in-depth thought pieces that explore the complex affects of [mxd] subjects.
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Sandra Manzanares is a filmmaker from the Greater Boston area and just recently completed her Master’s at New York University. Her short film, Like Fine Silk, has completed its festival circuit and is now available online. Sandra’s film “centers on the point of view of a young Afro-Latina as she’s confronted with culture clashes in the intimate setting of a black hair care store. It illuminates experiences that are not widely familiar to the mainstream population and gives voice to often unspoken, uncomfortable misunderstandings in order to promote empathy and dialogue”. We sat down with Sandra to discuss her film as well as her mixed feelings about being Afro-Latina in the U.S.
on the face of it, roguture is ‘just’ a humble business venture that happens to teach english and roast coffee. but as i see it, roguture is so much more, and provides an example of what living free, mixed, and non-binary is like– free in spite of the pressures to conform that come from identity politics, mixed in understanding that who they are is a composite of multiple influences, and non-binary in that their actions are ethical and fluid, not moral and determined. roguture is an expression of life that thrives in spite of the negative affects of binary forces.
if one disrupts, or is unable to incorporate oneself into the wa, it is tantamount to death. among the many things that are distorted by the wa, people’s concept of death seems the most affected. within a context where karoshi and kodukoshi are part of everyday reality, suicide seems almost trivial. but that’s the dark irony– death has become banal. and as a direct consequence of this, so has life. we’ve now ventured even further into the black hole.
“there’s a japanese word called ‘wa’. no one wants to disrupt this wa regardless of if it’s in the family, in a community, at work, or anywhere else in japan. it means harmony, not status quo…wa technically is good thing, it has a positive connotation, but the way that it works is so bad. this concept of wa is inherent to japanese people because they’re raised in this culture. and they can’t function without it. it’s so against their nature to break that wa. if you break the wa then you’re probably worse than a foreigner, you become something other than japanese.”
"To describe my background, I choose to use a word that is traditionally associated with mutt breeds, sterile mules, hybrid plants, or the unnatural. Mixed. I choose to use this word because it flies in the face of what I consider to be a celebration of inbreeding, religious homogeneity, and the hive-mind. Honestly though, being ‘mixed’ only has a negative connotation if you think certain things should remain separate."
“ideas come from your ‘inner garden’ or inner world...and the more diversity and depth you have in there, the more interesting your work will be. making my own art is like trying to cook up a meal with all the ingredients from the garden. often times the process is difficult and you want to pull your hair out. is this garden of the inner self actually wild? i don't know. but i like the idea of life spontaneously growing all over the place. i draw inspiration from that.”
"i refused to go down the same tragic path. i was proud of who i was and didn’t need a larger group to validate me. i chose to be a “lone-wolf” over trying to pass for anything other than what i knew i was– mixed. i refused to sacrifice my family’s historical narrative, and my own personal experiences, to serve the greater good of a ‘group’ identity that would never fully accept me as i am..."
caroline’s personal work explores the various shifts and stages that constitute the movement towards empathy. as with any concept imbued with moral cachet, the temptation is to define empathy and then reflexively judge one’s personal experiences relative to this definition… like love, there’s something ineffably unconscious to the experience of empathy, that logic and language fail to capture, and eludes definition. as expressed in her work, caroline doesn’t seek to define concepts such as love or empathy; rather, through her exploration of complex relationships, her films challenge and complicate our understanding of what it means to empathize, and love.