In the modern dance “PAVEMENT,” what starts out as a request by Kyle Abraham for a dollar—“Hey, yo, cousin, let me get a dollar right quick; I’m trying to play my numbers. Hey, yo, help me out, man. You know me. I’m trying to take my lady to the New Edition concert”—quickly devolves into a distressed cry for help: “We’re boys. We live in the same building, man. I ain’t sick. Help me. Please, help me. Help me. Somebody please help me. God, please help me” (Abraham 19:27-22:22). It becomes obvious, towards the end of the monologue, that he is no longer just asking to be spotted with a dollar, as his casual, lighthearted petitions deteriorate into unrestrained, panicked weeping. In his beseeching, he reminds passersby of certain commonalities they share—a desire to take someone on a date, neighborly proximity, and even just a mutual recognition of one another. After being denied help by those he considered to be brothers, Abraham turns to anyone else, including the audience, and finally resorts to God for help. The person or entity being beseeched becomes further and further removed as he loses faith in those most immediate to him. As a member of the audience, it pained me to hear his desperation and not be able to do anything about it. In this way, the audience shares in Abraham’s feeling of helplessness.

Pavement. Choreography by Kyle Abraham, performed by Abraham.In.Motion, Harlem Stage, New York, 2012.

In recognizing the perspectives of the artists, primarily Bill T. Jones and Arnie Zane, who undertook the Lincoln repertory, Ariel Nereson “owns [her] own eyes,” alluding to Jones’s disparaging of Arlene Croce’s critical position as “never having to own up to your eyes, which are not universal eyes, but particular eyes” in a 2005 interview remembering the role of the Still/Here controversy in the culture wars (Nereson 22). I found Nereson’s acknowledgment of her particular eyes being those of “a white critic and scholar, a positionality that carries an imperative to think with, and not only about, Black artists and their culture creation” (Nereson 22) to be particularly helpful in recognizing my own limitations both as a reader and commentator. In both roles, I have a responsibility to remain open-minded, in light of these limitations, and an obligation to work to understand the authorly intent (even more so if the material or perspective being presented is unfamiliar to me). A careful balance must be struck between relating my own personal experiences to the project at hand and relying too much on the comfort of what I already know to be familiar. As put by Robert Cover: “The part that you or I choose to play may be singular, but the fact that we can locate [the narrative] in a common ‘script’ renders it ‘sane’—a warrant that we share a nomos” (Cover 10). By assuming a position adjacent to the author or the performer, in the case of Nereson, through our own lived experience, we invite those two spaces to mingle with one another. Empathy, or at least an attempt at it, equips us with the means to share in the norms of others, grasp cultural differentiations, and appreciate diverging perspectives. Empathy is the mechanism by which a person can transcend their role as a mere spectator and achieve the ability to “think with” the author.

Cover, Robert M. “The Supreme Court, 1982 Term — Foreword: Nomos and Narrative.” Yale Law School Legal Scholarship Repository, Jan. 1983, digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/fss_papers/2705.

Nereson, Ariel. Democracy Moving: Bill T. Jones, Contemporary American Performance, and the Racial Past. University of Michigan Press, 2022.

In her article “Moving Bodies Moving Architecture: Structural Fluidity and Pedestrian Choreographies at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial,” Ying Zhu relays the “corporeal centrality” felt by Jeffery Ochsner in relation to the memorial: “As we walk along the memorial, we pass through year after year of losses until we are faced with the enormity of the war’s time frame” (Zhu 324). I experienced a similarly jarring encounter when visiting the Vietnam Veterans Memorial two summers ago. Nothing could have prepared me for the overwhelming number of names etched into the granite—panel after panel of lives lost. I thought it would never end—and to think that those names are only representative of lives lost on one side of the war. I remember feeling physically dwarfed by such a magnitude. I also remember the feeling of being engulfed by the blackness of the granite displaying the names, most strongly at the intersection of the diverging slabs of granite, which takes some time to reach if walking reverently from the opposite end. At this point the massiveness of the war truly sinks in if it hasn’t already—the task of traversing the other half becomes much more difficult than you originally thought it would be, made worse by the fact that this time you’ll be walking slightly uphill.

Zhu, Ying. “Moving Bodies Moving Architecture: Structural Fluidity and Pedestrian Choreographies at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.” Space and Culture, vol. 19, no. 4, journal-article, 2016, pp. 319–31. https://doi.org/10.1177/1206331216643780.

Throughout my reading of Dante’s Inferno, I couldn’t help but wonder how a person’s earthly circumstances factored into their placement in Hell. For those in Circle 1, or in Limbo, which includes virtuous pagans and unbaptized children, how is their existence prior to the coming of Christ their fault? Why are they being punished for a condition over which they had no control? Or for those in Upper Hell suffering for sins of incontinence during their earthly existence—were the circumstances they were born into—lives more hospitable to sin—taken into account when determining judgement? “Those born on a sunny day,” or into a family with strong Christian values, for example, “might be blessed with a happy temperament, and for some positions of authority,” in this case, eternal life in heaven, “this might be a qualifying attribute” (Rawls 8). Is the bar set higher for those bred for an eternal life in heaven, or does God expect everyone, regardless of inopportune circumstances, to arrive at the same heavenly conclusion? If so, how is Hell a just system of punishment? If from birth, a person is more predisposed to punishment in Hell, whether it be their growing up in a violent neighborhood, being raised by a non-religious family, living in a society that pushes rampant consumerism, or having to decide between obtaining food by stealing and sending their kids to bed hungry, does Hell achieve real punitive justice?

