♪ Opening theme music ♪
[Diane:] Hello, and welcome to this episode of ArtsAbly in Conversation.
My name is Diane Kolin.
This series presents artists, academics, and project leaders
who dedicate their time and energy to a better accessibility for people with disabilities in the arts.
You can find more of these conversations on our website, artsably.com,
which is spelled A-R-T-S-A-B-L-Y dot com.
♪ Theme music ♪
[Diane:] Today, ArtsAbly is in conversation with Dr. Cynthia George,
aka Dr. CynCorrigible,
an award-winning artist, educator, and program evaluator living in Nashville, Tennessee.
You can find the resources mentioned by Dr. Cyn during this episode
on ArtsAbly's website, in the blog section.
♪ Punk music - Drums and bass beat ♪
Tradition and authority,
toxic roots in the family tree,
no one learns no one grows
this is how stupid goes.
Cruel’s the same but its much meaner
selfish greedy nosy schemer
personal gain make that money,
shirk that work lick that honey.
Oh, I don’t know why you do the things you do,
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
I could care less about your motivation
your license to practice is on probation.
I don’t know why you do the things you do
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
I don’t know why you do the things you do,
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
Tradition and authority,
toxic roots in the family tree,
no one learns no one grows
this is how stupid goes.
Cruel’s the same but its much meaner
selfish greedy nosy schemer
personal gain make that money,
shirk that work lick that honey.
Oh, I don’t know why you do the things you do,
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
I could care less about your motivation
let a jury sort it out in litigation.
I don’t know why you do the things you do
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
I don’t know why you do the things you do,
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
I don’t know why you do the things you do,
stupid or cruel baby im no fool.
Misfeasance malfeasance
misfeasance malfeasance
misfeasance malfeasance,
what is this deviance?
is this part of human nature?
should I tell the legislature?
this level of incompetence
cannot give you confidence.
it defies all common sense
misfeasance malfeasance
misfeasance malfeasance.
♪ End of the excerpt. ♪
[Diane:] Welcome to this new episode of ArtsAbly in Conversation.
Today, I am with Dr. Cynthia George, aka Dr. CynCorrigible,
who is an award-winning artist, educator, and a program evaluator living in Nashville, Tennessee.
Welcome, Cynthia.
[Cynthia:] Hello, thank you for having me, Diane. I'm happy to be here.
[Diane:] Well, thank you for accepting to share your story and work with us.
It's very, very exciting.
I always start these episodes by asking about the person,
so who are you, and what is your background, what made you
start music, and things like that.
[Cynthia:] Yes, well, I am 6 foot tall,
and I've got a long blonde mohawk, and I call it my prohawk,
and actually, I kind of shaved the mohawk
as I was becoming a punk singer.
Um, I was actually… I'm from Nashville, Tennessee,
which is, of course, is Music City, but I never really wanted
to be a musician while I was living here.
It was actually in my PhD program in Richmond, Virginia,
and I was taking all of these classes, and I was kind of
turning my curriculum into punk songs, and so I was just writing these lyrics
about the education that I was receiving. I really had no intention of singing them,
but I did shave the mohawk off because it kind of fit the theme and the mood, you know, and
every time I looked in the mirror, I wanted to kind of remember who I was,
and not allow the PhD process to change
the fundamental parts of who I was, right? Because it can do that.
And then a friend of mine saw the songs I was writing,
and he was like, Cyn, this needs to be a record, you know?
And, you know, I don't play any instruments,
And I've never really had any formal music education, I've just grown up in Nashville,
sort of steeped in the culture. Most of my friends are musicians.
Everyone here is in a band, you know, and so I've just kind of
fallen into that. But now that I am doing it,
I love it, and it feels very purposeful.
I don't know how else I would appropriately communicate my message
without music and these punk songs, and so
I'm very happy that I stumbled into that.
and so now, um, Graduates Rise, I formed in, uh, I guess it was 2015,
and actually recorded my first album called Math is Hard.
I was downstairs typing my dissertation, and my band was upstairs recording the music,
and I released the album on the same day I defended my dissertation
and gave copies to all of my committee, and then I actually submitted it to
the working class studies association for peer review,
and it was received, and I went and
performed at their conference, like, in a lecture hall,
which was super fun, and, um, you know, and then it just kind of spiraled from there
where now, you know, I've released a second album, and I'm
working on songs with guys in LA, and, you know, just doing all sorts of fun stuff,
podcasts with you, and
Um, you know, just taking off,
Having a great time, uh, creating art,
and it was just a part of myself that had been missing.
I grew up poor, and we didn't have a lot of money for art supplies.
I also worked a lot, starting as young as age 9, I was working outside the home for money.
And I didn't have a lot of time to think about the arts,
it really took me, you know, into adulthood before I realized
that that was just a fundamental part of being human
and I needed that, and now that I have it, I could never let it go.
