I’ve had trouble figuring out what the term “movement” means to me. What it means to be a part of one. What the word itself means, even.
These are ways in which I understand it:
A movement is taking place when a group of people, large or small, work together to bring attention to a cause or issue and to create some kind of change.
“The Movement” can be a blanket term to refer to the many kinds of progressive work being done at any given moment, with the implicit statement that each of them are intertwined.
To be a part of a movement means…
Ah, and that is where I falter, immediately. Though I’ve seen examples of it. The writers, the speakers, the picketers, the bombers, the painters, the artists, the leafletters… It goes on and on. There are so many ways of participating in movement but I am constantly caught up in analysis of it.
Ultimately, it is about being able to connect. To understand the ways in which we relate to each other. To find the parallels between us. To find out how what is happening now relates to what happened thirty years ago to what happened sixty years ago to what happened a hundred years ago. To contextualize our stories in the greater fabric of the past, present, and future.
And then, to incite others to undergo the process, too. Activation. Of thought and of action toward a common goal.
narinda heng 