working my rainbows: an introduction to performance studies
installment 1

Here is my first installment in my Introduction to Performance Studies portfolio, titled working my rainbows. You can also view this project at goldendharma.blogspot.com.

Happy reading!
ebony

for the orisha who order my stepsfor the ancestors who whisper in my ear
for the elders who light my path
for the contemporaries who quicken my breath with brilliance
for the unborn who inspire me to be ever true and ever vigilant

ashe!


Introduction


"Gotta Take My Time, Getting This One Together"

"…I'm the Obeah woman from beneath the seaTo get to satan you gotta pass through me'Cause I know the angels name by nameI can eat thunder and drink the rainBeen through enoughYeah they call me Nita and Pices tooThere ain't nothing that I can't doIf I choose to, if you let me…"

-from Obeah Woman by Nina Simone

Folks living in the south meditate on slowness like Miles Davis meditates on a sustained note. Mustard Greens, a delicacy in African diasporic communities, are simmered slowly with garlic, bay leaf, cayenne, onion, and ham hock hours before dinner. Sun tea is brewed in backyards full of hot sun that pierces glass containers pregnant with split lemons, sugar and Lipton tea bags. Gumbo, a Cajun stew, is conjured in coal black cast iron cauldrons nights before festive family gatherings in ..:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />New Orleans.
Being raised in the southern Texas, usually pronounced as three syllables, taught me how to appreciate the sensuality of unhurried happenings. The humidity rests in the bones and slows the breath to a crawl. A southern Baptist spiritual, wrestled from a sinner's throat, takes what seems like hours to sing. I have known southern lovers who studied every sinew of my body at a snail's pace, leisurely like a sunset, seriously like calculus.
I start here, with a meditation on southernity, space, sensuality and the lyrics of Nina Simone to illustrate how I enter this discipline: as a conjurer, a southern woman, a poet, and an observer and taster of the various flavors of this world. Nina Simone teaches us in her song "Obeah Woman" the power of transcending and transforming one's surroundings to accomplish mystical feats Africana women engage in daily.
Nina sings through a gravel and honey voice the importance of taking time to get things together. In her case, she is getting together God's divine work: controlling the rain, lightning, naming the angels, and fighting Satan on mankind's behalf. I fortunately, have another charge in this life, one no less difficult but different nonetheless. The essays in this portfolio begin to articulate my understanding of how and why people act the way the do in a myriad of situations. Whether in the midst of trauma or ecstasy, intention, motivation, and effect are extremely important to the manner in which behavior is perceived and metabolized.
working my rainbows represents a sustained meditation. This project seeks to critique, analyze, question performances of resistance by means of spiritual activism, intra/intercultural exchange, and social justice work. Further more, the project seeks to think about how performances of resistance inform and impact local communities striving to dismantle systemic institutions that perpetuate a culture of state violence and social oppression.
In writing these essays, several texts anchored my burgeoning understanding of this field. Namely, "Points of Contact between Anthropological and Theatrical Thought," "Stages," "Resistance of the Object," Exhausting Bodies (excerpt), "You are here the DNA of Performance," "Contact Improvisation and Anthropological Analysis," "Docile Bodies," and "Performing Citizenship". These works provide historical and cultural background, map the origins of Performance Studies, and provide differing philosophies and writing approaches employed in the discipline. I am drawn to these essays and excerpts because of how body is implicated as a central to agent of movement. Most importantly, the articles grant the novice a plethora of information in which to analyze how the body is a tool of social resistance. In essence, the articles continue my love affair with the body and the multitude of performances it stages in shifting temporal and spatial paradigms. The scholars' works bring home for me how individuals or whole communities can access the power of the Obeah women as they move to transform, transition, and transcend oppressive situations. Whether literally in dance, or ethereally, in unearthing the past to remix the present in framing a transformative narrative and politic for the future, the articles situate the body in a multitude of happenings which spark a uniquely necessary transformative response.
In compiling working my rainbows, I confronted several obstacles. Some of those obstacles included: difficulty incorporating how particular analysis relates to my larger year-long project, difficulty writing responses to articles with limited knowledge of the field, difficulty employing Womanist tradition of analysis and writing to essays distant from the lyrical and poetic nature of the aforementioned tradition. I experience these obstacles as points of possible access and growth as I work toward a longer project on Nina's Simone's oeuvre and the role of spirituality in social justice movements. I also view these stoppages as areas where I may be able to join Performance Studies, Cultural Studies, and Performing Arts discourses with a much needed voice of the Womanist scholarly tradition. Alice Walker, June Jordan, Audre Lorde, Ntozake Shange, Jayne Cortez, bell hooks, Angela Davis, and Hortense Spillers are a few of voices who serve as my mentors; I am eager to continue in our tradition.
While wrought with difficulties, several successes took place as I compiled this collection. Similarly to writing poetry, I sharpened my abilities to respond to complex, gripping concepts in concise two or three page responses. Additionally, I found that I particularly appreciate the process of responding to film and dance. I could definitely foresee further research of these art forms. I was also reaffirmed in my belief of the importance of the community in the education process. Participating in class lectures assisted the development of clear thoughts about a topic or concept.
All in all, it is incumbent upon me to root my analysis of performance and creation of performance in deciphering its impact on local communities. The papers in working my rainbows assist me in creating everyday scholarship and performance that people can sink their teeth into. After composing these twelve essays I am clearer about how I will position my body in the ongoing conversations comprising this discipline. I am clearer about how I will engage in this Program, as a year long meditation on spirituality, resistance, bodies, movement, and sustained transformation of the present in the creation of a world without sexual violence in the now and ever after.