Alighieri, Dante. Inferno. Translated by Michael Palma, 1st edition, W. W. Norton, 2002.

Hare, R. M., and John Rawls. “Rawls’ Theory of Justice–I.” The Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 23, no. 91, Apr. 1973, p. 144. https://doi.org/10.2307/2217486.

In her short story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” Ursula K. Le Guin critiques a common perception held by society: “The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain” (Le Guin 1). This observation led me to wonder if we are less fascinated by happiness because of its privilege. For me, happiness is often accompanied by feelings of guilt or a recognition of my own selfishness, I think, because I become aware of how little happiness some, or rather most, experience in their day-to-day life. While enjoying a dessert at Thanksgiving, I was reminded of those who will never experience biting into a pastry to discover custard filling the interior; while vacationing with my family over the summer, I was reminded of those who work three or four different jobs just to make ends meet. In both instances I felt stupid! Why, “if it is in [my] power to prevent something very bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything else morally significant,” am I not, when I “morally ought to” be (Singer 235)? Why am I instead enjoying the privileges I have been afforded? Maybe the pedants and sophisticates are right in that if happiness is not balanced by a share of pain or sacrifice, it is stupid. My guess is that our fascination with pain has to do with its universal accessibility. Everyone has experienced pain to a certain degree, but genuine happiness, unfortunately, is largely unfamiliar to an overwhelming portion of the human population whose basic necessities are not being met. As for the intellectual value we place in happiness and pain, events of suffering—events of historical evil—are the ones that make it into textbooks (rightly so). The “banality of evil” and “terrible boredom of pain” demand our attention, because we have a moral responsibility to understand sources of others’ suffering and hopefully do something about it. Pain garners more interest because it should.

Guin, Ursula K. Le. The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas. 1973, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ones_Who_Walk_Away_from_Omelas.

Singer, Peter. “Famine, Affluence, and Morality.” Princeton University Press eBooks, 2018, pp. 677–84. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv19fvzzk.67.

The last sentence of the introduction to Robin D. G. Kelley’s Freedom Dreams gave me more hope about the future than I have felt in weeks: “What the old-guard male militants really need to do is give up the mic for a moment, listen to the victims of democracy sing their dreams of a new world, and take notes on how to fight for the freedom of all” (Kelley 2002). I have always known that to achieve real justice, we must prioritize the voices of those who have experienced injustice—but Kelley clearly identifies who that group is: Black, feminist women. It is time for someone else to take the stage, to think imaginatively and innovatively, to do something different. Historically, those in power didn’t consult the people that existing systems have failed until the cost of not doing so became undeniable. A great deal of suffering tends to precede that reckoning. Kelley’s question, “Can we all get along long enough to make a revolution?” (Kelley 2002), cuts to the heart of this problem. The obstacles to collective liberation are not only structural but interpersonal—the tendency to allow differences in race, religion, and sexual orientation to fracture coalitions that share, at their core, a common stake in one another’s survival. What unites us is more fundamental than what divides us, and any movement serious about justice must reckon with that fact.

“Kelley_freedom-dreams_Preface and Intro.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kl7bTt7ap1qnGp9feEdk0_ZS3ilyvZqq/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

The narrow scope of the ruling in United States v. Jones is what I find most concerning. The Court did not rule on whether long-term monitoring is unconstitutional in itself—only that the physical act of installing the device constituted a search, which is an obvious breach of the Fourth Amendment (United States v. Jones 2012). This implies that if the government can track a person electronically without physically touching their property, the Fourth Amendment may not apply, even when privacy is clearly invaded. This is a significant cause for concern as we move further into the digital age and makes me wonder what we are really consenting to when we agree to the terms and conditions of mobile applications that track activity across websites. As Brayne notes, “even if we have never had any direct contact with the police, our trace data can incriminate or exonerate us, whether through showing that we’re friends with a suspect on Facebook or that we were physically nowhere near a given crime scene” (Brayne 2020). While Jones was the subject of digital surveillance in this case, there is nothing preventing you or me from becoming the subject next time. Because we do not know who is tracking us or when, digital surveillance functions as a contemporary manifestation of Bentham’s panopticon, catching us when we least expect it. Our constant awareness of digital surveillance changes the way we act, creating docile bodies (Foucault 1975) through the choreopolicing of our everyday movements (Lepecki 2013).

