Bank of Hysteria, 2018.
In conceptualizing the Bank of Hysteria, we drew from feminist theory and thinkers like Audre Lorde, who in 1981 wrote: “Every woman has a well-stocked arsenal of anger potentially useful against those oppressions, personal and institutional, which brought that anger into being. Focused with precision it can become a powerful source of energy serving progress and change.” Considering how we might give form to this “arsenal of anger,” we played with the idea of offering women, femmes, and gender non-conforming folks “rage receipts” that would serve as a material representation of their anger. The idea of the receipt grew into the metaphor of “investment,” ultimately leading us to conceptualize the form of an ATM. In an early conversation about the project, our professor, Jill Miller, used the term “hysterical” in reference to the ways women’s anger is commonly dismissed. The social history of the term hysteria resonated with how we interpreted the need for this project. Bank of Hysteria was not only a feminist pun on a major banking establishment, but a way to connect our project to a larger discourse about the ways women, femmes, and gender non-conforming folks are systematically written off as “too emotional” to be taken seriously. By establishing a Bank of Hysteria, we sought to valorize that emotionality and use it, following Audre Lorde, as a means towards social change.
Malika Imhotep
Ph.D. African Diaspora Studies
Jessica Liu
B.A. Cognitive Science and Asian American/Asian Diaspora Studies, 2019
Becca Milman
B.A. Computer Science, 2017
Frances Thai
B.A. Computer Science, 2017
Phyllis Thai
B.A. Interdisciplinary Studies, 2018