I favorite will never leave the world. They may leave my vision, or my mind, but they are only a click away.
Not that kind of Queen . . .
I be on my suit and tie. Benjamin in hand. Nails painted. This is what I call dressed to the nines. In fact I’m the nines: a cat. Manx? Marx.
I get to my $14 dollar seat and the aisle is worth the price, let me tell you. I get to stretch my feet, bend my legs broken doll style, and stare up and the ceiling that will probably astound me for years to come. What if a lightbulb burns out? A ladder from the balcony does not seem practical. A cherry picker? At Hill?
?
The Oresteia is a trilogy by Aeschylus. Good plays. Amazing plays. Or so my freshman year self said to myself as I bought the tickets and waited weeks filled with anticipation. Each day I had flashbacks to Great Books 191 at 9 am with all of the “honors freshman.†To 2 am nights at the Law Quad while I furiously read Greek tragedy after Greek tragedy–like Gilmore Girls episodes.
I take my seat and gawk at the stage as it filled up with 400+ musicians. Orchestras, choirs, opera stars, conductors all pile onto the wooden floor and I think, “of course Hill Auditorium would break on its 100 year anniversary.†Alas, it proves me wrong. Similar to the audience of which I am a part. I think that I am the only person under 50 in the whole room. Magic. This is my type of crowd, that is, until people weeble and wobble on the stairs and I imagine person after person accidentally flinging themselves off the balcony and onto the main floor: performance art. I mean, I am performing so why wouldn’t others?
The downbeat slashes and strings go flying, lips go buzzing, throats go vibrato-ing, and I am hit head-on with French at its finest: rolled r’s. Catching glimpses of words and hearing the words projected onto the screen I am thrown into the environment every white gay male could dream of: the opera. I mean if I am to be a true queen then this should be my element. My niche. My passion.
What I love about the whole thing is that it is all a staged performance. Or rather trapped-to-the-stage. Everyone is stationary while the air is filled with movement. Easier to focus. The main singers wear outfits of sequins, blue satin, black tuxes, and they stand out of the crowd of students. My favorite part though is when this “avant-garde†opera goes spoken word and the, perhaps, oracle figure starts rapping and screaming in French about blood, and flesh, and murder, and hatred, and gods. Who doesn’t like Greek Tragedy?
*raises hand*
Let me explain: the man behind me erupts during the intermission: “Opera. Is like eggs. Today they’re scrambled. Some like them scrambled. Others like them fried. I like them sunny side up.â€
I love Greek Tragedy. Give me a play and I’ll swoon. Give me a book and I’ll faint. Give me a 3.5 hour opera and my knee will start to ache and my eyes will start to get tired and my ears will start to close the world out. There is only so many times I can hear “Praise Athena†before I think about that beautiful ceiling. Or the Benjamin in my bag.
Would I have given this experience up? Hell no! This is probably one of my favorite events I have gone to because not only did I get to listen (and critique) amazing music, see talented individuals, people watch, gaze at architecture, but I was able to feel a part of an audience that I’ve always wanted to.
However.
Today I confess, sadly, that I am not an opera queen. I thought I was a renaissance queen but perhaps I’m just medieval.
je comprendo don’t ne I understand pas no comprends
Music-critico-racial-pyschoanalytic-politco-philosophical theories are topics humanities students, which by students I mean me, thrive in. We like things that most people hate: why you sexually love your mother, how a triad is a trinity and how everything relates to Christ, how the systems we live in oppress people openly but no one seems to care, and if that tree really makes a sound in the woods . . . all alone . . . just like you and I: alone.
I’m the annoying student in the back that heckles when people mispronounce Foucault’s name (foo-cal-t). I’m the arrogant student that says “ontology†all too often. I’m the ass that raises my hand after every gendered comment. And yes, I hate marriage.
So every so often (all too often) I go to a lecture or talk and stare like a fresh baby looking at the world in a dazed and confused way. I hold my chin like my head might fall off, stare to the nearest wall, breath deeply, and think of absolutely nothing. It’s like trying to breath in a cement block.
“I don’t understand.â€
I’ve been to two talks, in particular, that have flown so far above my head they are like the sun–definitely there in the sky but like the sun. Far away. Though I recognize it’s a sun and can describe the sun, talk about it “intelligibly,†and get warm from it.
Once I realize this is a sign from the universe that I need to get off my high horse and realize that I’m not always awesome I get to start new activities. This is the art of not understanding.
I look around the audience. Humanities students and professors are some of the best looking people IN THE ENTIRE WORLD.
I go into broken model pose. Sometimes I need as much practice as I can get and pretty much everyone at humanities talks are contorted into weird positions all while crossing their legs.
I think about my “thesis.†I do this often and I think that the osmosis theory of learning might kick in . . . finally.
I think to myself in french or spanish or I imagine what other language might sound in my head. I mean I have been stuck with English and my voice for 20 years, it’s time for a mental change.
I breakdown about how terrible the world is. People fight and protest for those that are temporarily abled-bodied, white, cis-gendered, and upper-middle class. All while people are being killed in the street, fired from their job, homeless, and all while I type this on my laptop.
I ponder about my white privilege, my male privilege, my cisgender privilege, my ability status privilege, my citizenship status privilege, my socio-economic status privilege, my educational privilege, and all my other privileges.
And then the lecturer says the world “antagonism†and I’m back!
Not understanding things that happen around me allow me to either A) think harder, B) focus on issues in my life that I don’t “have the time for†and gives me a rather quiet space to do so, or C) do this dance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8UyWmcCQYk
Sometimes you just gotta dance. And I do understand that.
