At the end of last year my theatre show Burgerz, which I debuted in 2018, closed its UK tour after selling out the Southbank Centre.
Needless to say, I felt proud.
Not only had I worked hard to create a show that had been so well-received, but I did so against a backdrop of increasing transphobia and racism.
As a trans Black person, talking about these identities on a main stage in central London felt like a moment.
I promise this piece is not just about my work and achievement; it’s not an excuse for a humble brag – I have Twitter for that.
This is really about one particular response my show got and how we see achievement, especially when it is coming from marginalised people.
‘Travis Alabanza is the first Black trans person to sell out a show at Southbank Centre’, one reaction to my show read online.
I paused, feeling a bit uneasy, before I commented: ‘Thank you for this, but how do you know?’
I was genuinely intrigued as to how that person did the research to make such a statement. It turns out they hadn’t.
‘Well, I definitely haven’t seen another Black trans person reach that stage. I meant it as a celebration’, they replied.
I asked the person to edit the caption until they felt they could verify it. I knew in my heart this wouldn’t be possible to confirm – nor did I need it to be.
This was not the first time someone had tried to place the word ‘first’ next to the word ‘trans’ or ‘black’ and then my name without the research to support it. It’s always meant as a compliment, as if when something or someone is the first of their kind, it makes their achievements even more exciting.
For example, I have seen many articles boldly claiming that a couple were the first trans parents to start the process of surrogacy for a child. It was if the media were saying that the only way this could be seen as an event worth celebrating was because it had never been seen before.
The funny thing is, in this case, anyone who has experienced a queer, South London squat community event can tell you that trans parents and kids have existed much earlier than ‘they’ was made 2019’s word of the year.
‘First’, in this case, clearly meant the first you had heard about it.
My work exists within a history and a present – and therefore a future.
It seems every day on my timeline there is a new claim within our community of the first person to do something. Some, I am sure are true, others I wonder how we know.
It isn’t to say I don’t want to celebrate these triumphant achievements, but these moments should matter, regardless of whether they’re the first of their kind or not.
In fact, by claiming these are ‘firsts,’ rather than everyday occurrences, we sensationalise such incidents and take them away from the norm. They’re new, exciting, just happening, never been done before, which actually further isolates the experience.
I get why people from marginalised communities label things this way. When so much coverage of who we are is negative, these ‘firsts’, which are largely positive stories, serve to balance that narrative.
I also understand why it can seem like you are the first. When oppression affects employment, job progression, and representation it can often feel like you are the only one that has ever existed.
But what if something could be important, justified, matter – whether or not it is the first of its kind or not?
In my mind, claiming things are ‘first’ cannot be separated from capitalism. It makes it marketable, sellable – it builds whatever is being described’s importance. Using ‘first’ as a way to individualise, rather than create a community.
And in a more sinister way, it has been used throughout history to justify violence, erase histories and ignore other cultures. Lands have been taken from people and cultures erased by whiteness in the name of ‘firsts’.
We also need to acknowledge that when we say something is the first, we may well be wrong or, more often, it’s not as simple as that. History and documentation is complicated, particularly around identities that do not fit into white and cisgender lenses.
Often, marginalised identities have been removed from archives, or we’ve not had access to documentation and how we describe ourselves doesn’t fit into the neat categories offered to us by official records. This means our knowledge around who has come before us can often be more complicated to find.
It’s been a difficult process to have our lives reflected and recorded in historical accounts.
When we say something is first, what we really mean is the first we know about, or the first recorded in this way.
There are many reasons why the person who commented on my show may have felt that I was the first. But by rejecting that language and going away from temptation to claim that, I have found my work to be more meaningful.
It doesn’t matter if I was or wasn’t the first Black trans person to sell out a show at the Southbank Centre (side note: I’m sure I probably was not!).
The feeling of being first is the short buzz that capitalism and erasure sells us, but learning about the histories and communities that came before me and learning why they were not archived in the same way has tied me into the power of knowing I’m not the only one.
My work exists within a history and a present – and therefore a future. Because of the ones that came before me, my show will have a legacy long after the lights go out.
There may be a sense of achievement in being the first, but there is long standing power of connecting yourself to a lineage.
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source https://metro.co.uk/2020/02/10/why-does-every-achievement-have-to-be-a-first-to-matter-12205461/
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