Abstract:

The digital performances forwarding discourses of "we're all in it together" proliferated in the opening months of the COVID-19 pandemic, performing the social legibility of pain and loss within the public sphere. The body takes on an indexical force in such performances, constructing a symbolic community defined by the shared experience of sheltering-in-place. This performs social distancing, culturally acclimating audiences to a world in which we connect virtually but remain apart in our bodies. This has a legitimate public-health utility. That said, such performances can inadvertently construct the "we" in "we are all in it together" in a way that centers the stay-at-home experience while flattening racial and economic divisions. This essay examines two digital performances focusing on the experiences of diverse artists in quarantined isolation: Mike Sears and Lisa Berger's Ancient and Emily Mast and Yehuda Duenyas's How Are We. Both performances situate the act of sheltering-in-place as the shared facet of community belonging, utilizing aesthetic strategies that either obscure or amplify the ways that hierarchical systems of power influenced inequitable lived experiences of quarantined isolation.

摘要：

在 COVID-19 大流行的最初几个月中，传播“我们都在一起”的数字表演传播话语激增，在公共领域表现出痛苦和损失的社会易读性。身体在这样的表演中发挥着一种索引的力量，构建了一个由就地庇护的共同体验所定义的象征性社区。这执行了社会疏离，使观众在文化上适应了一个我们虚拟连接但在我们的身体中保持分离的世界。这具有合法的公共卫生效用。也就是说，这样的表演可能会在不经意间构建“我们在一起”中的“我们”，以一种以居家体验为中心，同时拉平种族和经济分歧的方式。Ancient and Emily Mast 和 Yehuda Duenyas 的How Are We。两场表演都将就地避难行为定位为社区归属感的共同方面，利用美学策略来掩盖或放大权力等级制度影响隔离隔离的不公平生活体验的方式。