Highlining as Outdoor Counternarrative : Building Bridges to AlterNative Futures and Creating Transcultural Networks of Solidarity through “Slacklife”
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| Year of publication | 2022 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | Highlining is a subdiscipline of slacklining with roots in climbing practiced at heights. Slackliners walk on a flat 2,5 cm wide webbing that is dynamic and light. Highlines are rigged in both natural and urban landscapes and can be viewed as artivist pieces that promote free movement and challenge the biopolitical control over bodies as highlining provides an opportunity to go to spaces where human movement is naturally limited, and therefore, unexpected and unregulated. Moreover, the “slacklife” philosophy is characterized by a set of values that are important for the creation of socially and environmentally just futures as they can be juxtaposed to harmful historical legacies of conquest and colonialism. Highlines can be rigged to express solidarity, to contest borders, and to unite and connect transborder communities. Creating transcultural networks of solidarity through slacklife embodies the power in a shift in perspective as a radical act of decolonialism. This piece will present highlining as a new form of collaborative outdoor counternarrative that questions the dominant notions about the outdoors, nature, and borders. As a case study, it will present a highline project that was rigged in 2019 across the Río Grande in protest to the then-president Donald Trump?s plans to “build the wall” along the US-Mexico border. Co-created by teams from Mexico and US, the highline constituted a powerful peaceful protest as it showed an alternative to the life and society Trump's administration was trying to establish. It also underscored the significance and potential of art as a form of resistance. |
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