Feminist Assemblages
The Making of ‘A Thousand Shapes, A Thousand Forms’ — UAF A&P’s Annual Learning Report
In times of unending precarity, dwelling in “strange new worlds” might allow us to stretch our imaginations to “grasp the contours” of the worlds we live in, writes the Chinese American anthropologist, Anna Tsing, in The Mushroom at the End of the World.
In a world that portrays human rights defence as a threat that needs to be monitored, curbed, and shrunk, how do we represent the evolving culture of feminist crisis response without relying on dominant anti-gender narratives? How do we learn from and represent the other-than-human worlds in which we participate, but in which we don’t make the rules?
These large questions are, in a sense, what Urgent Action Fund Asia & Pacific’s annual learning reports interrogate and respond to. Every year we ask ourselves — what kind of more-than-human socialities can we seek inspiration from to represent the complexities, pluralities, non-binariness, non-hierarchies, and liminalities in which cultures of feminist crisis response reside?
Sometimes we find answers in oceanic oral histories, and at other times, through science fiction, in creatures of the world that are not understood fully, or have been forcefully categorised to fit, function, and perform in worlds structured by dominant ways of thinking and understanding.
Creatures that don’t conform
Please keep dreaming alternative worlds. They make the one we are stuck in so much richer.
– Ursula K. Le Guin
In looking for alternative models that symbolised the cultures of feminist organising, ways of being, caring, and resisting, it was the African-American science fiction writer Octavia E. Butler’s unpublished work on slime moulds and other non-human beings that drove us to imagine worlds represented in ‘A Thousand Shapes, A Thousand Forms’.
1625, Octavia E. Butler Papers, Huntington Library, San Marino, California.
Slime moulds model the critical, queer, and radical ideas of kinship, care, and collectivisation that we hear in stories of activists and defenders from the Pacific and Asia. In Plasmodial Improprieties, scholar Aimee Bahng writes how admirably Octavia Butler meets the question of pronouns with openness, “queering and querying the limiting politics of either individualism or collective action” in wondering whether slime mould is an “aggregate of individuals, a mating group, a swarm, or a single organism”. The struggles and experiences of feminist movements from our regions, just like Butler’s formulation of slime moulds, reside in a way of life that could be, rather than life that already is.
The struggles and experiences of feminist movements from our regions, just like Butler’s formulation of slime moulds, reside in a way of life that could be, rather than life that already is.
At first glance, the slime mould — a simple organism that defies conventional categorisation as either plant or animal — may seem an unlikely muse. Yet, it is precisely in its unique characteristics and behaviours that we find resonance with feminist movements across the Pacific and Asia. Feminist human rights defence has a history of emergence that begins at non-conformity and non-hierarchy that creates spaces of resistance to imperial, capitalist, extractive, hetero-patriarchal systems of oppression.
Feminist human rights defence has a history of emergence that begins at non-conformity and non-hierarchy that creates spaces of resistance to imperial, capitalist, extractive, hetero-patriarchal systems of oppression.
It is said that slime moulds, or myxomycetes, grow in abundance and live wherever there is organic material — from tropical forests and woodlands, to deserts, mountains, and remote islands. Such ubiquity in its presence is also the nature of growing feminist movements that are carried within stories of resistance we hear from ocean states like Samoa and Vanuatu to mountainous countries of Nepal and Mongolia. Just as the presence of slime moulds is a sign of health, energy, organic material, and life, the presence of thriving feminist resistance and resilience is a sign of a progressive, equal, just society with abundant imaginaries.
Why slime moulds have evolved to be so bright and beautiful has been pondered upon by slime mould researchers. A few among them believe that their iridescence is a protective layer which strengthens their membrane and protects the spores from rain, which makes them vulnerable to fungal attack. At UAF A&P too, we believe that care, both self and collective, sustain feminist movements led by women, trans, and non-binary human rights activists confronting and resisting multiple systems of oppression and crises. The vibrance and beauty of feminist crisis response through the medium of art, humour, and celebrations are cultures of care that nurture movements.
Just as the presence of slime moulds is a sign of health, energy, organic material, and life, the presence of thriving feminist resistance and resilience is a sign of a progressive, equal, just society with abundant imaginaries.
The adaptability of slime moulds finds another striking similarity with feminist movements. When faced with unfavourable conditions, slime moulds, like feminist movements, can transform, splitting into individual cells or merging to become a single entity — demonstrating incredible flexibility and resilience.
In 2023, as human rights defenders and activists confronted an ever-changing landscape of threats and challenges, they consistently adapted their strategies to resist repression. Whether advocating for policy changes, providing direct support, or mobilising communities, their ability to morph and respond to the needs of the moment was critical.
The most striking parallel among others, is the varied defiance of sex workers rights defenders, indigenous land rights activists, queer activists, defenders with disabilities, that deem slime moulds to be “Creatures That Don’t Conform.” Both are beings that radically transform our understanding of ourselves and our surroundings. Beings that defy simple categorization, and expand our imaginations of a world that could be. Beings that are at once individual and a collective. The ability of slime moulds to connect, adapt, collaborate, and persist offers a powerful metaphor for the ongoing struggle for human rights, gender equality, and climate action in times of shrinking civic spaces and environmental and climate crises.
The ability of slime moulds to connect, adapt, collaborate, and persist offers a powerful metaphor for the ongoing struggle for human rights, gender equality, and climate action in times of shrinking civic spaces and environmental and climate crises.
As we reflect on UAF A&P’s work in 2023, we see the same qualities: a deep interconnectedness, a commitment to collective action, and an unyielding resilience. These parallels, explored in ‘A Thousand Shapes, A Thousand Forms’ remind us that, like the humble slime mould, feminist movements are capable of creating profound change through seemingly small but essential actions, ultimately weaving a tapestry of justice and equality that spans the globe.
Querying the Limitations
To describe another world, it is learning about our own world.
— Ursula K. Le Guin
In our endeavours of retelling stories of feminist movements, care, crisis response, and solidarity, we rely on allegories and metaphors borrowed from strange, new, nonhuman worlds, yielding visions of a possible life held unexpectedly in common.
The intention of capturing beyond the written word, conversations, desires, histories, encounters, recollections, and incidents shared with us by activists and defenders intertwined with UAF A&P’s learning journey is a form of what, Angela Garcia, calls “writing with care”. These narratives, finding inspiration in multispecies knowledge, take shape through immersion in experience and storytelling, creating speculative fabulations and leaving space for untold realities, vulnerabilities and uncertainties.
At a time when everything is pushing us to be harder and sharper, the visual narrative of our reflections on the past year is a gesture in being kinder and gentler to ourselves and others.
Read our Annual Learning Report 2023.
Report designed by Thilini Perera
This blog has been written by Twisha Mehta, Digital Communications Facilitator, UAF A&P.
