H ow do you imagine worlds/ cessing practices (the healthy ones, teehee) of my child- hood and younger adulthood. In middle school, I would draw word-collages of inside jokes with my friends, much like the one included here (probably more intricate and exciting back then though), and in young adulthood— and now, although less often—I would open discussion on social media on nuanced topics via micro-essays on my Instagram Close Friends Stories. Because I am constantly being stimulated, answering big questions like, “How do you imagine THE FUTURE?” is more easily digestible when I connect the inner child to the present adult human. Please envision these paragraphs as a “tap / hold to read” IG Story post, white text on a black screen, and that privi- leged little green-highlighted white star in the top corner. *tap* *hold to read* When I imagine worlds into the future, I’ve realized that descriptively, none of the anti-isms are the first things that pop into my head. Of course I imagine a world of anti-racism, anti-capitalism, accessibility, trans and queer as f*ck existence— but I’m not using those descriptors as the main foundation of the world I imagine. *tap* *hold to read* dance/the arts/otherwise into the future— “how” as in what do I imagine, or “how” as in the actual practice of imagining? As I con- tinue to heal my inner child and various traumas while navigat- ing the current state of the world, I’ve found myself revisiting pro- Anti-racism, anti-ableism, anti-capitalism, anti-sexism, etc. only exist because of the systems of oppression that they aim to dismantle. Though they are in opposition to these systems of power, they are still created constructs and spaces that ultimately center the oppressive systems because the systems must first be defined in order to defy. In my imagined future, all of that goodness is already inherent to basic living. The “how” I’m caught up on at the moment is whether or not we arrive there linearly, or if we’ll have taken a quantum leap across perceptions of time. Likely the latter, as my imagined future is grounded in practices of community building, shared leadership, and humanity and art-centered living, imagined through my personal lens of Filipino indigeneity. Ways of life typ- ically associated with “developing” and “impoverished”
countries, ancestral knowledge that existed before colo- nialism, but also ways of life associated with childlike wonder that somehow still flourishes within colonialism before capitalism has the chance to squash it out. When I imagine this global Wakanda, it’s less heightened— lib- eration is expected and understood universally, in a com- mon-sense way of, “Well, of course. Well, yes.” The term “embodied liberation” is nearly unheard of because it’s so inherent to everyday life at this point in the future. (Right now it is nearly unheard of because only artists and activists are really using this language reg- ularly.) Pace of life is easy-going, free from the need to produce goods for consumption in order to survive. The looming air of “The Administration” and “Politics” is non- existent. It is a very tranquil state where society’s needs of food, shelter, water, preventative health practices are all met easily, willingly, and through community-sourcing (mutual aid as the standard, as opposed to mutual aid out of last-resort). The kids on the internet would call this tranquility of being “whimsy,” or “delusion.” The older kids on the inter- net would refer to that as “toxic positivity.” The activist/ organizer circles call it “radical dreaming for the future.” I am at the intersection of all three of these pockets so I use all those terms interchangeably and within this context of an imagined future. *tap* *hold to read* More of my “how,” as in rooted in what has existed for ages: We are at a period of time where those who are just now awakening to the systems of oppression through which we’re forced to move have finally arrived at trying out the vocabulary of “white supremacy,” “dismantle,” or “colonialism” in their every-other-day language. Whereas those of us who have understood these truths for a while are now at, “DON’T LOSE YOUR FUCKING WHIMSY BRO, DAYDREAM 25/8,” an understanding that reaching back to our inner-child, inherent indigeneity as humans and not only geographical ancestors (hat tip to j. bouey for that concept), and creative wonder will fuel the aboli- tion of all oppressive systems. That’s not a dig on those who have lived life privileged enough to thrive in these systems that it takes a gentle cre- scendo into fascism for them to awaken. Truly, it’s not. But I do think we need to put them in little incubators of art therapy so that they can arrive with us at this dreamy state. *tap* *hold to read*
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A word collage of thought processing the question “What does it mean to you to imagine into the future?”
A Daily Booty Shake, Morning Doodles, and Whimsy by VERONICA JIAO
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in dance SPRING 2025 20
SPRING 2025 in dance 21
In Dance | May 2014 | dancersgroup.org
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