EXCO 118 - NapCo: Abolition and Rest

1 credit
Rooted in the work of the Black-led organization, “The Nap Ministry” founded by Tricia Hersey, and the teachings of BIPOC feminists, disability justice activists, and abolitionists, this class will explore these questions and the possibility of a world where rest is celebrated and capitalism is no longer valued, through the mantra: “Rest is Resistance.”The purpose of this class is not to define a “right” way of how to sleep or what future to dream of, but to create an environment where we can all show up as we are and feel comfortable enough to talk about what matters to us and the world we want to live in beyond white supremacist tenets of perfectionism, individualism, and either/or thinking.The course is designed as a 1-credit, half academic/half practicum class and will meet for two hours a week. For the first hour of the week, we will discuss readings that explore a combination of Black and Indigenous feminist thought, Afrofuturism, disability justice, and community care based on the guiding questions of the week, the “DreamSpace Prompt,” related to sleep and radical visions for the future. For the second hour of the week, the class will schedule a time to come together-most likely in one of the meditation rooms in Wilder -for students to Nap (or rest/lay down) in a shared space and create a collective DreamSpace. In preparation for the DreamSpace, we will discuss as a class the ways that white supremacist patriarchal capitalism forces us into exhaustion, as well as focus on our relationship with sleep and creating environments of care in the midst of stress and uncertainty. The class is an intentional safe space for BIPOC & QTPOC to reflect, reset, and restore our minds and bodies.

Vera Grace Menafee
vmenafee@oberlin.edu
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