Moving Together

Abstract

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent floods in New Orleans, traditional community networks and support systems were in shambles. As neo-liberal forces moved in to privatize vast swaths of society, a clash over gentrification within the city quickly set in. Newcomers to the city pushed former residents – especially Black citizens – out of their traditional neighbourhoods and simultaneously instigated cultural battles locals viewed as anathema to their understanding of home. Amid these disputes, Junebug Theatre company, the oldest Black theatre company in the city, launched a series of solidarity building artistic engagement programmes entitled Homecoming Project to educate the public on local histories. Using Black feminist theories of solidarity, I theorize this project as embodied ‘rememory’ work, utilizing Toni Morrison’s conception of rememory ‘as in recollecting and remembering as in reassembling.’ In working with community members to collect memories and then instilling audiences with these experiences through a neighbourhood-based second-line (a traditional New Orleans roaming dance and music performance that has roots in the city’s jazz funeral tradition), Homecoming Project works as an embodied memory machine. Across the Homecoming Project performances, I articulate how the project built a ‘spirit of solidarity’: a frame I develop to articulate the process of ritual-based group solidarity that acknowledges inter-group tensions while uniting allies through shared experiences of place.