Worlds Meeting Worlds: Murmuration, Aesthetics, and Odeimin Runners

Abstract

The Odeimin Runners art collective seek paths to create work outside of colonial institutions and systems and instead think about what it would mean to mutually nurture communities and relationships. In our practice, we think through and weave together Indigenous and Black/Caribbean philosophies such as the teachings of the odeimin (strawberry) plant, Dolleen Manning’s Mnidoo—worlding, and the relational thinking of Glissant. Through community engagement and the development of an online story map incorporating process cinema methods, Odeimin Runners reflect an Indigenous worldview of All Our Relations which intuits a pluriversal world. Bringing together stories from different cultures and ways of being and experiencing the world, we make connections across time and dimensions. The hope in this “acolonial” work, on the outskirts of colonial frameworks, lies in producing nourishment that contributes to the flourishing of the multiple, interconnected worlds.