“US v Jones.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-tAQrB6G6hBvkBKt_kYTptFWzrD4spap/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

“Brayne_Predict and Surveil.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1htWLw53EvbJhN2vdWaJWdlfCUK8LP0MM/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

“Foucault-Panopticism.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hnwrszcsdXbBbLqJgr1on8jfI7mm3dhS/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

“Lepecki-Choreopolice & Choreopolitics.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pj5jHuPta2KDaCBLzFMMQzMp50gOqkp7/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

In “Embodying History: Epic Narrative and Cultural Identity in African-American Dance,” Albright discusses Toni Morrison’s method of ascertaining historical truth: “If I’m looking to find and expose a truth about the interior life of people who didn’t write; if I’m trying to fill in the blanks that the slave narratives left…then the approach that’s most productive and most trustworthy for me is the recollection that moves from the image to the text. Not from the text to the image” (Albright 1997). Fact can exist without human intelligence, but truth requires human interpretation and construction. For most African Americans, and other disempowered groups, history is not factual but truthful — since most of it was suppressed rather than accepted as fact. Truth is a feeling. Something becomes a truth when it is performed, reified, and repeatedly subscribed to in popular imagination. This dynamic is precisely what the documentary Ethnic Notions (Riggs 1986) warns against. While factual misrepresentation is dangerous on its own, it is the incorporation of misinformation into storytelling and popular imagination that proves most harmful, as it infiltrates the subconscious. Highly stylized, abstracted caricatures of Black children in Looney Tunes, for example, have inhabited the subliminal imaginations of all those who watched the show. And because American media is so widely distributed, these representations permeate the media industries of other nations as well. Black minstrel performers were made to present themselves as authentic depictions of Black people, producing a deep uncanniness (Riggs 1986). Minstrelsy was thus vital in perpetuating false narratives through performance—one of the most powerful vehicles for truth-making.

“AnnCooperAlbrig_1997_EmbodyingHistoryEpicN_ChoreographingDiffere.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LS7FfmHF6QojB1UwwDbQYqyNu9eYVAH2/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

Video: Ethnic Notions. https://access.infobase.com/video/15650-ethnic-notions?aid=100772&brand=fod. Accessed 11 May 2026.

During his presentation on Latta Place, Todd Stewart, vice president of the Arts and Science Council’s public art sector, asserted: “Art is not created in a vacuum—art’s meaning changes with the world around it.” This observation extends beyond just art. The readings and artifacts we encountered over the course of this semester are similarly dynamic, interpreted differently by each person depending on their life experiences. Each of us has inhabited a different nomos leading up to our shared time at Davidson (Cover 1983), and when our paths diverge again, our mingling of experiences will shape how we encounter and interpret the world around us thereafter. The same logic applies across time. With every new historical development comes another layer of possible interpretation, and while the original intent of the artist can be preserved, the work itself accumulates new meaning with every new context applied. This is especially true when art outlives its creator, rendering it vulnerable to interpretation without the artist present to defend its purpose. The question, then, is whether it is the artist or the viewer who ultimately defines the significance of a work. As we are reminded, “imagination is shaped by our entire life experience, our socialization, the concepts we are exposed to, where we fall in the global hierarchies of society,” suggesting that meaning is never fixed, but always in negotiation between the work and the world receiving it (Brown 2017).

Stuart, Todd. “Creative Placemaking as Cultural Justice.” Humanities 104, 28 April 2026, Davidson College, Hance Auditorium. Plenary.

“Robert Cover-Nomos & Narrative.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/161yUG07qYx7QV9yIAe48xsrFDW5qcXhR/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

“brown_Emergent Strategy.Pdf.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CEZjAfgiZ53QRLpeSix5lzCxwB59XAr4/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.

Our viewing of the final section of Bill T. Jones’s choreographic masterpiece Last Supper at Uncle Tom’s Cabin/The Promised Land in which performers appear unclothed and singing prompted a discussion of nudity versus nakedness that I think is worth sharing. The central distinction between the two lies in the degree of vulnerability required. Nudity implies intention, while nakedness suggests a level of improvisation. In this sense, nudity functions almost as a kind of clothing (“in the nude”)—a deliberate, prepared presentation of the body. Nakedness, by contrast, is candid and unguarded. Photos or paintings of unclothed bodies are described as nudes precisely because their subjects are posed or prepared. But if you walk in on someone getting out of the shower, they are simply naked, laid bare without preparation or intent. This distinction carries different social registers. There is a degree of reverence afforded to the nude body that is not necessarily extended to the naked one. A naked body can be humorous in the right context, utilitarian in the act of sex, or a marker of deprivation and violence in cases of abuse or humiliation. Nudity, on the other hand, is always a known display—intentional, framed, and offered to an audience as art. In performance, bodies are in the nude, not naked. The performers in Jones’s work are knowingly presenting themselves to a crowd, which transforms vulnerability into agency. This is an important distinction to hold onto when discussing performance, because sensitivity to proper terminology shapes how we understand the body and its meaning in different contexts.

“Bill T. Jones Dancing to the Promised Land, VC B596, (0207504460875).Mp4.” Google Docs, https://drive.google.com/file/d/128uhMScne79KwPJZImAwjRWfrORRrRNQ/view. Accessed 11 May 2026.