Our fourteenth SDUK broadsheet, LINGERING, follows and complements WISH YOU WERE HERE, WISH HERE WAS BETTER, a mobile public event series presented by the Blackwood that made space “for people impacted by the ongoing overdose crisis—and its cascading systemic issues of precarity, houselessness, and criminalization—to mourn, while providing opportunities to imagine and work towards a more just future.” Throughout this broadsheet, contributors linger with these sociopolitical issues, among others. They navigate complex emotions like grief, joy, and mourning while developing vital forms of activism; celebrating disability and queerness; shaping institutions; or finding poetry in everyday life.
But how do we “work towards a more just future”? What kinds of methods and practices are necessary to navigate across difference? A contribution from the What Would an HIV Doula Do? collective roots their own approach in inquiry—sharing ponderous, critical, and rhetorical questions that explore consent practices. Fady Shanouda, nancy viva davis halifax, and Karen Yoshida employ a methodology of listening and recording—oral history—in their emerging archive of disabled Canadian art practices. For Craig Jennex, the queer nightclub and dance floor serve as potent collective spaces, shaped by desire and longing.
This issue’s focus on the overdose crisis prompts reflections on drug policy within and beyond Canada. How does the overdose crisis provoke urgent resistance to the longstanding war on drugs? Matthew Bonn writes of the varied strategies employed by people affected by the crisis, led by people who use drugs and mothers of individuals lost to overdose. Tamara Oyola-Santiago chronicles the mobile harm reduction practices of Puerto Rican activists in New York City, while Jeffrey Ansloos and Karl Gardner reflect on the misuses of harm reduction that obfuscate its radical roots, while echoing the call for police abolition.
With the healthcare system strained by multiple forms of upheaval, how are its institutions—and the people who shape them—adapting to increased pressure? A conversation with Rasheen Oliver and Kimone Rodney of Homeless Health Peel (led by Mya Moniz) shares how their organization was founded in response to COVID-19, and its continued operations beyond the pandemic’s worst phases. With parallel focus on local initiatives, Emily Cadotte examines doctors’ advocacy responses to the critical issues affecting their profession.
Amidst the grave effects of the overdose crisis, the scope of collective grief and mourning has increased in magnitude. How can grief be lasting, healing, and transformative? “A Good Death” shares diverse responses from four death doulas, who recount ways of normalizing death, planning for it, and claiming time to grieve. An essay and soundwork by Mourning School links grief to speech, sharing experimental ways for lamenting, sounding, and voicing death.
Beyond extraordinary forms of loss, what are everyday strategies for living with our own illnesses and those of loved ones? Lynn Crosbie’s poems trace the contours of day-to-day life while caring for her father following a stroke, while Shan Kelley’s paintings magnify the daily routines of living with HIV. Brothers Sick meld personal experiences of chronic illness with their politicized effects, referencing activist slogans and banners in their artworks.
Inside the print version of this broadsheet, readers will also find a postcard—one in a series of six produced for WISH YOU WERE HERE, WISH HERE WAS BETTER. Engaging with histories of AIDS activism that employ printed matter, these postcards serve as a takeaway offering for participants and visitors. The Blackwood website features additional content from this issue, including Mourning School’s soundwork and a Spanish translation of Tamara Oyola-Santiago’s contribution.