How social change actually happens: through the body
Posted on SELFISH ACTIVIST by Tada Hozumi
https://selfishactivist.com/how-change-actually-happens/#content
“Long-term sustainable social change must fundamentally come from work done at the energetic layer of the body. Dreaming. Dancing. Playing. Making art. Resting. Sharing touch. Gathering to remember. Sitting with our inner demons. Grieving loss. Performing ritual.”
I think it’s time for our social change strategies to become holistic and integrate an understanding of the body.
While there are different expressions of oppression, from white supremacy to transphobia, on the subtle energetic level, oppression is really just one thing: learned distrust of the body.
This is to say, oppression is trauma itself, institutionalized.
Oppression disconnects us from the subtle energetic impulses in our bodies that tell us who we really are. We become less human, fixed and rigid. If you take the time to reflect, you will notice that a lack of relational/emotional dexterity is the common thread to all of the ‘privileged’ identities that define oppressive constructs: white, male, rich, able, and so on.
Following, inequity isn’t privilege itself. That is merely a symptom. Privileges are really institutionalized defense mechanisms, put in place so that privileged identities can avoid processing pain. Oppressive violence is the result of the false privileged self being triggered into the self-protection reactions of fight/flight/freeze.
This is why long-term sustainable social change must fundamentally come from work done at the energetic layer of the body.
Dreaming. Dancing. Playing. Making art. Resting. Sharing touch. Gathering to remember. Sitting with our inner demons. Grieving loss. Performing ritual.
It is these acts that deeply affect our unconscious and the energetic makeup of our bodies that create change. But they are made invisible by the achievement-focused ways of our rational mind, reflected in patriarchy, whiteness, able-ism, and so on.
When we forget that our experience is not in the mind but in the body, we start to think the way forward is by filling our brains with information but neglect to attend to our deepest unconscious patterns.
So we constantly disappoint each other. We end up with great resumes and long checklists of achievements that outwardly project our adequacy as social justice warriors, but internally we are without the capacity to authentically engage with each other. Because we can’t effectively manage our emotional energies.
And this is yet another sign of how our disconnection from the body and reliance on intellect has a hold of us.
The great error in designing social change around the functioning of our mind is that almost 100% of what we do is unconscious. The conscious rational mind can only register what happened in reality about 0.5 seconds after it actually happened. When we live in our heads, we are actually living in the past.
How can we change the present when it is already gone from in front of us?
Change happens in the present moment – in the wordless place of play and intimacy. Because this is where relationships are made and we are able to experience what it is like to be able to be with each other in an authentic way.
The tangible strides that we make, such as changes to oppressive laws, are really cumulated effects of these micro-moments of change.
But again, our rational mind deludes us into thinking the real work of oppression cessation is done at the level of ‘planning’, or even ‘doing’, when it is actually happening underneath at the level of ‘being’.
When we live in our mind, we see oppression as something outside of ourselves that needs to be fixed.
When we start to slow down, we begin to sense that what we need to do is heal the effects of oppression on us.
But when we become fully present, we see that what we need to do is heal oppression itself. Because it is us.
In light of this, I believe we are in a time that social justice strategy itself needs to be re-invented. The Western patriarchal capitalist approach to change has us stuck, out of the present.
We need to throw out our assumptions and take a deeply critical look at how we, as self-professed activists, are actually engaging in the very systems that we are trying to disengage from.
We need to abandon our egos, that make us feel safe in our self-righteousness and take stock of how we are actually treating ourselves and each other, moment to moment.
We need to be brave and name the patterns that surround us in graceful ways in order to shift the dynamics we are entangled in.
So, if you feel sad, angry and exhausted from participating in social justice community, I believe that is your body sending you a message. Those feelings aren’t wrong. Letting yourself recognize them doesn’t make you oppressive as we like to tell each other. It’s what you do with them that matter.
The most important thing is to sit with these feelings and register them in your body. That’s all. You don’t need to figure it all out right now.*
Tune in. Come into the present.
And when the authentic curiosity arises, take the courage to meet each other.
Because that is how change actually happens.
Finally, I want to acknowledge that this healing process is already being facilitated by my many colleagues: therapists, coaches, writers, energy workers, dancers, shamans, artists, witches, medicine people, herbalists and more. And it has always been that way. We simply need to become more present and available to their work.
* (Even if you’ve experienced so much oppressive violence that you struggle to connect to your body, please know that you just acknowledging that is the work. And I want us to remind ourselves, the numbness we experience in our marginalized identities is nothing compared to the fortified institutionalized dissociation that whiteness, maleness and other privileged identities are protected in.)
***
Image: A diverse group of dancers, of different class backgrounds, cultures, sexual orientations, and genders, party at the legendary disco, Paradise Garage.