[Diane:] But although, it's funny because you grew up in Nashville,
where there is music everywhere, right?
[Cynthia:] Yes.
[Diane:] Did at a certain time when you were growing up,
did you get in touch with some musicians
or not at all, it really started when you were in grad studies?
[Cynthia:] Well, I… being here, like, I… I worked at Fan Fair.
You know, like, I would sell t-shirts, and so I would interact with musicians and,
and then all of my friends, like, one of my little high school boyfriends was a musician, you know,
and he would make songs on a little 8-track tape, and
You know, like, most of my best friends were musicians, and so I was always around it,
but I just never thought it was something that I was gonna do.
It was… I never felt talented enough, you know, and,
and then in… Nashville's also very music industry heavy, and so there is
a lot of, um, the sort of corporatization of music, and not everywhere,
but on the surface, I was really avoiding that. You know, I did not want to be part of music business.
And, just my soul rejected it, you know?
But in Richmond, Virginia, it is a total punk rock city, and so there,
it just felt different, and I could see myself on those stages, and they would have these locals-only shows where
sometimes they were out in the woods, you know, we had a show spot down by the river, and they would pull a generator out,
and people would perform right there under the bridge, you know?
And, um, and those sorts of… That approach, right, and those sorts of shows
and those sorts of shows kind of opened up that confidence in me to say, okay.
Maybe I can get on stage and sing these songs, and…
because it takes an incredible amount of vulnerability, you know,
to be able to stand up and say,
Listen to me, right? Like, I've got something worth saying, and something worth watching, and,
and I want an hour of your time, you know,
to focus on me, and I was comfortable doing that, like, in the academic world, and, you know, I'm a social worker, so I would
do, uh, I did a lot of teen driver safety and a lot of community prevention training, and so I was
comfortable standing in front of crowds, educating them,
but I had never really tried to entertain them.
And so it's no surprise, I guess, that my band comes out as a sort of edutainment sort of approach
where I've teamed up with some amazing musicians, like, that's the best thing about being in Nashville.
Now that I'm back here, I moved back after I finished my PhD, and I've
reconnected, because here, like, there are so much talent, and they are all just
at the peak of their skill level, and just waiting to get in the studio with somebody,
and so I've been really lucky to get some great musicians to really help bring
my melodies and my lyrics to life.
[Diane:] I'm curious about the reception of your work in…
at the beginning, when you were on college or university level,
and you arrived to your professors, and you say, this is what I want to do.
Are there professors who really say, oh yeah, we should do that!
Or did you fight with them a little bit?
[Cynthia:] Well, I did have one professor tell me that once I shaved the mohawk off,
she said, oh, you're never gonna get tenure now.
[Laughs]
And so I wrote a song called Quit Lit, where I'm literally saying, like, you know,
I'm talking about the tenure process, and I am tenured now.
You know, and so really, it's about finding your niche, um, you know, and not ever letting anyone
stop you from what you feel in your heart you're supposed to do, you know?
And I knew at the time that she was giving me advice from the 70s and the 80s,
and the traumas of her career that she had endured, and I loved her, you know, I mean,
and so I wasn't gonna get angry or anything about that. I appreciated the advice
that she was trying to give me.
But I knew that I needed to go into a new world, and a new realm of higher education
where students wanted different things, right? And so
I would say that the punk band, the Mohawk, helped me.
Um, you know, my students, um…
I mean, my students love me, and, you know, and that is because I relate to them, and I care about them.
And I'm giving them the fresh take, you know? I mean, and the image that I present
helps them know that they're gonna get that fresh take, right? And so, they will show up to my classes with their textbooks,
and they have already started reading them, and they are ready to do my assignments, you know, and they
want to please the punk rock professor, and I didn't intend that when I started this, right? It was really a rage outlet,
and, you know, and just that expression. But now that I realize, like, it's recruiting,
And, you know, and I had this group of young kids that would just, like, come up to me after shows
and talk to me about how they get into college, you know?
What's the process for that? And I think about how lucky I am
to be in those positions where I'm approachable, right? Where people that would not feel comfortable going to
somebody that holds a PhD, and asking them, you know, silly questions about
how to fill out the FAFSA, you know, which is the Free Application for Student Aid here in the U.S, and
you know, and I'm just so happy that I am able to sort of demystify that process,
and make myself approachable, and just happy to be in the room, you know,
and that they come to me with questions like that.
[Diane:] But more than questions, I mean, you integrate that to your… the way you're teaching.
But you also make them do some interesting work.
Can you talk about that, your approach, and what you are…
What comes to… out of these courses that you make with them?
[Cynthia:] Sure, um, I am at Tennessee State University in Nashville, Tennessee, which is a historically Black college and university,
and so we have a tremendous amount of students that are coming from low-income households,
and there are a lot of first-generation college students, regardless of household income. They may be the first person that ever has tried to come
to higher education, and that can be very intimidating. I'm a first-generation college student,
And so, first and foremost, like, I meet them where they're at, you know?
