Episode 3 – Feeling that Motley We: An Interview with Cameron Awkward-Rich

[0:00:02 Speaker 0] This is Audio Q. T. The Podcast of QT Voices, the online magazine of the LGBTQ studies program at the University of Texas at Austin. Thank you all for listening. Karma Chavez on your host of audio Q T today and this fall under the leadership of Grace and Hunt, the associate director of L G B T. Q. Studies. UT hosted the Thinking Trans Trans Thinking Ah Conference of the Trans Philosophy Project, and the keynote speaker for this event was Dr Cameron. Awkward, Rich on award winning poet, A careful thinker and a black trans man, Cameron is the author of Sympathetic Little Monster, which came out in 2016 and was a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award. He’s also the author of Dispatch, which perceived books published last year. He’s a cave cannon fellow in a poetry editor for Muzzle magazine. Cameron earned his PhD from Stanford University’s program in Modern Thought and literature, and he’s an assistant professor of women, gender and sexuality studies at the University of Massachusetts. Amherst and I could say a lot more, but I’ll leave it there and say, Cameron, welcome todo que t. Hi,

[0:01:20 Speaker 1] Thanks for having me

[0:01:22 Speaker 0] So this year has been a lot in your work is to say the least, Uh and your work is really about I don’t want to minimize, but one of the big things of your workers I read it is really about feeling and sentiment. So I’m wondering what has 2020 felt like to you? Yeah. It is true

[0:01:44 Speaker 1] that a big theme of my work is feeling and sentiment. Um, but unfortunately, I think that, as with, uh, many academics, um, the reason that I think so much about feeling is because I find it to be a slightly bewildering thing, the question of what I feel and what what that might have to say about the world or in my world. But e think that, like most people, the feeling of 2020 has been for me a feeling of both profound clarity, right? I think that it is a year in which, um, it all of the all of all of the ways that we know that the world is structured unequally all of the ways that we know that the structure of the world exposes people to pretty much our death. All of the ways that we know. Yeah. All the ways that we know about the brutality of the world, it seemed patently obvious things year in a way that it sometimes feels buried. But

[0:02:41 Speaker 0] it was

[0:02:41 Speaker 1] also a year, um, of sort of great confusion. Um, it was a year, right? That a lot of reevaluating of what my work ought be, what my responsibility to the world be. Um, yeah, I don’t know. But also, I’ve had the fortunate experience of being on leave, uh, semester. So it has also been, um, yeah, I’ve also not exactly been in the muck of it, as many people have been.

[0:03:11 Speaker 0] Yeah, leave. This was a weird year. I mean, not to do too much academic talk. It is a weird year to have a leave because on the one hand, what a gift not to have been in the classroom. And then, on the other hand, uh, there were no archives open. You couldn’t do nearly as much traveling. Um,

[0:03:28 Speaker 1] it’s true. I had to reimagine what it might mean to finish my book. Um, in ways that I was not exactly expecting.

[0:03:37 Speaker 0] Yeah, and so I think it would be interesting. I think for people to hear a little bit about your work. So I kind of thean pittas to This is we’re doing this whole, uh, magazine issue of Q t voices on this thinking Trans Trans thinking Conference on DSO. Of course, you were the keynote to this conference because your work is so innovative cutting edge on and you’re you’re sort of, you know, one of these next big things right now. And so I think people would love to hear about what your book is about. If you want to say a few words about it,

[0:04:15 Speaker 1] Sure, I’m happy to um I’m not sure, actually, that I am one of one of the next big things. I think that one thing that I’ve learned about my book in having the time and space to return to it this year is that it is actually a book that and is very attached to and interested in, uh, kind of old conflicts between, uh, the sort of then emerging fields of trans queer and feminist studies. E think that there are a lot of graduate students actually who are doing the rial sort of innovation in trans studies. But loosely I will say that the book that I’ve been working on is a book that begins with the observation that one of the ways in which Trans studies was able to establish itself in the academy or to begin to establish itself in the academy as a kind of viable academic discourse was through the sort of disavowal of any relationship between Trans Nissen’s and what we might call madness right over and over again. The founding scholars and trans studies, um, would have to insist I’m not sick or I’m not crazy or this or that, Um, and while on the one hand those sort of founding disavowals have made it possible, I think for trans studies to exist in the ways that it does now, um, it’s also true that they rely on kind of profoundly able ist sort of understandings about, um, what is viable knowledge? What are the, um, habits of thought and modes of feeling that might produce something like justice or might produce something like knowledge? Eso The project of the book is really to ask, um, what do, uh, the forms of feeling and habits of thought that I call transplant adjustment. What what do those forms of feeling. Help us think about the kind of persistent conflicts between trans feminists and clear thought.

