The Archive – The archive is a term that I have thought about a lot when we were discussing African History and colonialism. When Dr. Weimers talked about what was recorded and what was not, something that stood out to me was that only certain things are archived based on what people that was important to them or society at that time. A lot of the times, it is the people in power, the people that have influence, that have the ability to archive things. Before Humes, when I thought of an archive, I thought of a physical object or a physical piece of writing, like a record. Discussing archives in Humes though, I have realized that archives are everywhere, and they do not always have to be physical. When an archive is physical, it means that someone must have been able to read or write to document it. There are many people that could not read or write, so information, stories, and knowledge were passed down orally throughout generations.
Another way that the archive showed up in plenary was when we had the Ring Shout lecture. Although the Ring Shout is its own key term in my portfolio, it is another way that culture and history has been archived without it being a physical artifact.
Ring Shout – The Ring Shout is an African Diaspora dance form. It is a cultural dance developed in North America by descendants of African people. The dance was practiced on plantations secretly, since plantation owners did not approve of the cultural expression of the people that they were enslaving. A key aspect of the Ring Shout is that it was used to honor the deceased. Enslaved people were not granted time by the enslavers to mourn their deceased loved ones, so practicing the Ring Shout in secrecy was a way for them to do so. In African diaspora dance forms, one dances to the left to honor and celebrate the past, and dances towards the right to honor and celebrate the future. The Ring Shout is danced going towards the left, because it is used to honor ancestors.
Commemoration – What does it mean to commemorate something? During the first semester of Humes, it has been interesting to think about all of the ways that one can commemorate an event, a person, a tragedy. A question that I have been battling is, can you bring justice to an event, a person, or a tragedy by commemorating it? And who gets to decide how, when, where, and who commemorates it? During plenary, we learned about the student that was tasked with completing the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C. The student received a lot of backlash because of her background, her demographics, and her ability to create a memorial. It made me think about how just because there is a memorial to remember an event, it does not mean that everyone will be happy with the way that they just commemorate it. It is impossible to always make everyone happy, but who gets to decide, who has the authority to say, “This will bring justice to it”.
Moral Worth – Kant explains that the moral worth of an action is not in its consequences but in its intention from which it is done. The motive that propels someone to do an action can be judged based on what that person intended to do with that action. Kant explains that to determine the moral worth of an action you have to look at the reason of principle, or maxim, under which it is performed.
Moral Duty – Singer explains moral duty as something that we must do because it is our responsibility, not because it is good for us but good for the other. He draws the line on these actions when it starts to harm the person that is performing the moral duty, but until then, if an action is in someone’s moral duty, that person must perform it. This is called marginal utility- when someone is unable to perform a good deed to someone because they will end up hurting themselves in some way.
Counter-memorials – Counter memorials signify a person that is unhappy with a memorial that has been set up. I have thought about this a lot recently, with how unhappy people are with the Trump presidency. Many counter memorials have gone up on the Washington Mall, which is a space where many monuments are in D.C. My mom, an artist, made a counter memorial during the first Trump presidency, and that was my first introduction to what the concept was. Counter-memorials offer an outlet for the artist to express their feelings about either something that is wrong that is going on in their community or society, and could also be a memorial that goes against another memorial. In Humes, we have discussed the many ways that justice can be carried out, and the most interesting ones to me are when people decide to speak out and express themselves in an artistic way, that is up for interpretation from the public, but also sends a clear message.
Interpretation – This key term, in my portfolio, is being written about in the government sense. Taking a lecture from Dr. O’Geen, we learned three things that Supreme Court Justices do when they interpret the Constitution to make a ruling. Interpretation is a public act, interpretation is an obligation, and the consequences are real and direct. Restorative Justice – Restorative Justice is a practice that came up when we were discussing the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Committee) and its effect that it had on post-apartheid South Africa. It developed because world leaders did not think that a system that was more traditional, like the Nuremberg Trials after WWII, was effective in the progression of society. When watching A Long Night’s Journey Into Day, a documentary about the impact that the TRC had on the victims and perpetrators of apartheid, I thought about what it meant to restore justice for all of the individuals involved. It was very moving to see the deep reflection on the perpetrators, and the response of the families of the victims that had a loved one die and had to come face to face to the people that committed the acts of violence. However, something that stood out to me was the humanity of the people. There seemed to be forgiveness, understanding, and deep reflection, which can be very hard in any case, but especially regarding something as deep as a life lost.
Restorative Justice – Restorative Justice is a practice that came up when we were discussing the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Committee) and its effect that it had on post-apartheid South Africa. It developed because world leaders did not think that a system that was more traditional, like the Nuremberg Trials after WWII, was effective in the progression of society. When watching A Long Night’s Journey Into Day, a documentary about the impact that the TRC had on the victims and perpetrators of apartheid, I thought about what it meant to restore justice for all of the individuals involved. It was very moving to see the deep reflection on the perpetrators, and the response of the families of the victims that had a loved one die and had to come face to face to the people that committed the acts of violence. However, something that stood out to me was the humanity of the people. There seemed to be forgiveness, understanding, and deep reflection, which can be very hard in any case, but especially regarding something as deep as a life lost.