for sekou:

raised by jack-o-lanterns and parking tickets
dandelion eyelashes part the onyx birthstone

in weary times
our soupy mouths form easy o’s like lake huron
lumbering towards the universal sound
the land of rocking chairs

when poets die
let their henna circle my body seven times and become a new mole

crimson neither stopwatch
nor discount metronome

when poets die
let them be carried through the streets on the lips of harmonics and
earlobes.


Kim Arrington is a singer/song writer/playwrite/poet and all around fly sista. google her and be inspired. www.kimarrington.complease send your sekou poems to me and i will post them where ever i can.ebony

Now!
for sekou sundiata

i know what is means to have miles davis in your skin
to speak like a weeping willow
to resist citizenship
to chew gum like a gourmet meal
now
i know how to harness a dream
right behind my belly button
and hold it there til it sprouts wings
bears fruit
blows across an ocean like a liberated spore
you asked me the question
is the american dream a dream or a program
and at that moment i knew you were a blessing in my wounds
a libretto for the revolution epic
a hinge for me to hold onto in times of extended prayer
now
i know why i love my daddy's black taffy laugh
and his eyes like an anthology of sunsets
and his one purple nail that speaks slow around his chin
a chin that drinks the moonlight
i know now sekou you drink the moonlight
let it fill your vaselined cheeks articulate your tongue reawaken your tonsils
you asked me
what is a dream with out education
you asked me what is a dream with out education
youaskedmewhatisadreamwithouteducation liberation resistance love light
youasked me me me mmeeeeeee
whatisadreamwithouteducation
maybe its gospel without mahalia
or hip hop without rakim
or jazz without john
or new orleans without the mississippi
or my grandma without the love of her life
or me without poetry
orororoororororor
you asked me
what is a dream without education
i say it aint it aint it aint a dream with out the technology of technicolor

may the spirits walk you gently down
and raise a song in your honor
may elegba grant you safe passage
asheooooo asheooooooooo ashe

After Denko by Sweet Honey in the Rock

So I am currently going through a birthing process as I complete my first major project for my Performance Studies degree.

As I should, I turned to song a poetry by the women to fortify my body and voice. I spent this weekend writing, and listening to Nina, Sweet Honey, Alice Coltrane and meditating on words actions movement voice history and next steps.

