rituals for rock ancestors: Performing community upriver

I am a selected presenter for the Annual American Studies Association (ASA) Conference in November 2024. I will be presenting, Rituals for Rock Ancestors: Performing Community Upriver with Jen Shook, Assistant Professor of Theatre, Dance, & Performance Studies at Grinnell College.

Several long-distance collaborations between artists, archival researchers, anthropologists, and engineers converged upon the ancient rocks of Easton, PA when a geology-inspired sculpture trail installation called for a performance to lead local community members along the trail. The resulting collective performance, Upriver, combined storytelling, poetry, dance, music, working horses and mules, braucherei, steelwork, hard labor, and soft eco-prints. And it turns out the ancestor rocks knew us before we knew them.

This multimedia performance presentation shares the process of making relations among humans and more-than-humans, grounded in a very particular place across vastly different perspectives and times. Attendees will then be led through creative cartography exercise reflecting on community, place, and time.