Creative Placemaking – Creative Placemaking is defined in A Future of Placemaking by Sarah Calderon and Erik Takeshita as “supporting and embedding arts and culture strategies that are working across community planning and development sectors to create equitable, healthy, and sustainable communities.” It is “about unleashing the unlimited power of arts and culture to advance community wellbeing” (Calderon et al). It addresses the future, imagining and remembering, advancing equity, building relationships, and fostering cross-sector collaboration. In the panel “Creative Placemaking as Cultural Justice”, several artists from different backgrounds came to speak about their work as placemakers in their own community and how they foster a sense of belonging and remembrance for marginalized groups of people whose voices have not been heard when building the spaces that they live and thrive in.
Cheapness – Cheapness is a result of the Capitalocene, which is defined by Raj Patel and Jason Moore in A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things. They explain that the Anthropocene is not adequate to define the actions of humas right now, since it makes it seem like our human actions are inevitable. They claim that Capitalism is a result of frontiers. Frontiers are the “encounter zones between capital and all kinds of nature…they are always about the cost of reducing business” (Patel and Moore). Frontiers are where power is exercised by the state through “violence, culture and knowledge to mobilize natures at a low cost” (Patel and Moore).
Self expression – This term kept popping up when we were learning about the legacies of Black Face Minstrelsy, and Bill T. Jones’ dances and his work with history, legacy, and memory through self expression. In a video that we watched in class about Bill T Jones, he said, “It’s hard not to make any work political.” It stuck with me, because how does your identity simultaneously not matter and also matter a lot? What is the balance between recognizing that and creating a piece of art or dance that recognizes those identities, yet those identities become ways that they can be politically harmed? Dance is a form of self-expression, and it also mixes legacy, expectation, history, and identity.
Agape – Agape is unconditional, active love. It is the love that Martin Luther King learned about in India. Agape is the basis for his leadership in nonviolent resistance and advocacy in the Civil Rights Movement. It goes in hand with satyagraha, which means truth and lov. MLK talks about this in “Stride Toward Freedom”, and he lists out the 6 principles: it is resistant, not passive; it doesn’t seek out to humiliate the opponent, but to win friendship and understanding; it resists the forces of evil, not the people doing the bad thing; demonstrators must be willing to endure suffering (including arrest and jail) without retaliation; it rejects physical and spiritual violence; it affirms a just, whole harmonious universe.
March – This key term comes from the graphic novel March and the importance of speaking up and demonstrating for your rights and the rights of your community. John Lewis was a powerful figure who showed the impact that nonviolent resistance can have. I also connect this key term to the AIDS movement that we studied, with ACT UP! and other movements that advocated for healthcare and equitable treatment of all people. March encompasses the different forms of protest and advocacy that we studied, but specifically grass roots and how people have power when they gather and march.
Biomythography – Ann Cooper Albright writes in Embodying History, “Using dance as a metaphor for the physical desire to survive and the metaphysical need to fill that survival with hope, these choreographers have, with the help of their collaborators and companies, created theatrical spectacles that evoke the legacies as well as the celebratory spirit of a people wedged in between two worlds. In many ways, these epic works remind me of the term that Audre Lord e used to describe her autobiographical work “Zami : A New Spelling of My Name.” Grounded in. but not limited to the historical facts of a people’s existence , these epic dance narratives weave what Lorde calls a “biomythography,” elaborating visionary sagas of social and personal survival.” Biomythography is found in retelling stories through a sense of truth and community, as well as using history as a living continuum. It asks the question, what happened, and how do we repair the wrongs of the past?
Trace – “Policing the digital traces of everyday life is now a routine, if inconsistent, element of contemporary law enforcement, because we have collectively provided unprecedented opportunities for surveillance. In addition to using data in the course of investigations, the police increasingly rely on big data and automated systems to decide who, when, and where to police. To varying degrees, we are all subjects of digital surveillance.” This definition is a form of digital tracing. It connects back to the Archive as well, since we learned about how it’s very intentional what is chosen to be archived, and how surveillance – that form of tracing – takes power away from the individual. However, how is the flip side, archiving something- that form of tracing- a mechanism of power that is given because the stories and memories of that person, place, or thing are preserved.
Surveillance – Surveillance has been a word that has appeared throughout the Humes course. It is a heavy theme when discussing the Panopticon, and also when we learned about surveillance and how that impacts our lives and who is watching us, and why. In Foucault’s writing about the Panopticon, he writes, “power is exercised without division, according to a continuous hierarchical figure, each individual is constantly located, examined and distributed among the living beings, the sick and the dead…” (Foucault). That hierarchical figure is an authority that we do not really know but give power to due to our systems of tracing.