[0:06:12 Speaker 0] Yeah, yeah. No, that’s so interesting in what I’m thinking about as you’re talking is this piece that you wrote in Paris Review over the summer? Um, right after George Floyd is murdered by police. And, of course, it’s not just George Floyd who’s murder at that time. We have Briana Taylor and we have Ahmad Armory. And we also have someone named Tony McDade who I think some of us in the queer community Trans community might know about, but received no where near the attention and eso. I think I’m interested to hear a little bit about what you have to say. Because, of course, McDade, his life is at the center of this inability to slash between trans nous and badness. Would you talk a little bit about why you wrote about 20 McDade? And if that kind of fits into the bigger project you’re talking about? Yeah, it’s

[0:07:09 Speaker 1] interesting that that was an essay that sort of came out all at once, and I think that the reason that I could write it sort of all at once was precisely because I had already been thinking about And the questions off transmission madness and questions of, like, what allows us to understand trans people as, um as on the one hand, really trans. But on the other hand, as sort of a viable political or ethical subjects, Um and so I became very sort of preoccupied with 25 data and the way that he was sort of circulating in, um, queer and trans discourse because it was a kind of circulation that required us to understand him as kind of like a flat like a flat object, right? Somebody who waas killed by the place because of, um, his trans masculinity, his black trans masculinity specifically. But what one learned when one tried to get as close to his life as e could right through thesis sort of long Facebook video that he sort of left as. And, you know, it sort of seemed like his last. His last speech act, right, Andi, Also through a kind of proliferation of news articles that was written about him, um, one kind of comes to understand that he was not a kind of good liberal victim, right? he was somebody for whom? The sheer sort of brutality, right of living as a black person. Ah, poor, like specifically, a poor black person who had been in and out of various kinds of cultural cultural institutions whose life and cognition was deeply shaped by, uh uh what he called quote unquote living suicidal, whose? Um, kind of e think that, like all of the ways in which he seemed like a kind of incoherent subject, um, did not was not a story. Um, that would make sense to the ways that we have learned to sort of mourn, um more and and make martyrs of black people when they are killed by the police. Yeah, and so I think that I was just interested in thinking about if we take Tony McDade’s own account of his life for granted. Um, what kind of story can we tell about? Transmits then and about morning. Uhh. Victims of police violence. Then I don’t know if that makes sense.

[0:09:49 Speaker 0] No, it makes a lot of sense. Um I mean, I think that this is always a challenge for our movements. Is this question of who is grieve? A ble who is more noble. Who do we rally around? And I think we’ve seen ah lot of this over the last year, in part because of Tony McDade, but just sort of the proliferation of, uh, police in vigilante violence against black folks that’s been in the media and the ways that this question around what does black lives matter mean in relation to black trans life? And you see these different discourses, right? Where, Of course, some people. I mean, if you think of black lives, matter is a thing. It’s like it comes from a queer place. Maybe not Trans, but a queer place for sure on then you yet have a lot of folks CIS folks in particular, who have, ah, sort of, you know, wait your turn mentality on DSO. I think what you’re pointing to is is the ways in which this is a question that’s live specifically around the question of trans life. But more broadly for our movements, about who is the center?

[0:10:55 Speaker 1] Yeah, I think. I mean, it’s that it’s all of that, and it’s also I think, that one of the difficulties of thinking about this with relation to transmits in particular because of the history of the medicalization of gender nonconformity. Right? Trans nous cannot get away from, uh, discourses of mental illness in the same way that queerness, I think, has been able to since the removal of homosexuality from the d S. M right, um, transmits is, uh, still sort of and in expert discourses, and also in various kinds of transphobic discourse is thought of as a kind of mental illness. And so because of that, in order for people to appear to be sort of legitimately trans, I think that there is often the sense that one has to strip, right? Anything that might be, um, a kind of hint of incoherence or madness from the way that they narrate themselves. And this was something that was impossible to do with Tony McDade. Even though I think a lot of people tried. Um, and also I should say that one of the some of the most, um, inspiring to me uh huh. Ways that people attempted to think about how they might redress or how we might address. Um, this sort of violence that marks the life of someone like Tony McDade was, um uh, black trans actress project based in New York called the Okra Project. Um, did this sort of massive fundraising campaign, um, Thio on raise money to provide mental health care, right for black trans people and ideally, by other black people. And so this was a way where, um in, like, accounting for the full context of Tony McDade’s life and death led people to think What are the ways that we might prevent? Um, this kind of thing in the future, our address, the kind of violence that McDade was up against him. One way is by not disavowing, right, the entanglements of transition, mental illness, but really thinking about uh huh providing forms of care that black trans people often aren’t able to access.

