A Celebration of Hybridity

by Clarinda Mac Low

The United States of America is a mixed-up place. I mean that in the best way—it’s a polyglot nation, a cocktail made from every human gene pool, stirred, shaken, shook up and poured out into a fizzy, intoxicating concoction. I mean that in the worst way—it’s a confused nation, a patchwork of genocide, enslavement, greed and self-destructive impulses, always turning back on itself and getting in its own way, one long howl of inchoate anger and betrayal.

But today, right now, after an election where the people of this nation woke up briefly and fractionally, but effectively, I mean it in the best way.

The United States of America is a mixed-up place.

Suddenly, miraculously (or so it feels to me) we have a President who reflects this with every aspect of his person. Scholar/athlete, foreign/US born, island/heartland, black/white… . We don’t know what Barack Obama the person will do in his term as the cleaner-of-messes-in-Chief, but as a symbol his potency is undeniable. As a symbol he is potent not least because he wears his hybridity so seamlessly. He has seemingly synthesized all his aspects into one clear persona. He contains our dichotomies and transforms them into unity. The idea of “purity” starts to melt and change its shape.

Hybrids are our future. Hybrids keep us strong. Mixing pushes boundaries. Mixtures become new definitions.

The face of the world is changing inevitably, inexorably. Creative process reflects social conditions; we mix media and forms with abandon, busting out of definitions to create indefinable art situations and social networks. They are indefinable not because they are unclear but because the language to discuss the experience and the process hasn’t caught up with what is actually happening.

Oh it’s nothing new—humans have been mixing media since opposable thumbs came into fashion. But here we are, in our own time of challenging our own drawn lines and boundaries, and it is as confusing or as frustrating as it ever was. Actually, maybe it’s more confusing and frustrating than it was before—before we thought to make the boundaries, the sharp lines between words/visual/sound/ movement/interaction and subdivisions in each one; fiction/poetry/non-fiction/playwriting, painting/drawing/sculpture. Etc. Etc. Etc. Our hybrid creations slip between the cracks, become invisible, literally cannot be seen because they fit no parameters.

Wait, though. Look. Even the President of the US is a hybrid now. A hybrid synthesized to very visible unity. Our definitions and boundaries are shifting and changing, bit by bit. People become more comfortable not knowing what “it” is. It is what it is. Like Barack Obama; what “is” he? Hawaiian outsider or Midwestern insider? Black or white? Kenyan or American? Doesn’t matter. He’s his own event. He is what he is. Now maybe we’ll become more adept at stepping back, letting be, and allowing “it” to be what it is, as a person, or an event, without the need for naming.

Viva la hybrid!

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