The concept of deconstructing language/words described in M. NourbeSe Phillip's interview made me think of this performance that speaks to the inherent oppressive element of colonial languages. The poet speaks of the reclaiming of language by its refashioning. What we consider improper English or slang can be an act of empowerment rather than a mark of ignorance.
Errantry (errance) 18- errantry does not proceed from renunciation nor from frustration regarding a supposedly deteriorated (deterritorialized) situation of origin; it is not a resolute act of rejection or an uncontrolled impulse of abandonment. - The thought of errantry is a poetics, which always infers that at some moment it is told. The tale of errantry is the tale of Relation. 21- The thinking of errancy conceives of totality but willingly renounces any claims to sum it up or possess it. 20- The thought of errantry is not apolitical nor is it inconsistent with the will to identity, which is, after all, nothing other than the search for a freedom within particular surroundings. Rhizomatic thought / rhizome 18- the rhizome- prompting the knowledge that identity is no longer completely within the root but also in Relation. Poetics of Relation 11- each and every identity is extended through a relationship with the Other 20- in the poetics of Relation, one who is erra...
Opening language to its own im/possibility: a noise that sounds like ancient and new.
ReplyDeleteJust a small note on Jordan Abel, a Nisga poet from B.C. --
ReplyDeletevia his website:
[His poetry book] "Injun", is a long poem about racism and the representation of Indigenous peoples. Composed of text found in western novels published between 1840 and 1950 – the heyday of pulp publishing and a period of unfettered colonialism in North America – Injun then uses erasure, pastiche, and a focused poetics to create a visually striking response to the western genre.
After compiling the online text of 91 of these now public-domain novels into one gargantuan document, Abel used his word processor’s “Find” function to search for the word “injun.” The 509 results were used as a study in context: How was this word deployed? What surrounded it? What was left over once that word was removed? Abel then cut up the sentences into clusters of three to five words and rearranged them into the long poem that is Injun. The book contains the poem as well as peripheral material that will help the reader to replicate, intuitively, some of the conceptual processes that went into composing the poem.
Though it has been phased out of use in our “post-racial” society, the word “injun” is peppered throughout pulp western novels. Injun retraces, defaces, and effaces the use of this word as a colonial and racial marker. While the subject matter of the source text is clearly problematic, the textual explorations inInjun help to destabilize the colonial image of the “Indian” in the source novels, the western genre as a whole, and the western canon.
images of the work here https://s3.amazonaws.com/walrus-assets/img/InjunPage.jpg
https://thewalrus.ca/a-loss-for-words/
"I'm drawn to the fugitive nature of Injun. I imagine Abel poring over source texts, deconstructing code, forging meaning from scraps and breaking through colonial constructions with fever, and I can't help but think he's re-created my experience of being Indigenous in Canada. Well done." – Leanne Simpson
DAMMNNNNNNNNN YESSSSS THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR POSTING THIS MY HEART HAS CRIED YES A THOUSAND TIMES THANK YOU
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