5.30pm to 7pm; Free Admission 23/08 WED - The Plaza, National Library Building 27/08 SUN - *SCAPE Playspace 31/08 THU - Marina Bay Sands Event Plaza 02/09 SAT - Marina Bay Sands Event Plaza A #chanceencounter. #Dancing in the #city. #Occupying #publicspace as the sun sets at the end of a #hecticday. A #turningpoint before #darkness #engulfs us. #Twilight #magic as #dancers #draw both in #space and literally. With #MARK, the Singapore-born, #Berlin-based choreographer #DanielKok @daniel_diskodanny brings independent #danceartists of Singapore together at diverse sites for dance. Kok’s work often examines #complex #themes, delving into the #relational #politics of #spectatorship. The Singapore Young Artist Award winner for dance in 2008, has presented his performances across Asia, Europe, Australia, West Africa and the United States. In MARK, nine dancers attempt a #collectivedrawing in different #urbanspaces. The #traces of their #gestures, acts and relations reveal what happens when a dance encounters the #public. The #audience is invited to join the dancers #physically in a drawing, which evokes #social and #imaginary landscapes where people can meet one another in an #unfamiliar space. They come together in such a space to #discover new layers to their #dailylives and to find #beauty in giving attention to one another. MARK is an invitation to a radical moment of #togetherness. The act of dancing is a desire to leave behind an #indeliblemark on the #socialbody. Commissioned by #Singapore International Festival of Arts (#SIFA). (at National Library Singapore)
‘Het identiteitsloos lichaam’ #1 Een brief aan Karel Tuytschaever
Jesse Vanhoeck
Can we imagine a body that is dancing his way out of identity? To dance is not necessarily to come forward as an identity but it also contains the possibility to come forward as not any more being an identity. Or to have dissolved ones identity.
Deze uitspraak deed choreograaf Mårten Spånberg tijdens zijn keynote op de POSTDANCE conferentie in Stockholm georganiseerd door MDT, Cullbergballet en Andre Lepecki. Ik noteerde de zin in mijn notitieboekje, las hem, herlas hem en dacht aan Karel Tuytschaever.
Karel en ik leerden elkaar enkele jaren geleden kennen tijdens het SPIELZEIT project van HERTOGS|HAEST, hij als acteur, ik als dramaturg. Maar Karel is ook danser, docent en choreograaf. Toen ik voor ICK begon te werken hielden we contact en hij stuurde mij begin dit jaar het essay dat hij schreef over ‘Het identiteitsloos lichaam’. ‘Bedankt! Ik ga het snel lezen!’ stuurde ik terug, maar ondanks mijn veelvuldig gebruik van uitroeptekens bleef het nog enkele maanden op mijn bureau liggen.
Toch, telkens ik er naar keek, werd ik weer geprikkeld door de titel: ‘De anatomie van het identiteitsloos lichaam’. Zelf werk ik als dramaturg van choreografen en directie van ICK, Emio Greco en Pieter C. Scholten steeds rond het begrip van ‘The social body’, vanuit de premisse dat in het simpele zijn van elk lichaam al een sociale en politieke lading besloten zit. Het werk van Emio en Pieter vertrekt vanuit de innerlijke motieven van het lichaam, ze hebben zelden aparte mannen en vrouwen rollen (tenzij ze de genderconstructie als thema nemen zoals in de voorstellingen ROCCO of Double Points: VERDI), en benaderen elk lichaam, elke danser vanuit de eigen anatomie en individualiteit. Geen unisono, maar synchronisatie tussen verschillende lichamen. Maar zelfs wanneer je graaft naar innerlijke motieven, kan je niet om de verpakking heen. Er staat een lichaam en dat vertelt een verhaal nog voor het beweegt. Hoe ga je daarmee om? Dus het idee van een ‘identiteitsloos lichaam’ sprak wel tot de verbeelding. Ik ontdeed me uiteindelijk van de veronderstelling dat ik het ‘te druk’ had en las het essay van Karel.
Hij beschrijft zijn praktijk als docent dans. Hoe eerstejaarsstudenten bij hem binnen komen en hij ‘ze probeert af te pellen om tot de natuurlijke vorm te komen, een kneedbaar lichaam dat zijn identiteit opnieuw zuiver in functie van een ambacht kan heropbouwen’
Door het wegnemen van de theatraliteit (een les is geen voorstelling) en het blootleggen van de techniciteit, zie ik alleen maar persoonlijkheid. (…) Waar moet ik doorheen kijken om hun identiteitsloos lichaam te kunnen zien? Bestaat een identiteitsloos lichaam wel? Hoe komt het dat ik identiteiten zie in synchroon, anatomisch materiaal. Vooraleer ik een antwoord kan vinden op wat een identiteitsloos lichaam is, moet ik dus proberen te achterhalen wat de identiteit van het lichaam van een performer bepaalt. Daarachter ligt de kern van het identiteitsloos lichaam.
