What happens to home corner when a chemical fire makes it uninhabitable?
Shared by MINDY BLAISE AND VERONICA PACINI-KETCHABAW,
What happens to the home corner when a chemical fire makes it uninhabitable? As soon as the fire erupted, Footscray, a suburb in Melbourne, Australia was engulfed with a dark dust of chemical concoction unknown to most. The home corner became uninhabitable and humans could no longer be in charge. Survival depended on making kin with more-than-human. Hope for removing the destructive contamination involved developing symbiotic relations with the only toxic-resistant local Indigenous plant murrnong. The first task was to address the plastic home corner toys (dolls, food, crockery) that became toxic as they interacted with the chemical fire. Should these once cherished home corner items be buried, burnt, thrown away, donated? In collaboration with Wurundjeri-willam people and murnong, a spell was created to detoxify, cleanse, and heal. Since then, home corner has increasingly become a place for ritual queer kin practices of care.
Please see Linda Stupart’s Twitter account .
References
ABC News (2018, Sept). Massive industrial fire brought under control, but warning remains in place for Melbourne’s west. Available at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-30/west-footscray-fire-sends-smoke-over-melbourne-suburbs/1018141
