Text

theses

I was raised in Brooklyn – Bed Stuy, in a house of all genres, in a land budding Hip Hop in every project building, corner video shoot, in the marching bands on the divider on Atlantic avenue. Life for me has always been steeped in the music of breath and pain. This collection stemmed from my exploration of pain and my exploration of the music used to soothe or articulate better what one in pain cannot. This is the way things have always come to me. While I was a child of books and my mother is a writer, I have gone to quote and draw inspiration from music equally as many times as literary works. In this collection, I explore my relationship to my music, to my mother, my family and how it has both fueled and healed some of my experiences as a Black woman navigating dating after growing up idolizing Lil Kim, training since seven to be ride or die. When I went to college I had and watched relationships that made me really understand her and the music I listened to differently. I graduated to a world where even Beyoncé could be cheated on and blamed and began exploring whatever the hell that means too. What it means to watch women endure these relationships that are often toxic because we believe it is a rites of passage, we believe there is nothing better for us. What it means that women have been singing and writing about the pain of loving sometimes and we ain’t even notice.

ETD_9020

M.F.A.

by Safiya Washington

doi:10.7282/T34T6NQ5

ETD graduate

The author owns the copyright to this work.