[0:13:12 Speaker 0] Yeah. No, that makes a lot of a lot of sense. And I think that I loved reading about that in your work as well. And it’s really in line with so many of the the bigger turn thio mutual aid that we’ve seen this year. A za people are thinking about. How do we provide for ourselves for our own communities? Um, in ways that are mutually supportive and beneficial, And I think that that fits right into that. And it also makes me think a little bit about something else that you talk about in this essay, which is, by the way, just such a beautiful essay. And we’ll put it in the show notes so that everyone else could read it as well. Um, but you’re you’re talking about, uh, being you’re in North Hampton right now, sort of one of these white lesbian enclaves in the United States. E think you’re right. It is the, uh and you’re there. You’re there for work. You You live there now, and you’re wondering what the protests you’re gonna be like in your community after George George Flight. And you have this, uh, interesting phrase that you talk about as your somewhat pleasantly surprised by the pleasure you find in what you describe as the motley. We, uh and I wonder if you could talk about that moment, talk about that choice of phrasing and what that meant to be pro testing and community at that time.

[0:14:41 Speaker 1] Yeah, Northampton is a is A is a town where there are often protests. Everybody here is very sort of politically engaged, although in sometimes in ways that are bewildering to me. But usually, usually I think that protest that happened in North Hampton are very orderly. Um, and they’re orderliness is a kind of reflection of, um, what is ultimately a kind of liberal politics. But what was so kind of enlivening to me about, um, the at least, especially the first, um, black lives matter protest, year after George Lloyd’s murder waas that it was a protest that was really, um, led by, uh, youth of color. Um, it was really not interested in orderliness. Um, it was really, uh, not interested in the ways in which, uh, even the kind of good liberal government of North Hampton might make sort of managing concessions. But it was It was the first time I felt something like a new abolitionist feeling, uh, in North Hampton. Although I haven’t been here for very long, so I’m sure that that feeling erupts more often than I know. And and so and so what I meant by the kind of feeling of the motley we was that it was one of those moments where, um, everybody’s not everybody’s but everybody that I understand to be part of my we right. Um black and brown people were people. Trans people, um, everybody’s interests for a moment seemed to be aligned, and we were all collectively interested in the question of how might the world actually be different, Not how much it be managed differently. Not, um, what kinds of concessions might we get, but rather like what? What would what would it mean for the world, actually to be ordered differently? Um, and it’s a feeling it’s a feeling that one sometimes gets that kind of motley abolitionist feeling. Um, yeah, yeah, not that often.

[0:16:56 Speaker 0] Sadly, not that often. Um, but I think it’s a transition a little bit to your poetry because I think one of the things that your poetry does is it helps to conjure that kind of utopian feeling, that possibility of just thinking through things in a in a way that otherwise you wouldn’t in that makes me want to ask you, What do you think is the role of the poet in political moments like Cohen we’re living in?

[0:17:28 Speaker 1] Um, yeah, I think that I have multiple conflicting answers to that question. Um, I think that what was interesting about being a poet in that moment or in this moment is that, um it was a moment where everybody was clamoring for poetry, and it was a moment where, um yeah, I don’t I think it’s been a long time since I’ve gotten that many sort of requests for readings, essays, poets, poems, etcetera. Um, but it was also a moment where everybody wanted the poets to be doing it for free. Um, eso right. So So? So I think 11 of the sort of bizarre things about the relationship between poetry and politics is that everybody seems to know, um, that in order for her in order for these moments of the kind of motley we to go here, right, one needs art. One needs music. One needs poetry. One needs, um, ways off, uh, moving people, right? Literally. But on the other hand, uh, yeah, it’s not exactly clear that we it’s under. It’s not exactly clear how we will pay the people who do the moving, but that’s one thing. The other thing is just that e think that as much as I want to believe in the kind of utopian possibility of art A such as I want to believe that and actually think that encoded in much of the art that I love is the sort of utopian feeling is the kind of tiny, tiny, tiny gateways to, um feeling that the world might be otherwise. I also think, and this was an argument that I was sort of circling around in the talk that I gave for the trance philosophy conference so that one of the things that poetry is good for for me and I think for the world, is that it? It’s a It’s a sort of place to put frustration and conflict and, um, and dreams that cannot be realized right in the material world and in being a place to sort of store that stuff, right to store, desire to store, feeling it makes it possible, I think, to do other work, whether that be teaching or, um, political activism or writing writing ones, academic book or whatever it iss

