Dr Ebony Muller has joined the AWGSA executive in the newly formed role of Transgender Representative, and is also the co-Disability Representative.
When did you finish your PhD and what was it on?
They handed me the document in May 2022. I have a creative arts background. My PhD was in dance — specifically dance and movement improvisation. I looked at feminist care ethics and it was a practice-led PhD. I had a creative outcome and an exegesis. I applied that theory to my own practising and performance work. I looked at care both as an ideological and ethical agenda, but also an artistic agenda. So it was really embedded in the artistic. I still perform.
Tell us more…
Feminist ethics is a feminist moral theory. It basically just centres care as a moral ideal. So what happens if we put care at the centre of our world? To listen, to pay attention, to take responsibility and not just for those that we explicitly care. And care ethics, it doesn’t understand a distinction between the public and the private. So it’s a pretty simple theory. But there’s a lot of kind of really rich discussion around the intricacies of all that. What does it mean to care? And is intention good enough? Or does it require intention and action? Or action alone and your intention doesn’t matter? And you know, all of those kind of fun, more philosophical questions that come up. And then yeah, the way I used it, I kind of split it into four different parts in terms of my practice and performance. So one was just ideological. I call them different modes. So like, just you know, having the intention to care and having that value. And then there was the social, which was really negotiating that with the people that I practice with. So there was a group of us, we practised together every single week for several years. And we developed, I sort of developed a structure for improvising. And it was dance movement, but also like vocal. I’m also a singer. So we had vocalising as well. So it’s quite open. And the people involved were dancers, non-dancers, performers, non-performers. So it was quite an open space. I was trying to create quite an inclusive space with that kind of intention of care and how can we look after people in that space and involve them in dancing. And so that was a really kind of fun, but also, you know, tricky negotiation, right?
Because when you’re working with other people and their needs, and having to navigate all of that, like I really learned a lot through that process. And that’s several years of leading and facilitating that group. And then there was what I called the relational mode, which is really where the artistic element starts to come into play. So in the actual act of improvising, what does it mean to negotiate things like touch and consent and listening to another person, maybe when they’re on the other side of the room from you, hearing them, quite literally, but also in this sort of empathetic way, while I’m addressing what I need as well. The whole improvisation structure (without going too deep into it) was about kind of listening to where am I at right now? We followed a very simple structure of creating movement and creating sound, and came into greater relationality with each other as we as the time went on. So it was a durational event every time. And then also, as the time went on in our practicing. There were these two layers of coming together and really getting to know each other and deepening our care for each other, and our responsibility as well. And then, because of COVID, it ended up being a film, which wasn’t strictly because of COVID, but that was kind of how it came about. And then that ended up being really rich actually for the work. So I ended up running with that. It was sort of accidental, but then ended up being right. So the film ended up being just me performing the structure, I performed the same structure twice as I kind of increased in relationality to my environment. So it was also about being, what does caring for the place around you bring about in an aesthetics way? And yes, that was the film. And I just felt like the film really created this beautiful kind of texture of you able to see, you know, if my hand was touching the floor, like you could see the kind of attention there, like the listening, the responsiveness. We filmed it twice. The first time was the accidental one, which was for HillsceneLive Festival. It was in 2020. So that was deep in the COVID situation. And then the second one, actually, the second one as well was like, Melbourne had a five day lockdown and then we filmed it like the next day or something. But I also developed this really awesome relationship with the videographer, Cohen Medson, who was also, you know, we were developing our relationality to each other as he followed me, which was also improvised. So I should also say the whole film was like taken in one shot. So it goes for about 45 minutes. So it’s, it’s all, it’s not edited. It’s all about the care between myself and the videographer as well as me and the space and me and myself.
My work involves both an ethical and artistic statement and agenda. My work’s quite philosophical, I guess, in terms of my academic work. It has expanded into thinking about what is ethical care in creative practising more broadly. I really, one of the kind of key theoretical elements of my PhD was like creating this connection between the act of practicing and that act of care, so practicing as an act of care because it’s this thing that we do.
Can you tell me about the paper you just wrote with fellow AWGSA executive committee members Dr Emma Whatman, Dr Rosie Clare Shorter and Associate Professor Jessamy Gleeson?
There are suggestions that identity in the academy was kind of created for the ideal white male worker who is unencumbered, who doesn’t have caring responsibilities or maybe has a wife who takes on the caring responsibilities. And we do see that. But also that, you know, it goes beyond, I think, sometimes, just that identity, you know, some people are encumbered by whether it’s disability or the communities that they’re in, and that’s, you know, something that can’t be shifted. But then there are other people who we might assume due to their identity, maybe they’re queer, or maybe they’re a person of colour or they’re a woman that we might assume have those ethical values concerning care. But actually, like, I think also the kind of trick of neoliberalism, right, is that people will kind of push aside their own encumbered-ness to chase that. And so we’ve been kind of like moving through the trickiness of that, like, of the slipperiness. And I think I’ve also been arguing for like, everyone encumbered, like we are all relational to each other, you can’t not be. We’re reliant on each other, like, we won’t eat, you know, if the world stops labouring for each other, right, like farmers are creating our food, things like this… So we are all encumbered, but it’s whether you choose to acknowledge that or not. And there are some people who cannot look away from that acknowledgement. And there are others who can make choices whether consciously or unconsciously. So that’s what we’ve kind of been playing with in that space.
With regard to the idea of self-care – how do we reject the individualism of selfish consumerist self-care while actually looking after the collective?
