What Is the Purpose of Writing Arts of Contact Zone
Experiencing the Arts of the Contact Zone: "Ethno/Graphics" at the Museum of Natural History
In my Showtime Yr Writing form about The Americas, nosotros read a slice that has actually stuck with me. I plant myself constantly scrawling its fundamental terms into the margins of my subsequent readings. In other classes, similar Urban Studies, my heed would continuously wander back to the relevance of the slice. Fifty-fifty when I wasn't making direct connections, the text was always lurking in my hidden, implicitly informing how I approached new materials. And information technology was definitely on my mind when the other Scholars and I attended a panel entitled, "Ethno/Graphics" at the Museum of Natural History. The panel centered around how different writers and artists accept dealt with ethnographic questions through the genre of graphic novels.
Backtracking, the slice I read in class was called "The Arts of the Contact Zone" past Mary Louise Pratt. In this text Pratt defines "the contact zone," as a space where cultures can come across and wrestle with one another, often inside "asymmetrical ability relationships" (34). The contact zone is a dynamic and fruitful place where new meaning can be produced, yet it tin also reveal ignorance and misunderstanding.
Pratt claims that fine art produced past marginalized communities within the contact zone tends to use, yet also subvert, the language and conventions of the dominant culture. She creates a term for this kind of writing: "autoethnography." Autoethnography refers to "a text in which people undertake to describe themselves in ways that engage with representations others take made of them" (pg. 35). She discusses the ways in which marginalized writers re-appropriate language to apply for their ain purposes, including in order to critique the oppressor's civilization. She references the term "transculturation," coined by some other scholar, Fernando Ortiz, to draw this procedure. Transculturation is defined hither equally "a process whereby members of subordinated or marginal groups select and invent from materials transmitted past a dominant or metropolitan civilisation" (pg 36).
So when I went to the panel, these questions about ethnography versus autoethnography were fresh on my heed. And this console turned out to exist the perfect space to engage with these questions. The three speakers were Sherine Hamdy, Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez and Lucio Zago. Sherine Hamdy produced Lissa, a volume virtually two young girls in Arab republic of egypt who face different medical situations that exam their friendship. Williamsburg Shorts, by Lucio Zago, depicts the irresolute character of a Brooklyn neighborhood that has recently undergone an intense hipsterization. And finally, Edgardo Miranda-Rodriguez had written, drawn and published La Borinqueña, a comic book that stars Marisol Rios de Luz, a heroine of Puerto-Rican descent. The panel was incredibly constructed and the resulting conversation was dynamic and fruitful. All of the artists had interesting connections to their piece of work, very different styles and processes.
La Borinqueña was of particular interest to me, because it so perfectly represented the key concepts from "The Arts of the Contact Zone." I thought the comic book was a perfect portrayal of an autoethnographic representation. The comic follows Marisol, a New Yorker who attends Columbia University who goes on a inquiry trip to Puerto Rico. In Puerto Rico, amidst doing inquiry on rocks in ancient caves, she reconnects with her island and discovers her powers. The slice expertly weaves in Puerto Rican and Taino mythology and history, deftly switches between Spanish and English, all while employing a traditional Curiosity-inspired grade. It has the same glossy pages, dramatic speech bubbles, and strip format. At the panel Edgardo does indicate out one crucial difference: his protagonist is much curvier than the typical Marvel heroine, with darker skin and a curly mane of hair. It'southward this mix of traditional form and nontraditional content that reminds me so much of transculturation and autoethnography. Edgardo has preserved the original style of Curiosity to reach a mainstream audience, while simultaneously subverting the centralization of white male heroes. The comic also represents an effort to bring Puerto-Rican culture and history to a wider audience despite its erasure and misrepresentation in U.S. History. In 1 powerful ii-page spread, Edgardo depicts scenes from the original colonization of Puerto Rico to the tragic shooting of Pulse, a popular Latinx nightclub in Orlando.
Overall, the panel give-and-take was a really thought-provoking and engaging experience. At present I'1000 in a seminar nigh the Caribbean Diaspora in NY, and I look forward to thinking more near contact zones!
- Julie Seager '21
Source: https://barnard.edu/programmatic-initiatives/scholars-distinction/blog/arts-contact-zone-amnh
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