[0:20:12 Speaker 0] Mm thistle is really fascinating to me. So sorry I was taking notes as you’re speaking. So I was like this disappointment. Poetry is a place thio put frustration and conflict that which makes other, uh, work possible. Um, and I think I think this makes sense of my experience. It resonates so much. But I can’t help but return that to your earlier point about who’s going to pay people to do the work. That is the work of poetry that is the work of art. That is the work of music. Um, and this disconnect that I think has long existed. It’s kind of a tradition of Marxist thought. Thinking about the place that utopian is found is often in art, because those longings can’t be actualized the material world. And so I think your point about not being able to pay those who are helping us to feel and see those visions really speaks to that point about this disconnect between the world we want in the world we actually exist in. Yeah, and what’s the answer to you? I mean, you’re in a different situation, right? You’re a tenure track assistant professor, so you have, ah, salary and and stuff, and you know, it’s maybe neither here nor there for you to do a couple of free events. But what what’s that? What should the politics be with that, you know?

[0:21:36 Speaker 1] I mean, I think that I think that with everything I think that the answer is it’s complicated, right? I think that, um, e think that on the one hand, right on the utopian horizon, art should be one of the pursuits that people put and put their life in labor towards. Right, Um, but I think that in the here and now, the fact of the matter is that, um the entanglement of money with poetry in particular often means, uh, that people that come in small ways on big weighs less free right to do the kinds of work that might contain that utopian horizon in the first place. E, I don’t know, like, yeah, nobody thinks that, like, the patronage system was good for making radical art, but, um, and yet right that this this concerning news to sort of be the only funding what? One of the only funding structures for art that we have is that institutions with a lot of money dole it out to people that they think are doing work that is in some way in line with their vision. And so and being somebody who is not very good at thinking about political economy, I don’t I don’t know the answer to how it should be otherwise, but yeah,

[0:23:02 Speaker 0] yeah, I think it z it is. It’s an interesting question to me just more broadly even, uh, with this publication, this this key t voices and this podcast, some of the decisions that we’ve made around who we compensate financially for their participation and who we don’t and how we’re trying to be make ethical choices with that, I think is it’s always Ah, very live question, Uh, and deeply embedded in this moment, I hope people are listening to this is a diversion because it’s actually deeply embedded into how the movement moves in relation. Thio art. So I wanted Thio. I wanted to ask you about the concept of trans sentiment that you talk about, and I think that’s your work. Just embodies. And what can what you call trans sentiment teach everyone right now, regardless of their gender identity?

[0:24:00 Speaker 1] Um, well, I mean, okay, so I think that I I often mean many things by this. I think that in this Tony McDade s a, um I was specifically interested in, uh what I think of as, um, like a kind of trans earnestness, which is, and earnestness right is is not not exactly a feeling, but it is a kind of, uh, a way of thinking that that that seems to be entirely about, like, profound seriousness and often seriousness about things that perhaps ought not be taken so seriously, according toa other people around you. Um, but also there is in kind of noun Yeah, in one of them, sort of more obsolete definitions of earnestness. Ah, kind of sense that Ernest, right, is something that, um, uh is once like is like a financial term, about about a kind of return on a future return on investment. But also is about, um, kind of portent, right? Like an earnest is something that shows you the shape of the future to come on. Dso I was interested in thinking about why it is that Transnistria often is represented as a kind of earnestness, Um, as a kind of intense seriousness about things that other people think are not so serious. Um, and one of the sort of ways that I try to think that through in the essay is that, um to be trans toe live is trans in the world, requires, um, taking very seriously Theo idea that ones, uh, feelings, right? That one’s at feelings, but also things like haircuts. Like names like pronounce right that these things are very, very important And that taking them seriously eyes the only way to sort of actualize a trans life. Um, And I mean, I think that that sort of intensity, that earnestness is something that, um, might be very useful for everyone. Right? Three idea that it is good, actually, or that it might be a good actually to take very seriously. Um, the ways in which ones body, sort of like, almost despite itself, would like to manifest differently or would like the world to be differently around to be different around it. So that, uh, one can move with a little bit more ease? Um, yeah, so So I don’t know. I mean, e think that I think that this kind of hoping right, which is a hoping that is not kind of which is a kind of hoping that is deeply tethered to the president and deeply tethered to what feels dysphoric in the present, but wants very much to alleviate it and takes very seriously the idea that it can be alleviated. It seems like one of the kind of basic preconditions for something like movements, Right?

[0:27:15 Speaker 0] Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think that is a lovely way to wrap up our conversation. And so, Cameron awkward Rich. Thank you so much for being with us today.

[0:27:26 Speaker 1] Of course. Thank you so much for having me

[0:27:28 Speaker 0] just all right. Thank you all for listening. This is audio, QT