A Grammar Built with Rocks | Discussion, Reading, and Performance

This day-long program celebrates the publication of A Grammar Built with Rocks, an anthology published by Wendy’s Subway and co-edited by Shoghig Halajian and Suzy Halajian. Bringing together a range of feminist-decolonial texts and visual contributions, the publication foregrounds creative practices that respond to dispossession. It highlights how movement, transience, and improvisation offer alternative ways of being-together while being-in-place.

Inspired by Édouard Glissant’s theory of relational belonging, the program emphasizes interconnectivity among liberation struggles while remaining attentive to the specificity of place and history. Across disciplines and forms, the publication and program reflect a shared commitment to relational, cross-disciplinary exchange and collective modes of inquiry.

The day begins with a reading group facilitated by Amber Jamilla Musser that focuses on key concepts across the writings of Glissant and Suzanne Césaire—two prolific thinkers whose work serves as an undercurrent for many artistic practices featured in A Grammar Built with Rocks. A panel discussion moderated by Fawz Kabra considers place-based methodologies developed by artists engaging landscapes shaped by ongoing colonial and ecological harm, and the ways refusals are articulated and aligned across multiple geographies. The program concludes with a reading by Ryan C. Clarke, followed by a performance by Muyassar Kurdi. Throughout the day, a selection of musical offerings by A Grammar Built with Rocks contributors can be experienced in the listening room.

1pm | Writings of Dissent and Relation
Facilitated by Amber Jamilla Musser

This reading group, Writings of Dissent and Relation, facilitated by Amber Jamilla Musser, brings into dialogue two foundational texts in anticolonial thought: Édouard Glissant’s Treatise on the Whole-World (1997) and Suzanne Césaire’s “The Great Camouflage” (1945). Through close reading and group discussion, participants will consider how these writers articulate decolonization and the political stakes of poetry within broader struggles for liberation.

The session will also clarify important concepts such as Glissant’s definitions of opacity and relation, exploring how these ideas emerge from the lived conditions of Martinique and can be mobilized within contemporary artistic practice and critical research.

2:30pm | Panel Discussion
Moderated by Fawz Kabra

A panel discussion moderated by Fawz Kabra considers place-based methodologies developed by artists engaging landscapes shaped by ongoing colonial and ecological harm, and the ways refusals are articulated and aligned across multiple geographies.

5pm | Performance by Muyassar Kurdi
A ritualistic sound performance guided by the voice, unfolding through breath, resonance, and deep listening, carried by the body.