Disembodied Narrativism
At the heart of every woman’s battles (and probably most of their wins) there is a disembodied voice or voices.
The blend of voice(s) are unique to every body in every part of this world.
A young middle class black mother will have a different blend than a young poor white mother. A wealthy disabled woman will have a different blend of voice(s) than a healthy working class trans woman. An elderly latinx body will have a different blend of voice(s) than a middle aged nonbinary Asian-American body.
And so on and so forth
forever and ever more
Women are inundated by these voices
From the moment of birth to their last breath
AND
Because of the incessant quality of these voices, instead of reverberating off of a body, they often become enmeshed in the very fabric of identity a woman wears.
They become her truth
Her voice
Her beliefs
Her narrative
I call this phenomenon Disembodied Narrativism
Disembodied Narrativism: When the cacophony of disembodied voices telling a woman who and how to be becomes mistaken for ones own beliefs and owned as ones truth
or something along those lines
The more i think and feel into it, the more insidious this menace becomes
Disembodied Narrativism has the capacity to shut a woman off from her body and her dreams
It also has the capacity of alienating a woman from other people and experiences.
I imagine it as a long piece of fabric that slowly strangles every piece of a woman’s identity, squeezing until only the disembodied narratives remain and she is nowhere to be seen
Depending on the intersection of (and not limited to) race, class, sexual identity, age, religion, whether a woman is able bodied or disabled, has kids or not
will define the narratives, disembodied voice(s), and stereotypes that bombard a woman and her sense of self
Narratives like..
~a woman cant be sexy and be a mother
~black women are hypersexual and ultra strong
~a body must have a vulva and womb to be called a woman
~disabled women are asexual
~women are nurturers, givers, and selfless
~bodies can have anything they want if they work hard enough
~having a period is limiting and dirty
~bodies need to be in the care of physicians, they know whats best
~pursuit of profit over bodies and people
~the earth is a resource ripe for pillage and conquer
~we must buy more and consume in mass
~if a woman ages past 30 her life is over and she ceases to exist
~aging is dirty and unnatural
~nudity is wrong, bodies are wrong
~a woman in a hijab needs saving
~the US has the right to decide how other countries/cultures get to live
~competition and domination over collaboration
~be a good little girl and don’t fight
~wife’s do the cleaning, cooking, raising, and have careers outside the home, they are superwomen and don’t need time for themselves
~in a man/woman sexual relationship, man must cum first and if the woman doesnt cum, no biggie
~heteronormativity for the win
~add your own disembodied narrative/voice/stereotype here
You get the point
Every woman is affected by Disembodied Narrativism because every woman is shaped by the world they grow up in
Even though this phenomena is wide spread and imminent we have a choice in the matter
We can choose to dive deep and question those disembodied voices
We can choose to unravel the threads that lead to our own true beliefs
We can decide what is and what is not part of our narrative
We can create an embodied narrative
I believe the remedy for Disembodied Narrativism is Embodied Pleasure. Its a woman discovering the vitality and life that runs through her veins, its a woman inhabiting her body and taking up space with her truth.
Its you