Like, that's the number one tenet of being a social worker,
is meeting people where they're at, and so, I value that,
that they've come to me and asked me, you know, to help them with their careers.
And, uh, I've specifically teach research and public policy
and so in my research courses, I will have students do
literature reviews embedded in their field placements, right? And so they'll be talking about
what are best practices to provide counseling and substance abuse treatment to low-income African-American women, right?
Which is, like, this segment of the population that there's virtually no research on.
And if I could inspire someone to get their advanced degree and actually publish that paper one day,
that would make me so happy, right? I mean, and so that's, like, the sort of technical part of what I'm doing.
In my public policy classes, I incorporate the arts more.
And in that class, I do have them write a traditional paper and a presentation.
But they're studying social movements, and we study public policy from the bottom up in that class.
I've got an advanced policy where we go from the bottom, from the top down.
But in the bottom-up class, we talk about how people get engaged in public policy
and changing society, right? And so they study these social movements.
And I had them write a paper, they do a presentation, and then they make a zine.
Right? Which is, I had them make a little mini zine,
which is one sheet of paper, you know, that folds up into a little booklet.
And, um, they love it, right? Many of them, like,
y'all get the top straight-A students that will freak out over a zine.
Because they've never been asked to do anything artistic in their classes, right?
They can write those papers left and right.
But that creative aspect of, okay, now I want you to think about
communicating the essence of your social movement through art.
And I want that to be in a zine, right?
Um, and for those that don't know, a zine is short for magazine,
and zines took off, really, in the 80s
when the photocopier was invented and became widely available,
because it was so much cheaper and easier for people to reproduce copies of something they created.
And so it's really a radical means of free press,
where you don't have to get it cleared by a publisher or anything like that.
You can just put something on a piece of paper and hand it out.
And the many zines that I'm using are…
easy, right? They fit in a pocket, you know? And, like, something like this is cool,
like, even if you just find it on the street, you know, and you pick it up, you know, and you think it's trash,
and then you realize, oh, wait, there's some art in there, and…
And I'm a riot girl, the zines were big in the 90s, late 80s, and early 90s,
and I used to tape quarters to a piece of paper and, like,
mail it to somewhere, and then they would send me a zine back in the mail.
And, um, you know, and so zines have come a long way, um, and I am just again, so lucky to be
in charge of a class, right? Like, I get to create the curriculum, and I have decided that a zine
is an appropriate way to communicate this message, right? And so,
I use all of my powers as a professor, and, you know, I mean, and my students really respond to it,
and it brings their papers to life.
And, you know, these are students' first zines most of the time.
Like, every once in a while, I'll get some students that have made zines before,
but most of the time, it's their first zine.
And so I actually started publishing them, and so I've got a journal called Creating Change,
the online journal of zines about social movements.
I've got 6 years' worth, I think, so far.
Volume 7 will be coming out by the end of June, it should be out,
and those are published through TSU's library. They've got a digital toolbox, and they're published there.
And I actually have started getting students to publish their papers, too, which is a little bit
riskier for students, right? They're really nervous about publishing a paper.
But I've actually gotten a few to publish them.
I had one group of students actually not only publish their papers and their zine, but then they went on
to present their work at The Council on Social Work Education Conference, which is an annual
Academic conference where social workers from all over the world come together to share knowledge.
And so I was so happy. There's not a lot of master's level students
that present work at those conferences.
And so I was just so happy to bring something cool, right?
Like, I mean, it wasn't just, like, a stodgy old paper, it was these cool zines, you know,
and so my sessions are generally well attended at those events, and,
and I just… I just love taking students and
kind of giving that energy, right? Because that's really what the arts does, right?
And I'll just tell you the secret, the science behind it is dual cognitive processing, right?
And getting both sides of, you know, your brain working, your left and your right brain both working on a particular concept,
and like, when people can attach emotions to the facts that they're learning, right?
That's really when things come together.
And it promotes memory recall, and it promotes the ability for people to transfer that learning to other situations, right?
And other aspects of their life, and so…
I've got science to back it up as well.
[Diane:] Can I ask you for an example, for example, you come with a series of
legislations or laws that are impacting your... or that you can present in a course. Let's say ADA, for example.
So, if you come to your students and say, we're gonna do a zine on ADA,
what do they produce, to have an idea of what this zine contains?
[Cynthia:] Oh, yeah. Well, I never tell the students their topic, right?
Some teachers are very prescriptive like that, and I'm very loose, right?
And so I just say, I'm giving you a method.
And you have to choose which aspect interests you, right?
And because I'm wanting to cultivate their own desire for lifelong learning, right? And I… I never, like…
I've decolonized my syllabi, I don't know if you know what that means, but, you know, like, I'm really kind of
taken away Um, those aspects that would force a student to do something that they didn't want to do, right?
