About the Book
FUTURE/PRESENT brings together a vast collection of writers, artists, activists, and academics working at the forefront of today's most pressing struggles for cultural equity and racial justice in a demographically changing America. The volume builds upon five years of national organizing by Arts in a Changing America, an artist-led initiative that challenges structural racism by centering people of color who are leading innovation at the nexus of arts production, community benefit, and social change. FUTURE/PRESENT includes a range of essays and criticism, visual and performance art, artist manifestos, interviews, poetry, and reflections on community practice. Throughout, contributors examine issues of placekeeping and belonging, migration and diasporas, the carceral state, renegotiating relationships with land, ancestral knowledge as radical futurity, and shifting paradigms of inequity. Foregrounding the powerful resilience of communities of color, FUTURE/PRESENT advances the role of artists as first responders to injustices, creative stewards in the cohesion and health of communities, and innovative strategists for equity.
Selected contributors. Dahlak Brathwaite, adrienne maree brown, Jeff Chang, Tameca Cole, Ofelia Esparza, Antoine Hunter, Nobuko Miyamoto, Wendy Red Star, Spel, Jose Antonio Vargas, Carrie Mae Weems, Hinaleimoana Kwai Kong Wong-Kalu
Table of Contents:
Introduction / Roberta Uno 1
The Call / Jeff Chang 17
vestibular mantra (or radical virtuosities for a brave new dance) / taisha paggett 29
Part 1. Cultural Presence: Placekeeping and Belonging
Introduction / Daniela Alvarez 35
Aqui Estoy / Jose Ramirez 40
Beauty, Justice, and the Ritual of Performance / Patricia Berne & Nomy Lamm 42
An Accumulation of Things That Refuse to Be Discarded / Kiyan Williams 52
Counting Coup on the Compartmentalization of Indigenous-Made Rap Music / Talon Bazille Ducheneaux 54
Cultural Resiliency in the Face of Crisis: Learning from New Orleans / Carol Bebelle and Carol Zou 63
Collectively Directing the Current / Halima Afi Cassells 68
The New Eagle Creek Saloon / Sadie Barnette 74
Notes from Technotopia 3.0: On the “Creative City” Gone Wrong-An Antigentrification Philosophical Tantrum, 2012–2016 / Guillermo GÓmez-PeÑa 76
“Building Temples for Tomorrow”: Cultural Workers as Construction Crews / Alesia Montgomery 87
Invasive Species / Aaron McIntosh 94
Sunny and 150 Years of Placekeeping in Little Tokyo / Scott Oshima 96
Local Fruit Still Life / Daniel Andres Alcazar 102
Stage One: Establishing Community / Garrett McQueen 104
Red 40 / JazmÍn Urrea 108
More Noes from the Performance Essay Los Giros De La Siguinte/the turns of the Next / Devin Kenny 110
Part 2. Dismantling Borders, Building Bridges: Migration and Diasporas
Introduction / Sarah Sophia Yanni 123
Mano Poderosa / Rosalie LÓpez 128
A Cosmos of Dis/Joints / Vinhay Keo 130
Cross-Border Citizens / Teddy Cruz and Fonna Foreman 136
Indian Alley, Where Art Is Healing / Pamela J. Peters 146
Vessels: A Conversation / Chanice Holmes, Mykia Jovan, Rebecca Mwase, and Mahalia AbÉo Tibbs 151
Fence / Belise Nishimwe 158
A Touch of Otherness / Hayv Kahraman 160
Harmattan Haze / Njikeka Akunyili Crosby 166
Who Is the #EmergingUS? / Jose Antonio Vargas 168
Justice and Equity: We’re Coming for It All / Christine Her 171
building bricks for communal healing / Silvi NaÇi 176
We Never Needed Documents to Thrive / Yosimar Reyes 178
prop•er / Kassandra L. Khalil 182
Alongside: On Chinese Students in the United States and the Fight for Black Lives / Evelyn Hang Yin 185
Love Spirals: Notes on Brown Feelings / J Molina-Garcia 191
Part 3. Creating a World without Prisons: Culture and the Carceral State
Introduction / Kassandra L. Khalil 205
To Create in Prison / Spel 211
A Measure of Joy / Samara Gaev and Jarvis Jay Masters 214
There Is No Abolition or Liberation without Disability Justice / Lydia X. Z. Brown 224
HOGAR / Aydinaneth Ortiz 230
I Remember / Mark MenjÍvar 232
Coming Home / Dustina Gill 237
Singing Our Way to Abolition / Mary Hooks 241
