Refuse the Weather:
Envisioning Worlds Beyond Anti-Blackness, Indigenous Genocide, and the Settler Colonial Nation-State
LynleyShimat Lys
Copyright for this page: CC By 4.0 International
Abstract:
In this dissertation, I argue that Indigenous knowledge and resurgence, Black knowledge and Black futures, and connections between these generate paths away from toxic whiteness, anti-Blackness, and settler colonial nation-states. The refusal of toxic whiteness must not work to re-center whiteness. On the contrary, it is only through centering Indigenous and Black knowledge and the lived experiences of Black and Indigenous communities that it is possible to move beyond and away from toxic whiteness, toxic settler states, and toxic nationalism. Black and Indigenous communities have long histories of envisioning and enacting worlds beyond these toxic power relations.
Christina Sharpe refers to the everyday atmosphere of racism and anti-Blackness as “the weather” in her lyric essay collection In the Wake. Audra Simpson, Glen Coulthard, and other Indigenous scholar activists theorize and enact refusal of the settler colonial nation-state and paths toward Indigenous resurgence. In addition to close listening to the work of Sharpe, Simpson, and Coulthard, I also engage with works including the lyric essays of Saidiya Hartman and Tiffany Lethabo King, the work of Michelle M. Wright, and work by Kanaka Maoli scholar activists, particularly in forms of writing such as Kumu kuʻualoha hoʻomanawanui's work in Voices of Fire and Brandy Nālani McDougall's work in Finding Meaning, as well as theorists of Blackness, Indigenous scholars, and academic and literary authors living and working in the intersections of Blackness and Indigeneity.
In this dissertation, I link together a series of lyric essays at the boundaries between academic essay, poetry, and lyric prose. I work closely with several of the key texts both in terms of content and in terms of form. The work of Christina Sharpe and Saidiya Hartman lean firmly into lyric essay mode, including poetry, lyric prose, and lyric-minded academic writing. The work of kuʻualoha hoʻomanawanui and Brandy Nālani McDougall incorporate moʻolelo, oli, mele, poetry, and lyric prose, as well as lyric academic essay.
In terms of the theory and practice of lyric essay in relation to Indigenous writers, I engage closely with the collection Shapes of Native Nonfiction: Collected Essays by Contemporary Writers, edited by Elissa Washuta and Theresa Warburton, as well as the lyric essay work of Elissa Washuta. My own work in lyric essay has tended to come out of a series of book reviews that I have been engaged in writing for literary journals, most recently Anomaly Journal (formerly Drunken Boat). In reviewing books of poetry, I have begun to develop a style of lyric essay which links closely to the works I review, while also maintaining a relationship to the review form and the forms of academic and literary criticism. In this dissertation, I follow the lead of hoʻomanawanui and McDougall in beginning each chapter with poetry and lyric, introducing a short lyric narrative to position myself and the topics included, continuing with lyric forms of academic writing, and ending each chapter with further personal narrative, poetry, and lyric.
The essays will focus on ways of refusing toxic whiteness, and more importantly, of centering Black and Indigenous epistemologies and ontologies. As a mostly white person, I intend to take account of my own positioning in relation to various Black and Indigenous communities. I recognize that I hold forms of privilege over these communities, and that I live and have been living in relation to and in close proximity to several Black and Indigenous communities, as well as having relatives in these communities. I also live, and have been living on Indigenous land and I have a responsibility to the Indigenous lands in which I live and have lived, and to the Indigenous communities who are the traditional guardians of these lands. I take account of my positioning and I take account of the numerous negative impacts of toxic whiteness and of anti-Blackness and settler colonial nation-states.
Bibliography
Theoretical Underpinnings: Works Cited
Coulthard, Glen. Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition. University of Minnesota Press, 2014.
Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
King, Tiffany Lethabo. The Black Shoals: Offshore Formations of Black and Native Studies. Duke University Press, 2019.
Sharpe, Christina. In the Wake: On Blackness and Being. Duke University Press, 2016.
