I’ve outlined fusion a number of instances now – generally alone, and generally with mates. Sometimes to mirror phrases individuals at the moment use, and generally one thing all my very own.
I maintain defining fusion as a result of I don’t assume there’s really one appropriate and full reply to the query. There are as many fusions on the market as there are dancers – all utilizing our our bodies as a form of language for negotiating the issues we wish from our neighborhood. I maintain defining fusion to present individuals extra language to ask for the issues they need, extra locations to see themselves, and extra concepts for a way they need their communities to develop. You might join with this definition, or you could not. As you’ll see from the definition itself – that’s most likely okay.
Fusion is a potluck.
Fusion is a spot the place everybody brings one thing to the desk for different friends to attempt.
Fusion is a spot the place some individuals deliver an beautiful dish, comprised of scratch for hours and hours, and a few individuals deliver a fruit tray, and a few individuals deliver paper plates and tin foil.
Fusion is the place the place all of these issues are equally necessary.
Fusion would have a better time defining itself if it didn’t must maintain defending itself. Lots of people don’t like fusion, and there are good causes for that too. But till you notice that each single desk set for fusion goes to look completely different, you’re going to have a tough time doing something productive along with your dislike. You can criticize each dish on the desk, and the way individuals have made it, and the way individuals eat it. You can ask that individuals make the dishes higher. But fusion isn’t the dishes, it’s the potluck itself, and that’s necessary.
Fusion is a potluck the place individuals attempt meals from different cultures. Sometimes they make it not fairly proper, or in disrespectful methods (I’m at all times skeptical of fusion delicacies).
Fusion is a spot the place some individuals have dislikes and allergy symptoms, however we nonetheless try to discover them one thing to eat – to ship them away nourished and fulfilled.
Fusion is a spot the place you’re allowed to place issues in your plate for pleasure, or as a result of they’re good for you, or as a result of your greatest buddy made it, or since you’ve by no means seen it earlier than, or as a result of it appears notably good to attempt.
Fusion is a spot the place you’re allowed to say: “I don’t want to eat that right now.”
Some individuals would moderately go to a restaurant the place they know what’s on the menu. Sometimes I might too. Sometimes I am going to a potluck and there’s nothing there I need to eat, or the combo of friends is incorrect, or the music is simply too loud, or I’m subsequent to the one who’s sitting too shut and saying issues that rub my soul the incorrect means. I don’t essentially get to decide on my desk, or the atmosphere of my meal. But I don’t go to a potluck anticipating a restaurant, and I don’t go to a potluck or a restaurant for a similar causes. I occur to get pleasure from each.
If fusion is a potluck, we must always know the components within the dish we’re bringing, and be capable of share these components with others.
If fusion is a potluck, we must always make area for different individuals’s dietary decisions.
If fusion is a potluck, we must always respect each dish on the desk, even when we don’t attempt it ourselves.
If fusion is a potluck, we all know that not all dishes will go in the identical mouthful, however they’ll nonetheless be scrumptious.
If fusion is a potluck, we don’t flip away individuals who have made a good-faith effort to deliver one thing to share, however we additionally anticipate them to behave like good friends in our properties and areas.
If fusion is a potluck, then we’re asking our friends to return right into a sure form of container, with social norms that not everybody will know. Is it okay to only deliver beer? What if I’m in a rush? Can I exploit the oven at my host’s place to re-heat this? Can I take the leftovers house? We get to create these norms in our native and nationwide communities, and likewise know that hosts are going to have completely different preferences and values.
We can ask our hosts to make their values clear.
This analogy – which stretches impressively far – lends itself to a sure imaginative and prescient of fusion that’s not the one that each scene is attempting to construct. It is, maybe, not probably the most technically pushed, and I’m nonetheless in search of a strategy to account for the DJs. It does, nonetheless. seize one thing of the texture of the fusion areas I like greatest – the place I really feel welcomed for what I’ve introduced, and I do know that I can deliver various things on completely different nights and nonetheless be okay.
So for as we speak, my fusion is a potluck.
Bring your self.
Be welcome.