“Write into culture” gives an awakening performance!
On the 16th April, 50 people from GRT and non-GRT communities were invited and gathered for the first online performance of “Write into Culture”, called “Sisters in Solidarity”. The feedback from the audience was incredible and there weren't many dry eyes left in the house.
“Jaw dropping” said one audience member. “Honest and authentic,” said another. Words of appreciation echoed around the space, Powerful! Healing! Wisdom! Captivating! “I found myself sinking into the words of your heritage”.
To read more reviews follow @writeintoculture on Instagram.
“Write into Culture” is a Gypsy, Roma and Traveller women’s writing group set up by Dee Cooper and Lisa Smith in 2023. They recently celebrated their one year anniversary and performed live in June 2024 to celebrate GRTHM. They are now working on new pieces for some special projects they have coming up in 2025!
“Write into Culture” is a safe space where participants meet weekly to share their heritage and their love of writing with each other online, and now with their communities.
Below you can read reflections from some of the writers who performed and the passion that drives the team! There are very few spaces for Gypsy and Traveller people, especially women, to write and develop their craft without having to explain who they are or why their stories are important. Long may our stories continue and our family history and heritage leave a legacy for future generations.
Katie
Writing creeps into the quiet spaces between the dense lines of my life. It creeps up and out of me late at night or early in the mornings. Sometimes my littlest will crawl under my desk and slide up onto my lap, my worlds colliding. But mostly it is the quiet times when the writing seeps in.
That was until I joined Write into Culture. My writing now speaks aloud to zoom backgrounds and encouraging faces. It laughs and cries parallel lives from back then and right now. Sisters who all meet in between the lines of their very different lives. Lives that a hundred years ago would have been indistinguishable perhaps.
Each week we sit in our realities and share our differences as comfortable as if we were our grandmothers sat together making pegs in the afternoon sun. We write as the full and diverse and flawed community that we are. We write for ourselves, and for each other, as of course none of us are free until all of us are free. We can only do this because of the space opened by our founders, who embrace us entirely and protect us fiercely.
I started the night thinking only about getting through it. Then the comments start and with each one the words soar out and amongst and lift us up together, in joy and heartbreak. They are our words. Words are meant to be spoken and shared.
At the end of the night I shut my laptop and it’s dark and quiet again. I sit thoughtfully in the complexity of being heard in a space where many others have not. I sit in our words and I smile, thinking about all of those whose voices will come after ours.
Chelsea
Writing has long been a release for me. For as long as I can remember I have filled pages with words, but seldom have I shared them, even less have I performed them for an audience. I joined Write into Culture to motivate myself to write, but I couldn’t have imagined that I would have developed such friendships in the space that has been created.
Very rarely are Traveller women afforded the space to just be. Without having to explain what it means to be a Traveller and without having to fulfil a role or perform a particular function. A space to be, even when your words have failed you.
As someone who has excelled at academic writing, there is a vulnerability that comes with creative writing. You have to give yourself over to the process and be willing to open yourself and your work to feedback. It is easier to do this when you are doing it with people you trust.
Our eight weeks together ended but still we kept turning up, we kept writing and we kept sharing, but in performing for others, we showed them the power not only of our individual voices but collectively. It was also a reminder that the world beyond is missing out on a depth of voice and experience that they might never know.
My only hope from Write into Culture is that we are able to inspire other people to pick up the pen and write, no matter for spelling and grammar, but that those stories are told in all their forms. I also hope that there are more opportunities for Traveller writers beyond the space we have created for ourselves.
Amanda
How I Felt Writing; Writing Into Culture:
I felt authentic and I felt like a complete fraud. I felt scared and anxious. I felt my proud Gypsy Grannies’ presence keeping me brave. I felt thrilled and I felt terrified. I felt surprised and tearful. I felt all alone and I felt deep connection and support and acceptance. I felt conflicted and I felt in the flow. I felt privileged and I felt ashamed of my privilege that hasn’t been afforded those before me or perhaps those even in my presence. I felt, “Who am I to do this? Who am I to not do this? Who am I?”
I felt release and I felt burden. I felt desperation and I felt confusion. I felt too much and I felt blocked. I felt frustrated and I felt like a stranger. I felt family and I felt like myself for the first time.
I felt support and admiration. I felt joyful and playful. I felt sadness and compassion and empathy for myself and for you and for us. I felt amazement and pain and pleasure. I felt my heart shatter and I felt it bubble. I felt you; and I felt like myself again.
