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2013, 2014, Activism, ambi, ambidancetrous, blues, community, consent culture, cooperative living, group houses, intentional communities, new year, safer spaces, sexual harassment, social justice, swing
We talk a lot on this blog about dismantling systems of oppression, and about what we want to build to replace them. I see the welcoming of the new year as a time of intention setting, so this open thread is dedicated to sharing stories of those who are building something. Tell us the cool stories of work you or others are involved in to make the world better. Let’s all get inspired for 2014!
I’ll start with three:
1. Ambidancing: In lots of partner dancing, leading and following is tied pretty strongly, historically and currently, to gender roles. The people at Ambidancetrous think that sucks, and they’re working to build dance scenes where everyone has a real option to lead or follow. They tell us why single-role scenes are sexist, why the nod to ambi isn’t enough, how to change it as an instructor or a dance partner…and give us some past and present visual inspiration:
Two men dancing, Harlem, 1920s
DC’s Red Hot Blues & BBQ event this year
2. Safer Spaces: Also in the dance scene, I had the fortune this year to get involved with some really cool people who are organizing to make dance scenes safer and more inclusive: by drafting sexual harassment policies, improving the messages we send to our participants about consent, providing more visible means of reporting if something goes wrong, and so forth. The Safety Dance facebook page hosts a lot of interesting (and sometimes contentious) conversations about this movement.
3. Intentional Communities: I hope some of our commenters will have more to add to this, but intentional communities and cooperative living arrangements can provide a smaller environmental impact and greater interpersonal support. Bonus: a lot of the ones I know share a commitment to social justice, too! Two great ones in the DC area are Maitri House and the Ella Jo Baker Intentional Community Cooperative.
Takoma Park’s Maitri House
The Ella Jo Baker Co-op in Columbia Heights, DC
Now it’s your turn: What work toward a better future has inspired you in the past year? What projects might we all like to know about and explore in 2014?
One thing I really enjoyed, when I was still in the Contradancing scene (think Jane Austen’s era’s balls) – at the various venues I visited, several of the couples were same-sex. Not that it mattered, really, because you end up dancing with many different people through the figures of the dance – but as long as one partner of each couple was to lead, and the other to follow, all were welcome. My ex-husband and I really enjoyed those dances.
I have a lot of friends who contra dance and say it’s really fun. I’ve been meaning to try it!
On the topic of gender and contra, it’s good to hear that ambidancing is common. I also know there are a fair amount of men who wear skirts to the dance. On the other hand, all the calling (at least according to my housemate) is gendered (“ladies” and “gents”) as are some of the moves, like “ladies chain”.
OK, there are some misconceptions going on here. First, not relevant to this post, but contra is NOT from Jane Austen’s time or location. Sometimes ECD events advertise themselves that way. But contra is from a different time period, different place, and different social circumstances than upper-class Jane Austen balls.
There has been a movement including ungendered calls, aka global calls, for decades. See Chris Ricciotti’s work with the Lavender Country Dancers in JP, Boston, MA, or Brooke Friendly and Chris Sackett’s work in Oregon. Part of the reason that it hasn’t caught on more is that, in contra and more so in ECD, the two roles are not lead and follow roles. So there are more issues with what terminology to use.
Thanks for sharing this info! I tried googling to find out more about global calls, but I didn’t have much luck. What words do they use instead of “ladies” and “gents”?
Check out lcfd.org for lots more info. In particular, http://lcfd.org/gf-ecd-calling-conventions.html is a nice article to start with for ECD. They have other articles on historical context, etc. For contras, the most common conventions are armbands or bands and barearms.
Global terminology is more complicated. They actually avoid using names for the roles at all. Left file and right file come close, at least for proper formations. See here for more info: http://heatherandrose.org/terms.shtml
This video is related on a related topic – Contra etiquette for the guys I think it makes important points – please don’t flirt with women who may not be into you, please don’t dip women without their permission. As a lady who generally dances follow with men who lead it applied to situations I have been in. I recognize that it could be expanded by replacing “women” with “people” and “guys” with some single-syllable gender neutral term.
So I’m not an awesome progressive organizer or anything, so my stories are pretty small scale, but here we go:
– My New Year’s resolution last year was to take better care of myself – it worked out pretty well. I’m stronger and calmer and more able to work through crap and also more able to celebrate all of life’s fabulousness.
