World Wide Wake: A look into digital wake work in response to the murder of Breonna Taylor
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Abstract
In Christina Sharpe's, In the Wake, she refers to "wake work" as conscious work. Wake work makes a conscious and intentional effort to celebrate one's life as they are passing and after they have transitioned on. Wake work includes grief, sadness, reminiscing, happiness, laughter, and many more emotions. We think of wake work happening in the physical, but I want to look at how weight work exists in the digital. This paper will discuss how wake work is done in digital spaces such as social media platforms. I will also be looking at how social movements such as black lives matter can act as a place for wake work to begin. I have created four sections that will talk about wake work in digital spaces. Hashtag activism, memorializing death, Fugitivity, and Black Dignity are ways that wake work is done in these virtual communities. I will investigate and provide examples of how each aligns with wake work, particularly to the death of Breonna Taylor.
Publication Date
2021
Keywords
social justice, wake work, police brutality, digital humanities, digital media, social media
Disciplines
African American Studies | Digital Humanities | Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies | Hip Hop Studies
Faculty Advisor/Mentor
Dr.Jennifer Rhee
Is Part Of
VCU Graduate Research Posters