Sites of Struggle Map

disorientnow — Thu, 15 May 2008 01:08:52 +0000

The official story is…there is no story!

disorientnow — Thu, 15 May 2008 01:04:27 +0000

Why tactical intervention? Why here? Why now? In order to understand the need to use art as a means of disrupting the institution’s spectacle of erasure, it is necessary to provide some background information on recent incidents and mobilizations on campus to contextualize and situate this project.
On October 5, 2006, two on campus Greek organizations, Delta Delta Delta Sorority and Zeta Beta Tau Fraternity held a party called “Tacos and Tequila,” in which attendees attempted to perform what they imagined as “Mexican-ness” by dressing as gardeners, wearing sombreros, and in the case of the women in attendance, stuffing their shirts to be be ‘pregnant’, or wearing Mexican flags as skirts and dresses. One of the people in attendance remarked, “I thought that some girls were dressed inappropriately….But I didn’t think the theme was anything out of the ordinary.”i In response to the incident, the UIUC administration failed to impose any sanctions because they believed that the two groups did not violate the student code.ii October 31, 2006, over three-hundred students mobilized on the quad to create a spectacle to disrupt the spectacle of silence that characterized the administration’s response to the ‘party’.iii The rally, called “Breaking the Silence” was organized by a group of students called STOP, Students Transforming Oppression and Privilege. I was a part of this student group that materialized based on loose connections through the McNair research program, La Casa Cultural Latina, and the Black House. There were long, late-night meetings at peoples’ apartments because a few people refused to meet anywhere on campus. No one was allowed to use their UIUC email accounts. I mention all this because our organizing strategies were in part informed by contacts who were involved in the 1992 Latino student mobilizations that culminated in a the occupation of Henry Administration building. It was with a clear understanding the administration’s ability to deploy its apparatus of punishment to squelch dissent, that we about trying to build a coalition “off the grid.” After the October 31st rally, students, faculty, and staff pressured members of the administrative upper echelon to show up for a public forum in order to hear and respond to student concerns about the campus climate. The forum, titled, “Racism, Power, and Privilege at UIUC” took place on February 1, 2006 and was attended by well over a thousand people. At the forum the STOP coalition presented the administration with a set of demands aimed at addressing the rampant ‘isms,’ on campus.iv
Flash forward to now, to the Academy on Capitalism and Limited Government fund, to the University’s Blackwater scandal, to yet another racially themed party this semester, “Nightmare on Elm St,” based on what was imagined as Compton, California street-thug culture,v and its very easy to feel like not much has changed. The UIUC administration effectively co-opted the coalition demands into their strategic plan by setting up committees and tasks forces. At the beginning of the 2007-2008 academic year, the Chance launched a diversity ad campaign called “Inclusive Illinois,” with the mantra of, “One campus, many voices.”vi The “Inclusive Illinois” initiative, with no identifiable working group, with its ‘pledge’ on its website calling for individuals to essentially promise to be nice to each other, without acknowledging how power and privilege are structured into the institution, and without any reference to the dissent that informed it, for me, embodies the violent process of erasure through which histories of resistance and lived experiences that do not reify the institution are removed from the built environment of this campus. Inclusive Illinois tells us that the official story is that there is no story.
I talk about this all to explain the whys: Why here? Why now? Here because, first of all, because I am not here, in the sense that I had to be trained to produce knowledge the “right,” which demanded a disconnect from my own lived experiences. I spent my entire undergraduate career consuming scholarship that told me: queer. black. woman. that I was wrong period, that’s how I got punctuated. Here because the academic household viiis a space in which people learn how to produce “expert” knowledge, as opposed to learning about different ways of knowing. Different ways of knowing are precisely what I want to create the context for by using photo collage as a means of tactical intervention. Why now? Because I am here, in the sense that I have a desire to stay critically engaged in organizing on campus in order to continue to create alternative stories and counter-discourses. It is in the seemingly contradictory space of (in)visibility that I situate myself.

Sound Familiar?

disorientnow — Wed, 14 May 2008 23:44:32 +0000

I came across this speech given by Mario Savio, who was involved in the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley and I felt like it still resonated with how I feel today on the neoliberal campus. I disagree with the idea that we’re raw materials. I think we all come to the academy with our own thoughts, experiences, and ways of knowing. The conflict seems to occur when there is a mismatch between how we understand and make meaning of things and the ways of understanding and knowing that are validated by the institution. For some people, this is never a problem because the ways of the institution are aligned with who they are: their racial and class backgrounds, among other things, and how they create meaning.

Project: Disorientation

Sites of Struggle Map

The official story is…there is no story!

Sound Familiar?