I felt kindness and awe and tremendous gratitude. I felt love and I felt lovable and I feel pure love.
Preparing for performance:
I felt unsure and uneasy. I felt inadequate and unprepared, until I felt prepared and more than adequate. I felt like I might be misunderstood and therefore unseen and therefore invisible. I felt the repetition, and irritated at my repetition until I made changes; until I thought it was perfectly imperfect; until I finally felt like I am enough.
Delivering my pieces: I felt confident. I felt ready and I felt like I wanted to get it over with. I felt comfortable in the familiarity of the car, where I practised on other occasions of travelling. I felt supported and connected with our group.
How I felt after….I felt proud and relieved. I felt joy and happiness. I felt curious. I felt tired and energized. I felt like I could start writing again. I felt extremely grateful for our group and those leading it.
About the audience: I felt I was performing for our group like always. I felt we delivered it in a professional way. I also thought about what that means… The dominant culture always puts parameters around what’s “right” or what’s “wrong,” or “acceptable” or “unacceptable.” So I guess I’m finally at the age when I’m misunderstood, I care less about trying to be understood in an environment where no one will understand no matter what I do or say or explain. That’s the beauty of this group: I don’t have to worry about all that.
On sharing my work: I will definitely share my work again. I feel compelled, even though it’s terrifying sometimes.
BB
At first I wasn’t going to take part in this writing group, I felt too daunted I hadn’t ever really put pen to paper, not since going to primary school some 15 years ago which my time there was limited since we travelled, but my late mother who was the most talented Writer, Author and Poet among her many talents urged me to take part. I am so glad I have. I put pen to paper most days now. I don’t always share what I write, not even to my new found friends in the writing group but that’s the beauty of this group. You can give what you're comfortable with and what you want to give. And completely supported both within and outside the group.
February time, I and the rest of the group were asked by the founder Dee if we would like to take part in an online performance. Not all of us took the opportunity but those who didn’t supported us from the audience. Listening to stories, lived experiences, poems and having some fun with it all and written by other women from the GRT community, women that I’m proud to call friends. I was so proud of us that night and the buzz lasted for days. We had so much support from so many people. Our culture spoke and people actually listened. The night was a complete success. I watched my friends shine and not feel ashamed or hide who they were as many of us do in our day to day lives for many reasons.
It is hard coming from a community that has so much hatred, racism and prejudice aimed at us to get such amazing results from our performance and for them to gain some empathy and understanding how hard it can be for us sometimes. We are GRT women. We are Write into Culture.
Dolly
I’ve always written things, about how I feel or what has happened in my day, but those were more my younger days. I’ve never done anything with them, just got things off my chest. In this group I feel my words are valued, like what I write matters. I feel heard. I feel seen. I feel like every woman in this group I can relate to, in one way or another. We feel like sisters. Our stories connect dots to each other, find comfort now to things we thought we were alone in.
Writing pieces leading up to this performance was at times challenging, being so vulnerable can be daunting, but with my sisters by my side, it gave me the strength I needed to deliver something we are so desperately missing out on.
I’m not sure how to put it simply, how I felt straight after our performance. I was incredibly proud of all of us & what we had done. I felt so raw, but also a little more healed. I could feel waves of strength flow through the room as each of my sisters delivered their stories. I was seeing something different within them as the night went on. The oozing of passion, depths of pain that they held onto for so long. Words were really beginning to lift off the page as each word was spoken, like a humming off bees one after another, getting louder as we united.
You really started, I mean really started to realise how much this meant. Not just to us, but our audience, our community. A sea of comments as we poured out our truths, thanking us for making them feel heard and seen too. Grateful for highlighting the injustice we have and continue to face in a new light. Commended our bravery to do the unthinkable. Appreciative for being let inside the safe space we made for us, all of us.
It doesn’t stop here for me now. I’m no longer afraid of our truths being heard, I’m afraid they’ll try to stop us. It’s not about trying to find the words; it’s about running out of pages to write on. My fear is no longer being heard; it’s being forgotten.
I want to write into culture, with my sisters. In solidarity.
“We are massively proud of the impact of ‘Write into Culture,’ and even more so of the women who have trusted us to support them to develop and grow in their creative voices. The project has gone from strength to strength, and we look forward to the future,” said Co-founders Dee Cooper and Lisa Smith.
Write into culture class of 2023/24 for Travellers’ Times
(All photos belong to members of Write into Culture)