our Home is here
‘We Are Monster’ is a growing global network for Music Therapists of Colour. Many of us are familiar with the constant ache of searching for spaces where we feel belonging, where are our voices are heard, where we’re taken seriously, and where we can feel safe. A space to BE and to be ourselves. A space that feels like home.
This is that space.
When the network was birthed in 2022, it was clear that there was an overwhelming need to find space away from the 'white gaze' of the music therapy profession, and that of the wider medical, mental health, and academic systems. Norris (2020) reminds us: "Music therapy across the globe is situated within complex socio-political, socio-structural, socio-historical, and socio-cultural systems. It holds the vestiges of White European settler colonialism and is founded upon dominant cultural values and ideals that support its existence and simultaneously benefit and harm client communities."
As People of Colour (PoC) we need our own space to unpack, unlearn, and process this complexity without feeling at risk of being harmed by the very systems we are trying to navigate. We also claim our right to a space that is safe enough for us to call out racism in the profession; support and empower each other; prioritize decolonizing and rebuilding our communities; relearn our ancient wisdoms and musical rituals and traditions; and find unapologetic joy in ourselves and each other.
While the network is largely run by Davina Vencatasamy, Jonathan (Jaytee) Tang, and Michaela de Cruz, who are based in the UK, its membership is global, with practitioners from the UK, Asia, North and South America, and Europe. We are intent on growing it even further afield. A global network for Music Therapists of the Global Majority.
If you are a Music Therapist of Colour (qualified or in training) we’d love to have you with us.
our Work is here
A safe, homelike place, is a grounding place where we can do constructive and restorative work. We plan events around the needs of music therapists and PoC of the Global Majority so that we can create space for our diverse frames of reference and take our time to process our diverse forms of grief from intergenerational and ongoing racism. Ultimately, we come together so that we can play, learn, and BE, in ways we may not feel safe to do anywhere else.
We provide a digital platform for music therapists to connect with each other, and share our joy, pain, work, and play.
This is also where we organise with the community to show up with and for each other, such as at the last British Association for Music Therapy (BAMT) Conference in May 2024. We arrived as a contingent, which inspired us in energy and spirit for our own offerings at the conference, gave us the backing we needed to face the inevitable white gaze (and more), and allowed us to celebrate each member who presented with the fullness of our support. It was a beautiful testament to the power of community and the fire created from the experience will ignite us to recreate it over and over again.
why Monster?
"You guys know about vampires?...You, know, vampires have no reflections in a mirror? There’s this idea that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. And what I’ve always thought isn’t that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. It’s that if you want to make a human into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflections of themselves.” –Junot Diaz (2009)
When we call ourselves "monster" we are actively reclaiming the thing which was denied to us: our reflections–-and therefore, our racial and cultural identities. We can no longer be the "monster" we've been made into by the dominant race/culture when we are seen by each other and when we can see ourselves in each other. On an equally profound level, the word "monster" is used between jazz musicians as a descriptor of expertise in one's craft. “You’re a Monster!” means you’ve killed it onstage and are a master at bringing your instrument to life. As musicians who believe in the inherent healing properties of music, we are proud to be "monsters" who can recognize other "monsters" in our beauty, diversity, talent, and resilience.
Diaz, Junot. (2009). Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot Diaz tells students his story. Accessed at https://www.nj.com/ledgerlive/2009/10/junot_diazs_new_jersey.html on 24 November 2024.
Norris, M. S. (2020). A Call for Radical Imagining: Exploring Anti-Blackness in the Music Therapy Profession. Voices: A World Forum for Music Therapy, 20(3), 6. https://doi.org/10.15845/voices.v20i3.3167