And so, I will have students pick their issues, right? And I don't grade them on whether or not I agree with them.
I grade them on whether or not they are accurately capturing the essence of that movement, right?
And so, I want them to explore that. And, you know, and I'll be honest, some of those zines I get are… mediocre, right?
I mean, they're, you know, like, you know, I mean, there's still value in that. I'm not gonna question anyone's art.
Because they are, like, the art is mediocre, I mean, right? Like, the content is always on point, you know?
But you can tell when students have really put into it. Like, I had…
One student analyzed Alcoholics Anonymous as a social movement. Right?
And his paper was fabulous. And his zine is still, to this day, one of the best zines.
I think he's in issue 1, if you look at the journal online. It's, um…
Goodness, I can't remember his name. He would be upset. Jeff, uh, right?
But his zine on Alcoholics Anonymous as a movement
just really told the story in this really simple way,
because that's what a zine does, it's it makes you boil everything down to the essential elements
to communicate it as simply as possible.
And so, I love watching them take these complex issues that will fit into a 15-page paper.
You know, but then I want them to also boil it down to a tiny little mini-zine.
And they don't understand sometimes what an intellectual task that is, right? But it is a task, and
I kind of taught myself doing that, because I'm complex, right? I could talk for hours about things.
Create a semester-long course on one topic, but then I will also try to boil it down to a haiku.
Right? And how can I communicate this incredibly complex concept using this very limited
form, right? And then, of course, I'm human, and I understand the human condition, and people never
just deal with one source alone, right? They're always taking in multiple sources, and so
I just trust that the universe is going to give them the other pieces, but then, you know, the essential truths,
as I see it is in this tiny little haiku, right?
And then that approach goes into my punk songs, like, because I will
write songs that might summarize a whole chapter in one of the texts that I'm teaching from, right?
And my students might recognize it, and they'll say, Hey!
Tradition and authority, that's from Chapter 1 in our research textbook,
and that's also a line in your song, and I was like, you are correct, right? Like, bonus points!
Right? You get it. So I'm taking this really complex information
and making it more digestible and more entertaining, right? Because that's what it takes
for people to take in complex information. Like, sometimes we have this tendency to resist
just because it's overwhelming, or it's different, right? It's, like, outside of our normal schemes of thinking,
and so we want to reject that information.
And having it come in through a punk song, or a poem, or a zine, or art of any form
opens the human mind, and it touches the human heart,
And again, it gives that dual cognitive processing going
so that people are going to remember those concepts more.
[Diane:] So let's talk about your band.
So, Dr. Cyn and the Graduates Rise, where does the name come from
and what made you start writing?
I mean, you talked a little bit about it already, but I want to go a little bit deeper on that.
[Cynthia:] Okay, great, yeah. Um, well, I was actually, like,
I had to be a PhD student a year longer than I had planned, and it was kind of like this confluence of
my disabilities flaring up, and I had an administrator force me into a bureaucratic process
that I didn't need to go through, and so I just had this year of my final studies where I was waiting for a checkbox
that it turns out I didn't even need.
But in that year, all of my studies were done, my dissertation was done, I was literally just paying tuition away down a process.
And that is… that made me homeless, right? Like, I had to choose.
Can I pay tuition to go through this year? What do I do? And so I was living out of my car.
And staying with a bunch of different friends, right? And
it was one of those friends that I was staying with that saw the songs that I was writing and said, Hey,
let's do… make this band, you know? Like, let's make this album,
and so I was like, okay, you know, and so that was really… if it hadn't been for that
period of being homeless, which many people would take as,
you know, a blow, right, to knock them down into nothingness.
I, thankfully, was surrounded by enough people that supported me and loved me,
to get me through that time and help me tap into my art.
It was at a point where poverty had kept me from art for so long.
But this extreme sort of poverty just drove me right to it, right?
Where I had nothing else to do in that year, except for make this punk record, right?
And so, like, I made Graduates Rise and their first album, I think I spent, like,
$600 on the on the full album to do everything,
maybe a little bit more, which is ridiculously cheap for making a record.
And the band name, Graduates Rise, you know, I just looked online,
I wanted to find something that no one else had, right? A lot of band names have been taken.
I wanted it to have this education angle to it, and so Graduates Rise, as in all rise, right?
Where, you know, you say that at graduation, when you graduate.
And then also, to get off your keisters and use your education for something, right?
Because there is a sort of activist or advocacy slant to… there's a call to action in my songs, right?
And so, the Graduates Rise, like I needed a name that implied action.
And then Dr. CynCorrigible was a nickname a friend of mine gave me, and
it just kind of stuck, right? That comes from incorrigible, but the Cyn added, right? CynCorrigible.
And so, you know, it just kind of fit. And I started doing some solo stuff,
and so I needed the Dr. Cyn, and now I've got two profiles.