I think it’s interesting because I think I don’t think about self-care in that way, I don’t see it as an individualistic thing. But I totally understand the the reasoning for that. But yeah, but I think I talked a little bit about self-care, obviously, in relation to dancing, like in terms of that turning inwards, attending to the self and then the way that the structure of a lot of my creative practising is to turn inwards. Like, what am I feeling physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, you know, all the layers that we exist within? Whatever is coming up for that person, like honoring their, you know, their personhood. And then looking out and extending that relationality to others. I think about self-care in general like that. And like, obviously, as a disabled person, self-care is kind of a constant. In that sense, self-care is also community care because I can’t do anything for anybody else if I don’t take my medication, for example. On a very personal level, in order to even provide care for others, I often say, like, in order to be spontaneous, I have to be prepared as a disabled person. And I think that kind of comes into that self-care thing.
Is it exhausting to keep, to come out and coming out is not a one-off, you know?
I like thinking about it as a practice. It has stopped it from being like a constant disclosure and more of like, living my reality. And if I’m living my reality, then I’m bringing people into that reality as opposed to, assuming, I guess, this kind of neutrality or something. You know, I think it’s been almost a shift in like, just thinking about what is assumed when I walk into a space. And if I assume that what my normal is the normal, right? Then I’m not disclosing, I’m just being. And then also, obviously, it helps being around people who are like-minded. And then you don’t have to disclose, because you’re around people who have similar values.
Maybe that’s just like the particular age that I am and the age of my parents. People who are a little bit younger than me, I do see as having a bit more of that bravery or comfort to tell people who they are. I really relate to what you said about being like, “how can I bring it up now?”, is it too late? And so I often find with new things, it’s a lot easier for me to bring them up. I’ve gotten into again that practice of being quite transparent with people but things that are, you know, all this has been going on for multiple decades, sometimes that feels harder to disclose because it’s like I might have already known someone for a really long time so I feel like I’m bringing in a new element to the like to the party. I often feel that with coming out as trans non-binary, like that feels harder for me because people have known me maybe for a long time. And even I think with disability things, you know, especially on like this trip that I’m on at the moment, I’ve been catching up with friends and family – people I haven’t seen, some of them since before the pandemic – and I feel like things have changed, you know? I’ve always had chronic illness, but I’ve collected a few since then and it feels like one of those things that it’s hard to update people on. How do I say, oh by the way, I function really differently in the world now?
Do you have any ideas about the best way to do and to be activist at this current moment in time?
Yeah, it’s really interesting too. Because I think I never really think about myself as an activist, which I think is funny. But people have said that about me or my work. And I think I’m very much like a kind of very localised person in terms of my activism. I’m very, like I’m not really on social media much. So I think for me, the activism is in the conversations I’m having. Embodied activism I think is probably my comfortable space in terms of like, you know, like when I am at a big conference, like, oh, well, what do I need right now to take care of me as a disabled person? And maybe that does mean like sitting on the floor doing something that isn’t kind of stereotypically professional or whatever, but like, it’s necessary. So I think that’s probably my comfort. As well, obviously, you know, engaging in things like rallies and signing petitions and all of these things when I can. But I also think as a disabled person, sometimes that’s not always possible. What can you do from like your home if you can’t leave? It is in those conversations or it’s in making specific choices or, yeah, or in just like putting energies into the people that need you.
Even though my research on disability is kind of just bubbling, I’ve done a lot of work in disabled communities. I’ve taught people with disabilities in creative arts for a long time now and at Deakin also taught, primarily people who are studying to be teachers, but how to kind of think about disability in their classroom and inclusive education, things like that. And then I’m also teaching like some kind of foundation pathways units as well. And then I’ve recently just gotten hired at the University of Melbourne as well to also teach in, I guess it’s technically a Sociology unit, but it’s still around sex and sexuality and the sociology of gender. So yeah, my work is kind of really starting to go across maybe three spaces, creative arts, gender studies and disability, but for me they’re all kind of swimming in the same space. I’m still traversing these two identities of artist and academic.
What would you like to achieve on the AWGSA Exec?
I’m definitely a bit of a slow burn as a person. I will take my time to watch and learn and figure everybody out. And then I’ll be like, okay, here’s where I think I can contribute. But I think ideally if at the end of this kind of two year representative situation, if AWGSA is a place where like trans people and disabled people do feel more included, like by that next conference, if they can feel a lot more included and also that there’s space for them and there are things set up for, especially people with disabilities to engage with the conference fully or in their own way, I think that would be a real achievement for me. I think sometimes changes are small things, but small things can make a world of difference for some.
Who are your feminist, gender, queer icons, or, you know, people that you look up to, scholars, scholars of disability, race. If you’ve got any, not necessarily scholars, it could be anyone.
That’s an interesting question. Because I think, I think, you know, because people are imperfect, right? So you get little bits and pieces from everybody. I think I always think about this one amazing paper by Ruth O’Brien {link] she just says some really profound things about disability. She’s talking about policy within a US context. And basically she talks about how, about expanding the concept of disability. So, you know, even something like pregnancy, for example, is like a moment where you might be, not that people who are pregnant are necessarily disabled, but they’re in a shifting moment, right? Things are changing to them in their body, their needs are different. And what could it mean to think about kind of disability in this expansive way? And if we do think about it in this expansive way, and also thinking about ageing as well within that sphere, then really everybody is going to experience disability at some point or another, whether temporary or permanent. And I think that can shift our priorities a bit, if we take on that idea. And I think that paper was really significant for me. And lots of other people have written about that since, but I think that a real moment for me. So, in terms of scholarly work, it’s jus the one paper, but I, you know, I always reference it.
Thanks Ebony!
