Blackness, Performance, Freedom
Smoke filled lungs empty chronic symphonies, I relish in the taste of the current trapping my skin, match the jaded expression of the pianist played one gig too high. Left foot fused to the floor with a concoction of warm liquor, sweat, and melted keys. And sweet deceit fills our ears. Knees start to buckle,…
In college, Halloween has become just another excuse to party—a social occasion not unlike other weekends (besides the costumes, of course). But when we were little, Halloween was a family time of pumpkin-carving, ghost story-telling, and trick-or-treating. I hadn’t carved a pumpkin in years, and even the smell of the seeds brought back a waft…
When we broke out into breakout rooms in the beginning of October, our group chose to stage the scene on page 142 of Sassafrass, Cypress, and Indigo where Cypress dances to the familiar music that ends of having been coming from Leroy. Our group was very focused on the lighting choices we could make in…
A few weeks ago, we worked in small groups to imagine how we would might stage a performance depicted in Sassafrass, Cypress, and Indigo. In my group, we looked at the performance titled “Blackout” which starts on page 102. It is unclear when the performance ends, but we assumed that it ends on the chapter…
For this week’s journal entry, I explored a moment of ecstatic joy in my life. These moments are really hard to come by, especially now. It is so easy to get bogged down into the hardships of everything going on, but making my apple pie was something that was really nice to do on my…
Two of my journals have looked at how fashion impacts the message of music videos such as Beyoncé’s “Formation” and Childish Gambino’s “This is America”; for this post, I want to look at the clothing – or lack of clothing – in Erykah Badu’s “Window Seat” music video; in light of reading “Sound Gestures” by…
“Erykah Badu ‘On & On’ (Official Video)” [4:50]. Uploaded by Erykah Badu. June 2009. Youtube.com < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CPCs7vVz6s > Accessed 10/29/19. “Solange ‘Almeda’ (Official Video)” [4:57]. Uploaded by solangeknowlesmusic. March 7, 2019. Youtube.com < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6giKIu5jUvA > Accessed 10/29/19. “Erykah Badu – ‘Window Seat’ (Official Video)” [5:37]. Uploaded by Erykah Badu. April 2, 2010. Youtube.com < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hVp47f5YZg…
Living in a house with five other women, I am not often alone. Yet this week, I was able to return to my hometown in Hingham Massachusetts for a couple days. Because of this break from my communal housing, I was able to fully immerse myself into the “Body, Noise, Space” exercise. Over the summer, I had…
Having now personally reenacted the Moon Journey written by Indigo, I know these traditions to be capable of inciting a powerful emotional response. This realization pushed me to reexamine the purposeful placement of the recipes throughout the novel in order to achieve a better understanding of the three sisters and the text generally. The recipes…
In “Which Way is Down? Improvisations on Black Mobility” by Jason King, many claims are made about the relationships between falling and ascension, verticality and the horizontal, and the intersections of masculinity, activism, queerness, and shame. King uses the extended metaphor of a ladder to convey his ideas about shame and social mobility, elaborating on…