You can catch my old music at the streaming profiles for Graduates Rise
and my new music is at the streaming profiles for Dr. Cyn.
And then if you look on YouTube and stuff, it's Dr. Cyn and The Graduates Rise,
and so I'll apologize for a little bit of marketing miscommunication.
But everything is at GraduatesRise.com, and you can link out from there.
[Diane:] So, what is... I know you recently, or you are preparing
for the release of a new single, right? Can you talk about this?
[Cynthia:] Yes, well, it's a song off of my album. I've got a 10-song album called Canary.
And that album was heavily inspired by my experiences watching my mother struggle while living in a nursing home.
And she did suffer abuse and neglect, and she succumbed to her condition in 2019.
But she fought for 3 years to recover from an injury
that she had an accident, went into a rehab facility,
and then was injured by the facility within the first two weeks of her being there,
and that's part of why I moved back to Tennessee, it was to come back and help her.
And so, a lot of the songs off Canary were written while I was sitting in the nursing home, you know,
or in a hospital, in emergency room,
you know, working with her, and so
while Math is Hard, my first album was really about my experiences as a doctoral student,
Canary is really about my experiences, both taking… being a junior faculty,
there are some songs on there about education still, and about my first academic job.
And then a lot of it, like, there's a lot of things about lawsuits, right? And, uh, right?
And Stupid or Cruel comes from that. That was the… first song that I wrote,
and I wrote that the hour after I did my mother's deposition,
the deposition for my mother's wrongful death lawsuit, right?
And so, you know, I was in this conversation with lawyers, and
it was all in Zoom, because this was, you know, still during COVID times,
and um… they had asked me why I thought the nursing home abused my mother.
And of course, I don't know, you know, I mean, I don't care why they did it, you know?
You know, they shouldn't have. But all I could think about is misfeasance or malfeasance, right?
Like, is it misfeasance, you know, someone doing something because they don't know any better?
Or someone doing something because they don't care, you know?
And those are sort of the binary opposites of why something like
nursing home abuse and neglect even occurs, you know?
And of course, the issue is very complex, and it's about,
you know, training and capacity and how well the floor is staffed, and, you know,
and the fragility of my mother, and how complex health conditions can be,
and, you know, it's just a really tough situation. But I was still just a girl who…
whose mother had been murdered, you know?
And so that… the song, Stupid or Cruel, comes from… my pain,
but it also comes from my joy, right? Like, my mother was fierce.
We actually put on her tombstone: the strength of the bear and the stubbornness of the donkey.
And boy, is that true. Like, I say that those are two qualities
that I definitely got from my mother.
And I'm proud of that, right? And so, um, you know,
she would have loved the song, right?
And so that Stupid or Cruel as a song became… that's the only live-action video that I have done.
I made some videos using AI for all the songs on the record,
but Stupid or Cruel, I actually shot a live-action video
Um, I got borrowed equipment from the United Cerebral Palsy Exchange,
which runs an equipment exchange here in Nashville for durable medical equipment.
And then my band, of course, supported me, and, um, the video features me...
I got couture hospital gowns made, like, I really had a friend of mine that's a designer, like,
cut up hospital gowns and make a hospital gown from torn-up shreds.
And we made it all stylish with, like, the little… normally your butt's showing, and we moved the slit to the side, right?
So I do have, like, these cool couture hospital gowns, one made out of rags of different colors,
and one in black, and so I'm kind of going back and forth between those.
I had a friend of mine make an aluminum throne out of crutches.
These were old crutches, right? from the equipment exchange,
and he repurposed them into the aluminum throne,
which was from the Game of Thrones, which had a throne made of swords
that came from soldiers that had fallen in battle and melded by dragon's breath, right?
Well, my aluminum throne is made of crutches that were, you know, let go by various people with disabilities over the years,
and I repurposed those, you know, into the aluminum throne.
And so the video kind of juxtaposes
me in a power position, singing from this throne.
And then me in a hospital bed, in a Hoyer lift,
and, you know, struggling to do the things that I witnessed my mother struggling to do.
Like, get help to brush her teeth, right? Like, nobody brushed her teeth.
If I wasn't there to do it, I don't know what would have happened, you know?
And, you know, and it was very hard to transfer her out, so she spent too much time in bed, right? Because
they only had one Hoyer lift, and that wasn't enough staff to move her, you know, safely.
And, you know, like, these are such common problems, and toileting, right?
Toileting will… ruin a facility, right? Like, if that facility can't manage eating and toileting of their residents,
then they're in trouble. And so many of the world's nursing homes struggle to manage
feeding and toileting. Right? And so all of that complexity, again,
I boiled down into this song called Stupid or Cruel.
And, you know, and try to, as an artist, depict the complexity of that
through this music video and this song,
and I'm also making a zine that will be released in Volume 7 of the Creating Change Journal
that will include, like, my mother made tips, right? And she would always say...