Denko is a Bambara song offered to and by women traveling through the birthing process. I am birthing right now and call on this song for light, wisdom, and strength, and clarity.
Because my professor, Judith Casselberry, is brilliant she played the song today in my class. She didn't know I needed it, but she so knew I did.

I wrote this in class

After Denko/ a meditation on birthing words, light, wisdom

1.
i am here because the rattle of the blues brings down the spirits because gravel in nina's throat loosens teh music in mine

because i don't know my mother's mother's mother's name but she has a song to sing through me

because when i speak i want audre to wink and alice to clap three times

because my body is not a toy or a toilet or a laboratory or an existential dilemma

2.
the spirit quivers in the space where dreams are fertilized and nurtured
move the mountains spirits rattle the webs lose loosen the breath

let the blood warm the skin
there is a riff the sun bakes only this body translates

let us be born
let us be born
let us be born

sweep me up in a ring-shout

i am healed by the rattle fed by the drum

ashe

-love and light,

ebony

Got Poetry! We do. Check us out!

Check Durham's Community Writing Intensive online chapbook.


View us at http://www.ohsointense.wordpress.com/.
We will be adding to the chapbook in the next few days to keep coming back,and leave a comment as well.

peace,

ebony noelle golden

furiousflower@gmail.com

there is a way to articulate hallelujah

prayer sweated over hot rocks

spirit piercing alien vernaculars

multiplied throats hurling truth

truth hurling multiplied bodies

See hear

grab the dirt

rotate the skull

spit light lighten the step step light

rest in the right then write

like this

1. fight

2. remember

3. resistresistresist

4. rest

5. rise and chop

6. splay and shed

7. bring leave burn

8. repeat

turn slow bring palm to cheek check pulse then repeat

resist repeat resist

where does the body begin

itch

swing

OutKast ft Erykah Badu, Cee lo, Big Rube... Liberation!

libertad for life!!!

Poetry By The People~~ Community Writing INtensive

POETRY BY THE PEOPLE
Community Writing Intensive
Durham, NC
May 8-10, 2007

Dear Lovers of the Word,
You are cordially invited to write and discuss poetry in and with the Durham community. You will be surrounded by people who love poetry and believe in its transformative power. Here’s what you can expect:

Daily Schedule
1:00 ~ 3:00 Silent Writing/ Manuscript Conferences
3:00 ~ 4:00 Late Lunch/ Early Dinner
4:15 ~ 5:15 Community Sharing/ Open Mic
5:30 ~ 6:30 Poetry Exercises
6:30 ~ 8:30 Workshop/ Critique
8:30 ~ 9:00 Wrap – Up

Sponsors
This year betty’s daughter arts collaborative, broken beautiful press, and SpiritHouse-NC have graciously decided to sponsor Poetry By the People, so you don’t have to. There is no charge for attendance, just come with poems, an open heart, and a love for community art.

Funding
For poets who are not in the Durham-Raleigh-Chapel-Hill area, two very modest travel scholarships are available.
The Betty Ann Sims, Ed.D. Artist/Scholar Travel Scholarship is available to any poet who can demonstrate how expressive art will impact future or current scholarly projects.
The Talya Pierce Travel Scholarship for Emerging Poets is awarded to a woman of color who is beginning to explore the field of poetry. The recipient of this award must not hold any publications or academic degrees in creative writing.

Application
Please submit a five-page manuscript, a cover letter that explains the role of poetry in creating community, and your contact information to inthepeopleshands@gmail.com by May 6.


Contact Person
Ebony Noelle Golden, MFA
Director of betty’s daughter arts collaborative
furiousflower@gmail.com
www.myspace.com/mamashieroglyphics

Make a poem with me that answers this question...