Standing in the Gap: Music as First Responder / Duane Robert Garcia and Vijay Gupta 245
Locked in a Dark Calm / Tameca Cole 250
As Crazy as the World Is, I Do Believe / Kondani Fidel with images by Devin Allen 252
Jumpsuit Projects / Sherrill Roland 260
The Bonds of Aloha: Connecting to Culture Can Free Us / Hinaleimoana Kwai Kong Wong-Kula 262
The Nail That Sticks Out / Tani Ikeda 268
Art Is a Trojan Horse: Reclaiming Our Narratives / Faith Bartley, Courtney Bowles, and Mark Strandquist 272
Try/Step/Trip (Excerpt) / Dahlak Brathwaite 281
The Evanesced Series (2016–) / Kenyatta A. C. Hinkle 290
Part 4. Embodied Cartographies: Renegotiating Relationships with Land
Introduction / Elizabeth M. Webb 295
Kiksuya / Michael Two Bulls 300
American Doesn’t Exist / Lyla June 302
Between the Real and the Imagined: A Conversation with Lyla June and Tanaya Winder / Lyla June and Tanaya Winder 304
Sopa de OstiÓn / Ruben Ulises Rodriguez Montoya 310
Island Earth: Water, Wayfinding, and the Currents That Connect Us / Nāʻāleu Anthony and Haunani Kane 312
ACCESS DENIED: Creating New Spatial Understandings / Jaklin Romine 321
Essential Economy / Jia Lok Pratt 326
Earth Mama II / Favianna Rodriguez 332
We Are Proud of This Land / Carlton Turner 334
Mauka House / Kapena Alapaʻi 340
Withholding an Image: Disciplinary Disobedience and Reciprocity in the Field / Ashley Hunt 343
Thinking through Fragments: Speculative Archives, Contested Histories, and a Tale of the Palestine Archaeological Museum / Dareen Hussein 354
Secrets That the Wind Carries Away / Morel Doucet 359
Ohiŋniyaŋ ded wati kte: This Place Will Always Be Home / Angela Two Stars 364
Ballers / Mel D. Cole 368
Part 5. Living Our Legacy: Ancestral Knowledge as Radical Futurity
Introduction / Kapena Alapaʻi 373
These Roots Run Deep / Dyani White Hawk 378
The Future Is Ancient / Allison Akootchook Warden 380
Being in Oneness: Conversations with Nobuko Miyamoto, Kamau Ayubbi, and Asiya Ayubbi / Nobuko Miyamoto, Asiya Amatullah Ayubbi, and Imam Kamau Ayubbi 384
1619 / Douglas Kearney 396
Encircling the Circle: Blood Memory and Making the Village-a Conversation between Cleo Parker Robinson and Malik Robinson / Cleo Parker Robinson and Malik Robinson 400
Culture and Tradition: A Monument to Our Resilience / Ofelia Esparza 408
EspaÑol / Yanina Chicas 410
ApsÁalooke Feminist #4 / Wendy Red Star 412
Mother’s Words and Grandmother’s Thoughts: Living the Right Way (a Conversation) / Maribel Alvarez and Ofelia Zepeda 414
The AIM Song / Elisa Harkins 421
Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Reflections of Futurity / Queen Quet Marquetta L. Goodwine 426
For Paradise / Elizabeth M. Webb 430
What Is the New Basket That We’re Going to Weave? / Lori Lea Pourier 436
I ka wā ma mua, i ka wā ma hope: Ōiwi Orientations toward a Radical Futurity / Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio and Jonathan Kay Kamakawiwoʻole Osorio 442
The Art of Peer Pressure: Black Fire UVA! / Kevin Jerome Everson and Claudrena N. Harold 450
Part 6. Currents Beyond: Artists Shifting Paradigms of Inequity
Introduction / Genevieve Fowler 461
Bang Bang / Natalie Ball 466
The Cultural New Deal for Cultural and Racial Justice / Michele Kumi Baer, Jeff Chang, MarÍa LÓpez De LeÓn, Tara Dorabji, Kassandra L. Khalil, Lori Pourier, Favianna Rodriguez, Nayantara Sen, Carlton Turner, Roberta Uno, and Elizabeth M. Webb 468
We Begin by Listening / Jeanette Lee 475
EMERGENYC: An Artistic Home for Emerging Artists / MarlÈne RamÍrez-Cancio 482
Listening through Dance / Antoine Hunter 491
Scenes and Takes / Carrie Mae Weems 495
Feminist Coalition and Queer Movements across Time: A Conversation between Alok Vaid-Menon and Urvashi Vaid / Alok Vaid-Menon and Urvashi Vaid 504
What Would Upski Think? / Devin Kenny 516
all organizing is science fiction / adrienne maree brown 519
Rebirth Garments / Sky Cubacub 522
A Call to Action / Eleanor Savage 524
SOVEREIGN / X 538
Flexing Hope Is a Practice / Ananya Chatterjea 540
Azadi / Arshia Fatima Haq 546
Afterword / Daniela Alvarez and Elizabeth M. Webb 549
emergence / Sarah Sophia Yanni 551
Acknowledgments 553