Like, I definitely get my social worker. She was not a social worker, she worked at Walmart,
as a cashier most of her life.
Um, but… she would always want to make things better, right?
And so I definitely got that from her, and she would even… she would say things.
Cindy - she called me Cindy, but please, no one else do.
She wouldn't say, Cindy, write this down. She was like, this is a tip that everyone in these homes should know.
And I was like, okay, right? And she would say things like,
You have to make sure to have a friend that will look at your butt.
[Laughs.]
I mean, like, some of this sort of ridiculous advice,
but it made so much sense to a woman that was literally dying from a bed sore that had been neglected,
you know, on her butt, right? And if someone had looked at that sooner and had raised the red flags,
then it might not have went septic, right?
And so, just, again, my mother was,
even though she didn't have the college education, you know, she never did arts or anything like that.
but that essence of her… I like to think I'm still… honoring that and carrying it forward,
through the album Canary and through the work that I do.
And just trying to make everything better when I leave.
No matter how… how bad my experiences may be,
I'm gonna do what it takes to make sure that the next person has a little bit better of an experience.
[Diane:] Well, we share one thing in being in an organization
that is using music as disability rights activism, basically,
and present the work of many, many artists with disabilities,
and it's called Recording Artists and Music Professionals with Disabilities, RAMPD.
And we are both part of this organization, which is how I know you work, right? It's really thanks to RAMPD.
[Cynthia:] Yes, RAMPD is great for that.
[Diane:] And not only does it connect people between them, but it also provides us, like, some,
some ways to meet and to share our work.
And I am curious to hear how you arrived to RAMPD.
[Cynthia:] I originally found out about RAMPD while I was watching the Wavy Awards,
which is out of New York, and they are an alternative awards program for
LGBTQ, BIPOC, and disabled artists, and they, um… I was watching this show just in tears
over all of the wonderful, amazing disabled artists that were there, and they were being centered,
and they were performing on the stage, and they were receiving awards, and
I was just like, where did they find all of these disabled artists, right?
Because I had no idea that this many people existed.
And so, I started Googling, right, and I was, like, searching all of the artists that were featured on the Wavy Awards.
And I ended up finding… it was actually DJ Pastor Rock, or Reverend Chris,
and I found him, and then that led me to Lachi, who is the creator or the co-creator of RAMPD,
and as soon as I saw that website, I was like, oh, let me join this, right? Like, these are my people.
And I had never really felt that sort of connection. Like, I… I mean, I love my Nashville peeps,
I love my Richmond peeps, you know, like.
It's not like I've been outcast from music communities.
But I never really, truly felt like I belonged, like, these are my people doing my art that get me.
And I found that in RAMPD, and I just was going through these profiles of all of these great artists,
and, you know, it's just like, I definitely want to be a part of this. And, um, and so…
I am… I serve on the Public Relations Committee.
And, uh, we help to put out the newsletter and highlight different artists,
and so I serve on that committee.
And then I have been working with Lachi and Arthur to develop some new programs, potentially, for RAMPD,
because I am a social worker and a program developer, and a program evaluator, right?
And I've been providing non-profit consulting for 25 years, and so, you know, I do research, right?
And, like, those are expertise and skill sets that Lachi was like, oh, let me figure out how to utilize this, you know?
Like, we want you for your art and this other stuff.
And, uh, you know, and so we're figuring out how to use that.
One way is, um, I started a program called Disabled to the Front.
And that operates here in Nashville. And it is a play on an old Riot Girl term, which was Girls to the Front.
And, uh, we would say girls to the front. At that time, it was very unsafe for women and girls
to be in nightlife and in music venues, right, and through… whether it was mosh mosh pits
or sexual assault, or, you know, just, you know, just wasn't really safe.
And so, the Girls to the Front movement fought to create environments that were safe for women to be at the front, on the stage,
and in the front of the crowd, right? And so, I kind of took a play on that and created Disabled to the Front,
which is focusing on getting disabled people on those stages, and disabled people to the front of the audience.
Oftentimes, as a person with disabilities, you end up in the back or along the sides of the venue,
and so I don't know how many times I've watched a show where all I can see are people's rear ends, you know,
because they gave me seating, but it was behind everybody else, you know?
And I'm like, wait, what did I pay for this ticket price for? You know?
Um, and so, um, I've wanted to kind of start that effort to bring attention to that.
And I met… Nashville has a Nightmare, right? And I met the Nightmare.
Nightmares exist in, I believe it's, like, 13 or 15 cities in the U.S. right now,
and I believe there's a couple of other countries around the world that may have them, too.
But there are for cities that have a significant amount of nightlife.
Right? To the point that nightlife becomes a culture and a critical component of their community.
And so, the Nightmare here in Nashville really welcomed me with open arms
when I said, hey, people with disabilities aren't really getting the access that they deserve to nightlife.
And he was like, you know what? You're right. He was like, why don't we start an advisory group on that?