How does poetry blossom in the midst of meditation?


respond here or on my blog at myspace.com/mamashieroglyphics


love,
e

processing process / a circular experience

Current mood: contemplative

more (quest)ioning!

so a sista friend asked me about my writing process and i invited her to lunch (you know talking about process takes time). in my ever present quest to develop a workable applicable (to everything and specifc things in my world) poetics (in which to enrich myself and the beings around me)

i think alot about the manipulation of words, sounds, spirit, images, and bodies. here is what we came up with.


processing process/ a work in progress/ a collaboration between/among the universe (especially kriti and i)


process is was use to be tangible etheral consistent full of light and absence

process will not accept a bottle or magnitude

process must (not) be or always is touch

process is (or isn't) always lack of urgency

process is presence yet anticipating reincarnation everyday

process is fullness wholeness holistic

process is looking for or waiting with language

process is the struggle for aunthenticity

process is living

process is a medium

process is patience

process is energy

and emerging

and making language

and creating

and telepathy

process is how

peace and pieces of peace slivers and wholes and splayed light

love,
e

The art of (quest)ioning

so on my consistent journey for art poetry relationship and a spiritfilled love affair with myself, i attempt to practice silence, even in a room of people. here is one installment of one of my listening sessions. look for more soon!

ebonybeinglight

always and forever,

the art of (quest)ioning / or vibing to alice coletranes harp everyday

where is the real? who is a "micro"community? when is a sista?

when is a performance? which is a trinity? where is a body?

where is the hurt? which is a critique? how is a vulva? how is the trust?

which is a soul? who is a response? where is the tear? where is the blood?

where is the power? when is a color? where is the desire? when is a voice?

so, family~~~~sometimes the answer is the (quest)ion? word! word!

take some time and get lost or found in your questions about this world and the beings on it

love and life
e

Shange and Moving Toward Healing Poetics!!!

Hey people,

Here are the notes and activities that I shared with the audience during my talk on Shange and performative healing poetics.

Sharing in love and light,

e

PERFORMATIVE HEALING IN NTOZAKE SHANGE’SFOR COLORED GIRLS WHO CONSIDEREDSUICIDE WHEN THE RAINBOW IS ENUF

Working the Chakras-

Green: Love, acceptance allowance

Each character in For Colored Girls’ personifies an energy field or chakra in the body. In traditional healing arts, the color green is associated with the heart chakra thus; “Alla My Stuff” is an imperative thrust toward the Lady in Green’s reclamation of self and self love. Lady in Green reminds the audience of the universal sound/expression of love, self acceptance, and allowance. The Green lady reclaims her own “tacky skirts”, her aired out vagina, “callused feet”, her “arm wit the hot iron scar” as her story, her walk, and her meditation on freedom, awareness, and wholeness.

This reclamation and proclamation illustrates specifically black womyn reclaiming ourselves; interestingly, the pieces, bodies, desires communities have harvested, historically and recently, for consumption. Lady in Green’s monologue is indeed a celebration of the reclamation of voice and herstory; and serves as an insightful glimpse into the importance of vocalization as expressive healing.

My stuff exercise: List all of the stuff that makes you the fabulous person you are. You can list descriptions of your personality, wonderful things you have gifted this world, or something special about you that don’t mind sharing with this group. Create a list of at least five items!

Dance this Fever Away!

In “No More Love Poems # 1” Lady in Orange deconstructs her individual experience as a “colored girl”. We enter the monologue as the Lady in Orange gains of awareness of what it means to be “her colored self” against a landscape of trauma and voicelessness. Thankfully, Shange does not leave the Orange lady rambling in a disorienting space of helplessness. By the end of the piece this character opens up to the joy of tears, rebirth, and the self-realization that comes as the character exfoliates feelings and despair and sorrow.

One more point of importance in this monologue concerns the development of a body narrative through the medium of dance. Shange, a trained dancer, peppers choreography throughout the performance of this play. Dance is what I like to call the unrestrained voice of the soul. Dance similar to vocal expressiveness allows the body to make strides toward healing by quickening the breath, warming the body, and securing the space where womyn can walk whole in their own bodies.

If your body to talk: Awakening to dance is a beautiful way in engage with your own body. Choose three body parts and allow them to have a free dialogue on the page. If possible allow the parts of your body to communicate with each other. Share your body conversations with someone next to you.