Hierin lees ik dat juist dat volgens hem het ontbreken van een theatrale code zorgt voor vertroebeling. En wanneer een performer zijn identiteit in functie van het ambacht weer kan opbouwen, is het vast ook mogelijk om, zoals Spånberg het formuleert, ‘je uit je identiteit te dansen.
Ik schreef Karel een brief (e-mail):
Dag Karel,
Het heeft even geduurd, maar ik heb je essay gelezen. Het is best een intieme tekst, hoe je lichamen en jouw observaties ervan beschrijft. Alsof ik de voyeur van jouw voyeurisme was.
Ik vraag me af hoe dicht onze onderzoeken naar ‘het sociale lichaam’ en ‘het identiteitsloos lichaam’ bij elkaar liggen. Het lijkt contradictorisch, maar bedoelen we eigenlijk niet gewoon hetzelfde? Wanneer anderen je identiteit gaan construeren, er een sociale betekenis aan gaan geven, maakt dat je niet juist heel erg identiteitsloos?
En hoe verhoudt zich in jouw optiek ‘de heropgebouwde identiteit’ van de performer (in functie van de ambacht) zich tot de idee van ‘oorspronkelijkheid’? Wat is die nieuwe identiteit? En wat gebeurt er als je er wel weer theatraliteit omheen hangt (dus in een voorstelling, niet tijdens een les)? Is het een construct waar je ‘in’ en ‘uit’ kan stappen?
Het is natuurlijk ook een erg jaren ’60 gedachte, de hele social body hype, toen de focus van het virtuoos en gedisciplineerd lichaam, meer op de eigenheid en expressiviteit van het lichaam kwam liggen, maar het is iets waar je dag in dag uit mee geconfronteerd wordt als je aan het werk bent in de studio. De simpele anatomie van elk lichaam en de zeggingskracht daarvan.
Daarom dat jouw tekst mij zo aansprak en tegelijkertijd verwarde. Je draait de dingen terug of juist heel erg vooruit. Je gaat op zoek naar de zeggingskracht van het lichaam voor of juist voorbij de sociale codes. Of zie ik dat verkeerd?
Ik hoor graag van je.
Groet,
Jesse
Jesse Vanhoeck is dramaturg en artistiek assistent bij ICK.
Karel Tuytschaever is performer, docent en bezielt daarnaast als maker het platform voor eigen werk BARRY.
In light of the topic of Visualization, I sit and ponder about the great ol' debate on globalization, security and privacy versus revolution/evolution, shared experience and positive connectivity.
So, Google Glass. What does its existence mean to the world? Better yet, what does it say about that world? Well, let's look back into history and pull apart some of the varying perspectives on what visualization could mean.
Classic Marxist philosopher Guy Debord, preferred to look at all kinds of visualizations/signs/images as a hindrance to critical thought because of the lack of authenticity and prevalence of commoditisation. He argued that the "spectacle" i.e. visual/image is merely a representational image of society in which relations between commodities have replaced relations between people. "The spectacle is not a collection of images; rather, it is a social relationship between people that is mediated by images," (1967). This kind of critique on visualization stems from Plato's theory of "simulacra" - the notion of an imperfect copy of the ideal world. In this way, his theory promoted a mistrust of visual images and the technologies that are involved in producing them.
And then you have the Renaissance Perspective, where the emergence of new technologies in capturing the world were becoming so common, we were mistaking it as a fixed nature. Yet, it still allowed for a vision of the world we live in where everything is in its right place. By using a mathematical sequence in interpreting the real world, it creates a visualization that depicts people and objects in a fluid, interchanging relationship. Which I guess is closest to Martin Heidegger's theory in "The Age of the World Picture," (1938), where he argues that we gain more and more new perspectives and create new 'socials' using technological innovations in order to view our world.
Fast forward to today; where forms of content and expression are so advanced and so varied, that our own literacy of visualization has increased ten fold. So what world is it that something like Google Glass creates? Is it merely a technological object that projects the ideal reality in which we live and interact? Is it just a mirror? Or does it create its own reality; a new social body that didn't exist prior to its creation?
I think it most definitely creates a new social body through the way in which it uses data in real-time, modulates, fragments, reassembles and expresses it to the rest of the world. As Andrew Murphy put it, "visualization is just one example of conversion of data from one form into another, which then feeds back into our senses, and shifts individual experience, the social, “publics”."