And, uh, and so, yeah, like, I've had several venues, like Fifth and Broadway here in Nashville, reached out,
and they are working with us to improve their accessibility and,
you know, the universe sent me the most amazing group of advisory council members.
And, you know, soon we're gonna have a newsletter launched, and you know, we're… it's a new effort,
but we are getting some things done for being a new effort.
And RAMPD is helping me to connect with other Nightmares in those other cities,
through RAMPD artists, right, to kind of spread the Disabled to the Front approach, right,
to those other cities, um, and that would be a new sort of effort for RAMPD to do something like that.
They normally focus on culture and awareness, and so we're kind of stumbling through
and figuring out how that's going to work out, um, you know, but I'm just… I feel so lucky
to be able to create this new will, right? And to be able to plan events
at these cool venues in Nashville, where normally people in wheelchairs, right, or deaf people, they would not feel comfortable
coming, they would not feel safe even coming to some of these
venues or events, and so… and I'm honored that they trust me enough that, you know, that they're gonna come, right?
And, um, you know, and that they're going to say, I'm gonna try going there,
because Dr. Cyn says it's safe, right? And, like, and it's fun.
And I want to go do that. And so I just feel so lucky that I'm in a position to be able to liaison
between the disabled community and the mayor's office and these venue owners
to try and improve and promote that access,
because it's hard to become an artist if you don't observe
and participate in art as an audience member, right?
And so, the Disabled to the Front effort is totally about getting disabled people in the audience,
and hopefully inspiring them to get on stage one day, right?
[Diane:] Yeah. We have so many things to share about that.
[Cynthia:] Oh yeah. We could talk a lot about that.
[Diane:] I have a question that is related to that, and you touched base to it a little bit, but
Um, I like this question because everybody has a different notion of
what it is to be involved in accessibility in the arts,
So, for you, what is it, and what is…
kind of a definition and, um, how… the way you see disability culture.
[Cynthia:] Oh, goodness. I mean, um… Now, it is about disability joy.
Right? And I am currently refusing to back off of that.
And, um, I grew up not knowing that I was autistic,
and my mother, with all of her strength of the bear and stubbornness of the donkey.
she knew I was autistic. I had IEPs, I was getting handwriting, you know, I was getting all of these services, you know.
But she never told me that I had autism. It was actually on her deathbed in 2019,
and we were watching a TV show about a kid with autism, and my mom said,
Cindy, you had that. And I was like, what do you mean, Mom? It doesn't go away.
You know? And uh… and I didn't really believe her at that time,
but it, you know, but my will started turning, I started thinking about it.
And then when I was cleaning out her house, I found… all of my old IEPs that she had kept all of these years, right?
You know, I mean, and so it's like she knew that she was going to have to tell me one day.
Um, you know, but it finally got out. But back then, it was hidden, right?
That was the normal thing to do in, um, you know, I was born in 75, you know,
and so it was the normal thing to do throughout the 70s and the 80s,
to hide your disability, and it wasn't something that you were going to be proud about.
And that's one of the main things that I love about Lachi, right?
It's like, she is just like, I am blind, this is my… this is part of my identity, right?
Like, there's no way that she could not claim that as part of her identity, and be authentic, and there is…
a bravery in that, that I really love and respect, right?
And that's part of what drew me to RAMPD, is all of these disabled artists that are…
wearing it on their sleeve, right? And they're willing to share that, and…
because there's actually a whole lot more disabled artists than you would ever know.
But they are hiding it, right? Um, and they are managing their invisible disabilities,
even to the point where they may be getting accommodations,
but they still keep that disability part covert.
Because they're afraid of discrimination, right? Or they're afraid that they would lose work, or lose respect,
and now, you know, we're at this trend where… and of course, people are being called "sickfluencers,"
or they're being shamed for sharing their stories on social media, and
you know, and I'm not gonna say that everything that's ever posted on social media is true, right?
Like, I'm not… I can't claim that.
But there are so many authentic people that are desperately just trying to share their story, right?
And, like, this is what my experiences are, and they may not be highlighted in
all the TV shows that you see in, you know, mainstream TV, or, you know, I mean, and so…
It is that, um, that voice from people that don't always get the microphone, right?
And, um, and that, to me, is what's important about disability culture and disability justice and disability joy,
and, you know, for so long, like, when I started Disabled to the Front, I had a friend of mine who was blind,
I was in, like, this empowered ladies group, and we were talking about things that I could do
with my massive skill set, right? Like, what can Dr. Cyn do?
And my friend just said, Cyn, we study disaster training,
we work on ways to get me to the doctor and back safely, we focus on housing.
She said, I just want to party!
She said, I just want to have fun, you know? I mean, and so I was like, oh.
I can do that, right? Like, that may be what I'm on this earth to do,
is to fight for disabled people's right to party,
and that doesn't mean I'm gonna back off of housing or healthcare, or
any of the other things that disabled people have a right to access.