Ebony Presents Lecture on Performative Healing in the Work of Ntozake Shange

Greetings folks,

In observance of Women's History Month and every month, I will present an interactive lecture based on Performative Healing in the work of Ntozake Shange.

Please attend if you can!!!

Date: 3/21/2007
Time: 7 pm
Place: Miller Morgan Auditorum on the Campus of North Carolina Central University

for more information email
furiousflower@gmail.com

peace and love,e

Yo Grits and Good as Ours: Support SpiritHouse and NCCU 2/17!!!

Yo Grits Aint Good as Mine: Support SpiritHouse and NCCU February 17!!!

Three artists, three fantastic visions, one night…

January, 08 2007

For Immediate Release
Durham, N.C. - Harry Davis, Derrick Mayo and Rodney Edwards: three artists from completely different worlds, drawn to canvas for different reasons. Harry Davis, an Army veteran and Wilmington, North Carolina native, was re-birthed through paints and canvases after an accidental shooting left him wheelchair bound. His subjects vary from tribal, to Americana to spiritual, but his masterful use of bold colors remain the same. His work is in the private collections of Halle Berry and Denzel Washington. His showings range from venues as varied as the CIA to our very own Artsplosion in Raleigh, North Carolina
Derrick Mayo looks more like an Indy rock star than the talented painter he is; sultry, brooding eyes and long dreadlocks complete the impression. His instruments are paintbrushes and his fans are the many canvases which welcome him with open arms when he begins to stroke their surfaces with a rhythm and cadence that produces such works as Expressions of Melody or Bird Lives or Lady Day. He pays homage to late, great jazz artists and angels of dance. If passion were a song it would be his alone, the words written across the surface of his canvases. His talent has been recognized and appreciated by the Durham Regional Hospital and Charlotte Mayor Pro Tem Patrick Cannon.

In each family there is a wild, errant child, but we love him nonetheless. This triumvirate is no different. Rodney Davis, foster child, in and out of prison since he was a teenager, was convicted of murder by the time he was nineteen. But did that kill the spirit in this man? Never. He twisted and manipulated his anger into an art form which through its sheer power made its way outside the prison walls into banks, corporations and art aficionados' personal coffers. His pain ripples across the surface of his canvases in broad strokes of darkness and light, transferring itself to the viewer. Inspirational, aching and revelatory all at once, his work will leave you emotionally dazzled.

On February 17, 2007 from 7-10pm these artists will have their work on display at a reception being held at North Carolina Central University's Law School. Hosted by the Grits and Gravy Filmmakers and Writers Festival as its first annual Artists in Motion fundraiser event, all work purchased is tax deductible for up to twenty five percent of the purchase price.

Admission is free and refreshments will be served.
For more information contact Aisha Hicks at (919) 636-1751 or at gritsandgravy08@nc.rr.com.

Call For Submissions

In The People’s Hands
(a grassroots literary zine)


Theme: Africana Women and Violence

Submission Deadline: March 5, 2007

Introduction

Africana (women of African heritage) share an interesting and distinct relationship with violence. Throughout h(er)story, and contemporary times Africana women have interfaced with police brutality, sexual assault, verbal attack, cultural brutality, academic dehumanization, reproductive injustice, political, and social disenfranchisement. Thank goddess, this is not the story of Africana women in total. We also experience and create love, joy, spirit, resilience, and fortitude that make our individual and collective journeys worth traveling. The complex relationship Africana women share with violence is reflected in our relationships with other women, men, ourselves; and is wonderfully and heartfully highlighted in the songs we sing, the stories we share, the love we make, the poems we recite, the food we cook, etc. etc.

In The People’s Hands, a SpiritHouse publication, was created to hear the voices of diverse communities. Submit work that explores your personal relationship with violence as an Africana woman or work in which explores this theme. Submit a literary creation that fits one or a combination of categories. Please note: We will not use your submission for any other purposes than creating In The People’s Hands literary zine. We will not reproduce in total or in part your submission for any other purpose than the paper-based, and online publication of this project. After publication author retains all implicit and explicit publication rights.