Simpson, Audra. Mohawk Interruptus: Political Life Across the Borders of Settler States. Duke University Press, 2014.
Wright, Michelle M. Physics of Blackness: Beyond the Middle Passage Epistemology. University of Minnesota Press, 2015.
Literature Review: Works Cited
Coulthard, Glen. Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition. University of Minnesota Press, 2014.
Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
King, Tiffany Lethabo. The Black Shoals: Offshore Formations of Black and Native Studies. Duke University Press, 2019.
Sharpe, Christina. In the Wake: On Blackness and Being. Duke University Press, 2016.
Simpson, Audra. Mohawk Interruptus: Political Life Across the Borders of Settler States. Duke University Press, 2014.
Wright, Michelle M. Physics of Blackness: Beyond the Middle Passage Epistemology. University of Minnesota Press, 2015.
Genre & Form Review: Works Cited
Anderson, Kim. Introduction. Keetsahnak: Our Missing and Murdered Indigenous Sisters, edited by Anderson et. al., University of Alberta Press, 2018, pp. xxi-xxx.
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Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
hoʻomanawanui, kuʻualoha. Voices of Fire: Reweaving the Literary Lei of Pele and Hiʻiaka. University of Minnesota Press, 2014.
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King, Tiffany Lethabo. The Black Shoals: Offshore Formations of Black and Native Studies. Duke University Press, 2019.
McDougall, Brandy Nālani. Finding Meaning: Kaona and Contemporary Hawaiian Literature. University of Arizona Press, 2016.
McDougall, Brandy Nālani. The Salt-Wind: Ka Makani Paʻakai. Kuleana ʻŌiwi Press, 2008.
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Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. “Centring Resurgence: Taking on Colonial Gender Violence in Indigenous Nation Building.” Keetsahnak: Our Missing and Murdered Indigenous Sisters, edited by Anderson, Kim, et. al., University of Alberta Press, 2018, pp. 215-239.
Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. This Accident of Being Lost. House of Anansi Press, 2017.
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Chapter 1: Alaloa Kīpapa: Works Cited
Aikau, Hōkūlani K. “Following the Alaloa Kīpapa of Our Ancestors: A Trans-Indigenous Futurity without the State (United States or otherwise).” American Quarterly, vol. 67, no. 3, 2015, pp. 653-661.
Corntassel, Jeff. “Re-envisioning Resurgence: Indigenous Pathways to Decolonization and Sustainable Self-Determination.” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, vol. 1, no. 1, 2012, pp. 86-101.
Goodyear-Kaʻōpua, Noelani et. al., editors. A Nation Rising: Hawaiian Movements for Life, Land, and Sovereignty. Duke University Press, 2014.
Goodyear-Kaʻōpua, Noelani. “Kuleana Lāhui: Collective Responsibility for Hawaiian Nationhood in Activists’ Praxis.” Anarch@Indigenism, special issue of Affinities: A Journal of Radical Theory, Culture, and Action vol. 5, no. 1, 2011, pp. 130-163.
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hoʻomanawanui, kuʻualoha. Voices of Fire: Reweaving the Literary Lei of Pele and Hiʻiaka. University of Minnesota Press, 2014.
Kauanui, J. Kēhaulani. Paradoxes of Hawaiian Sovereignty: Land, Sex, and the Colonial Politics of State Nationalism, Duke University Press, 2018.
McDougall, Brandy Nālani. Finding Meaning: Kaona and Contemporary Hawaiian Literature. University of Arizona Press, 2016.
McDougall, Brandy Nālani. The Salt-Wind: Ka Makani Paʻakai. Kuleana ʻŌiwi Press, 2008.
Silva, Noenoe K. Aloha Betrayed: Native Hawaiian Resistance to American Colonialism. Duke University Press, 2004.
Teves, Stephanie Nohelani. Defiant Indigeneity: The Politics of Hawaiian Performance, University of North Carolina Press, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/uhm/detail.action?docID=5322483.