But my particular personality and experiences has led me
to use all of my social capital and intellectual capital
to fight for disabled people's right to party,
and I just feel so purposeful in that, and there's so much joy in that.
And I just feel like the luckiest girl in the world. I'm living my dream, you know?
And my body may hurt, you know, from having these disabilities, and I may struggle with
some conditions and managing my sensitivities, and all of the things that come with being disabled.
But there is a joy that comes from surviving that process.
And now, through RAMPD, and I get to survive it with my comrades, right?
With other people that have lived that experience, too.
And their strength, and the numbers, right?
And, like, recently with Disabled to the Front, there were a group of us that went stomping down Broadway,
and I don't know if you've ever been to Nashville, but Broadway is,
um, it's a bit like Bourbon Street in New Orleans these days, right, where they just kind of close off the streets
and you can carry your drinks around from bars, and there's music and dancing.
All kinds of… all kinds of silliness, right? Um, rooftop bars, you know, and disabled people, right, it's not…
I mean, we're down there a lot. Like, if you go down there,
you see a lot of people with disabilities trying to experience that time.
And the mayor has done a lot of work to improve the sidewalk, the width of the sidewalk,
the levelness, right, so that people with mobility devices can get down there.
But it was so fun. Stomping through that crowd
with, like, two people in wheelchairs, two with walkers, two with a cane, right?
You know, I mean, and just being in that crowd
made me feel so good. Like, I was not alone, sitting in the back of a venue.
I had a group of people with me, and we were all dead set on having a good time.
Right? And that is how I'm gonna carry it forward.
[Diane:] Nice way of seeing it. I love it! I want to party, too!
[Cynthia:] Oh, well, come to Nashville, we're gonna have some parties. I'll plan some events in Toronto.
[Diane:] Well, I have a last question for you. And it's about
people who might have, uh, changed your perspective in the music you're making,
or motivated you to do something different.
If you have people to think of,
and it can be more than one, who would it be and why?
[Cynthia:] Well, um, I have to say, Kathleen Hanna, who is the singer from Bikini Kill and Le Tigre,
and she was the media-appointed head of the Riot Girl movement in the 90s, and
you know, and at the time, she did not have disabilities, you know, like,
you know, during the… at the peak of her career,
although she may be having another peek, right? But she got Lyme disease, right?
And so she deals with a lot of chronic fatigue,
and there's actually a documentary called The Punk Singer that goes into that and tells her story.
But she is now in her, goodness, late 50s, and is touring again.
And is, you know, and doing all the Riot Girl things that she used to do in the 90s,
and that is so inspiring to me, and,
you know, it was inspiring when I was younger, and it's inspiring now.
Um, you know, so I'm 50, right? You know, I mean, and, you know, some people would think, oh, that's too old to start a punk band,
and I'm like, no, that's exactly the perfect time to start a punk band, actually.
And it takes these older artists that are still out there just killing it, right?
You know, to motivate me to say, okay, well,
if she can do all of this with her chronic fatigue, then I can do this with my chronic fatigue,
and I'm just gonna find different ways of doing it, right?
I also love Lady Gaga. She has fibromyalgia and migraines, which are both conditions that I manage as well.
And, um, and she's got, uh, I think her documentary's called 5'2".
And it goes into her struggle with those conditions, and
you know, and I can really relate to how with a serious, complex migraine disorder.
Like, I can look perfectly fine, you know, totally invisible disabilities.
And then somebody can walk by me with perfume
and it can send me into a crumble pile of rags on the floor
where my brain just... electrical misfires take over
and shuts me down, you know,
of no control of my own, so don't ever wear perfume around me, right?
But little things like that, you know, they're just out of your control
when you have these health conditions, and you know, you're really dependent upon
the environment to help you sort of manage those, and um…
but watching Lady Gaga, because she's so active, right?
I've got mobility issues and stuff that she doesn't deal with on top of those conditions, but um…
But she gets so much done, right? She's so prolific, and she accomplishes so much
because she demands the right medical care and the right treatment, right, to be able to
manage those conditions, and of course, she's got money and a staff all around her that help her manage that.
Maybe one day I'll get that, I don't know, but right now, I'm thankful
for my friends and family that support me and help me, uh, you know,
manage my environment, you know, to be able to do that.
But I would have to say that those two are the biggest sort of inspirations
um, that motivate me to get out here and do this, you know?
[Diane:] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story,
and everything awesome that you're doing, we're gonna definitely
publish that on the ArtsAbly's website, and so that people can
find the zine, find your website, and have access to all that, too.
And, um, all the best for the single, right? That is getting out. And the whole album.
[Cynthia:] Yes, thank you so much, and if any disabled people come to Nashville, hit me up, let's party.
[Diane:] Well, thank you, have a great day.
[Cynthia:] Thank you so much.
♪ Closing theme music ♪