Criteria

Poetry
Two poems (maximum of two pages)

Short Fiction
1 story (maximum of four pages)

Essay
1 Essay (maximum of three pages)

Visual Art
2 pieces (please note one maybe chosen as the cover of collection)

Along with your creative work send:

-Two sentence biography
-picture (optional)
-contact information (phone, email address)

All submissions must be sent to:
InThePeoplesHands@gmail.com
In the subject line please type: Africana Women and Violence Issue

About the Sponsoring Organization

SpiritHouse- www.spirithouse-nc.org
SpiritHouse is a nonprofit grassroots community-based organization. We are part of a movement of progressive movements and organizations that endeavor to connect people to each other for the purpose of liberation, enlightenment, and fulfillment. We are independent. We are not supervised by any corporate, religious, or state bureaucracy. Our freedom allows us the flexibility to work and develop the partnerships of our choice. This gives us clarity and direction.

About the Editor-In-Chief www.myspace.com/mamashieroglyphics
Ebony Noelle Golden, MFA, is a poet, performer, and educator currently teaching African American Literature, Composition and Creative Writing at North Carolina Central University and Louisburg College as a Visiting Instructor. She has self-published a chap book of poems titled the sweet smell of juju funk and is currently editing mama's hieroglyphics to be released next year. In the near future, Ebony plans to undergo doctoral studies in Performance and stage her multimedia choreopoem, What Aunt Sarah Says to Siffronia When Sweet Thing is Moon-Watching and Peaches is Dancing to the Wind. Ebony can be contacted via email at furiousflower@gmail.com.

Midwives Exhibit in Durham!!!

Friends,
A traveling exhibition curated by Linda Janet Holmes, and on view at the Center for Documentary Studies, Reclaiming Midwives features photographs by Robert Galbraith that explore the lives and experiences of black midwives in Georgia in the early 1950s. Galbraith was a cameraman for George C. Stoney's 1953 film All My Babies, produced by the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Georgia Department of Public Health, and intended as an instructional tool for the midwives still delivering most of the babies in rural Georgia at the time. The film, featuring Albany, Georgia, midwife Mary Francis Hill Coley (1900-66), has traveled to train midwives around the world.
Please spread the word that we will be screening the film All My Babies, this Sunday, February 4, at 2 p.m. at Richard White Auditorium on Duke's East Campus. The director of the film, George Stoney, will be there for a question and answer discussion session after the screening. There is a $5 donation requested for admission. I hope to see you there!
Peace,
Courtney
--
Courtney Reid-EatonExhibitions DirectorCenter for Documentary Studiesat Duke University1317 W. Pettigrew Street Durham, NC 27705919.660.3664919.681.7600 (fax)http://cds.aas.duke.edu

altar installation and silent protest in durham sunday

Because direct and immediate action is love, and revolution, and beauty, and resistance, and ....

Because art is action all over this globe Because we are we are we are we are we are agentsloversalliessurvivorsstriversresisterssistersfightersradicalsfamily

Because nifong is not the glue that holds this case or this community togetherBecause we will not be silenced or confused in the face of white racist patriarchy and sexual violence...

beacause we need....Movement now...

If you want to sit and meditate silently in front of the Court House Sunday meet us there!Bring a flower, a poem, a candle, a stick of incense, a piece of art work and... let's collectively focus positive energy on healing our ourselves and our community.

This is not an overly choreographed event, just show up at the court house around 12 noon Sunday 1/14.

in my mother's likeness

the slack hip and urban cheek
the kitchen that slicks neck easily

not her tree limb legs
twig like fingers
piano ear or cato skin
(because my daddy is the color of ocean's edge)
but eyes

oh the seeking eyes identical shimmering
glass in both our skulls

Hocking a Wedding Ring Published at www.wombpoetry.com

Yo,

check out my moving and grooving lit life at www.wombpoetry.com.

Hocking a Wedding Ring Published in online journal for women poets!

love and light,

ebony golden,
betty's daughter literary press