– I did get to hang out with a bunch of fabulous progressive organizers at Rootscamp and two of the highlights was learning about these folks VOYCES and that this happened Public Narrative Training for Trans Organizers
– And obvs we are all works in progress; I’ve continued on the quest of self-education by reading lots of online feminism – woo! – and I just want to celebrate finding the folks at DDP! These posts rocked my world True Love Doesn’t Wait and also Modeling Consent
VOYCES looks fantastic! I taught for the GED to young people who’d dropped out of high school, and I know that the issues surrounding dropout rates are complex and the students who drop out are so deserving of better. Who beeter to understand those complex reasons and take compassionate, effective action than the people affected by it? I’m interested to hear how they were received by the school administrations and by the city education department.
Can you tell me more about the public narrative training? At Rootscamp did the organizers talk about what they would cover with the trans organizers who attend? And what kind of public narrative are they hoping to create around trans issues?
Regardless of any evidence about its effectiveness, I try to enact change by extending my empathy rather than confronting problems head-on.
Speaking to your three points, I’ve been trying very hard when I ask new people to dance to ask if I may lead as well. Some folk are aware of the ambidancetrous goal, but others react with, “well, yeah.” or “of course!” And to these people I say, “Well, I’d follow if you wanted to lead, but I’m not very good at it.” My hope is to open their minds not by forcing them open but by allowing them to see that they CAN be open. Still others, my favorite reactions, react with, “Oh, that’s a cool thing you just did there!” Those minds are already open and I’m just trying to help them open wider.
Since I’m not an organizer or directly involved in dance events, I try to address Safety by asking event organizers where their harassment guidelines are posted if I cannot find them. I do this on public forums so others can see. I’ll also ask why whenever I see a gender duality checkbox on a registration form. Not lead/follow, but male/female or the like. Usually organizers have no good answer to “Why?” but I don’t beat them up about it — I just make them clearly acknowledge they had no good reason. I feel if I can help to eliminate gendering in registration forms, I can make the event feel safer for trans, intersex, and androgynous folk.
I’m not good being involved in community because I’m reclusive and have social anxiety, but I do try to support and talk up events that happen in my community, for my community. Plus buying from local or independent creators whenever I can. That might not at all be what you’re talking about.
I was delighted to be invited to join the staff of DCLX DJs this year but when I saw there was only one woman DJ to seven or eight men, I publicly commented on that and expressed a concern that the ratio was too low.
At my place of work, which is all very white, very straight men, plus 2 women and me, I will explicitly say to my coworkers, “That thing you said made me uncomfortable because of the sexism it contained. Please don’t say such things around me.” If it were a larger company, I’d go to HR and see if there could be a systemic addressing of that tendency, but as we are a small company of ~25 people, if I shake the boat, I will be considered the problem. I’ve sadly learned this the hard way in the past.
And in my personal life, I attempt to provide feminist, non-gender-essentialist advice to those who need it in their sex, dating, and relationship lives. I do this on my vlog (restarting in January!) and one-to-one and occasionally on tumblr. tumblr’s insidiously sexist and gendered!
There’s a lot of work to do and I’ve only done a little, but it’s a start!
That’s great that you ask dance events when they have gender on registration forms. I do a similar thing with contra and ECD events, and if the answer is that they gender balance the weekend or other event, I don’t go.
Those are a lot of things! Yeah, The Revolution Will Be Polite is probably my favorite Ambidancetrous post.
I like your style of gently clarifying the oppressiveness of certain words/actions/systems to those who say/do/create them. Of course it’s not the only way, and it may not be enough by itself, but it’s an important element of the movement toward social justice: it brings people into an awareness that there’s another way (in conflict theory they call that thickening the narrative). I admire how consistent you are in it.
Choice in Childbirth: I’m hoping in 2014, we’ll see independent midwifery de-criminalized in Maryland (and hopefully elsewhere where it’s still illegal).
While it’s not the only step needed to reform our problematic maternity care system, I believe this moves us in the direction of women and families having the right to choose their birth care provider, to more respectful and consensual care, and to safer care.
A collaborative effort to raise awareness about these issues came out in November at http://www.unbreakingbirth.org, which includes some video and written material and an action center. There’s also a trailer at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecdy-onAbXg
Ryan, thanks for sharing! Could you tell me a little about why midwifery is illegal in Maryland to begin with?