Trask, Haunani-Kay. From a Native Daughter: Colonialism and Sovereignty in Hawai‘i. University of Hawai‘i Press, 1999.
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Chapter 2: Anointed: Works Cited
Banivanua-Mar, Tracey. Decolonisation and the Pacific: Indigenous Globalisation and the Ends of Empire. Cambridge University. Press, 2016.
Hau‘ofa, Epeli. We Are the Ocean: Selected Works. University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2008.
Jetn̄il-Kijiner, Kathy and Dan Lin. “Anointed (written by Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner).” YouTube, uploaded by International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, 16 April 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuDA7izeYrk.
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Teaiwa, Katerina Martina. Consuming Ocean Island: Stories of People and Phosphate from Banaba. Indiana University Press, 2015.
Chapter 3: Blackness in Oceania: Works Cited
Aboagye, Kaiya. “Australian Blackness, the African Diaspora and Afro/Indigenous Connections in the Global South.” Bla(c)kness in Australia, edited by Sujatha Fernandes and Jared Thomas, special issue of Transition, no. 126, 2018, pp. 72-85.
Andrews, Courtney-Savali Leiloa. ““Something Within Me:” A Performative Exploration of Afro-Pacific Identity and the Refrain of Black Lives Matter.” “Black and Blue in the Pacific,” by Teaiwa, Teresia et. al., Amerasia Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 2017, pp. 163-168.
Arvin, Maile. “Possessions of Whiteness: Settler Colonialism and Anti-Blackness in the Pacific.” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education, & Society, 2 June, 2014, https://decolonization.wordpress.com/2014/06/02/possessions-of-whiteness-settler-colonialism-and-anti-blackness-in-the-pacific/. Accessed 21 September 2019.
Cruz Banks, Ojeya. “Tånó: A Black Chamoru Dancing Self-Revelation.” “Black and Blue in the Pacific,” by Teresia Teaiwa et. al., Amerasia Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 2017, pp. 147-156.
Fernandes, Sujatha, and Jared Thomas, editors. Bla(c)kness in Australia, special issue of Transition, no. 126, 2018.
Fernandes, Sujatha, and Jared Thomas. Introduction. Bla(c)kness in Australia, edited by Sujatha Fernandes and Jared Thomas, special issue of Transition, no. 126, 2018, pp. 1-4.
Henderson, April K. Postscript. “Black and Blue in the Pacific,” by Teresia Teaiwa et. al. Amerasia Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 2017, pp. 187-188.
Molisa, Grace Mera. Black Stone. Mana Publications, 1983.
Perez Hazel, Yadira. “Bla(c)k Lives Matter in Australia.” Bla(c)kness in Australia, edited by Sujatha Fernandes and Jared Thomas, special issue of Transition, no. 126, 2018, pp. 59-67.
Shilliam, Robbie. The Black Pacific: Anti-Colonial Struggles and Oceanic Connections. Bloomsbury, 2015.
Teaiwa, Teresia et. al. “Black and Blue in the Pacific.” Amerasia Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 2017, pp. 145-193.
Teaiwa, Teresia. “L(o)osing the Edge.” Special issue, The Contemporary Pacific, vol. 13, no. 2, 2001, pp. 343-57.
Teaiwa, Teresia, “Mela/Nesian Histories, Micro/Nesian Poetics” “Black and Blue in the Pacific,” by Teresia Teaiwa et. al. Amerasia Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 2017, pp. 169-178.
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Chapter 4: Epistemologies & Ontologies: Works Cited
Marsh, Selina Tusitala. “Theory “versus” Pacific Islands Writing: Toward a Tamaʻitaʻi Criticism in the Works of Three Pacific Islands Woman Poets.” Inside Out: Literature, Cultural Politics, and Identity in the New Pacific, edited by Vilsoni Hereniko and Rob Wilson, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1999.
Tuck, Eve and K. Wayne Yang. “Decolonization Is Not a Metaphor,” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education, and Society 1.1 (2012): 3, decolonization.org/index.php/des/article/view/18630.