Elena’s project consists of creating a drag king workshop, addressed to any person regardless of their sex, gender identity or sexual orientation. It is a drag king workshop because inside drag practice it is still invisible and today there are a lack of spaces where you can find it. The goal of the project, from one side is to provide tools to learn to transform into drag king, empowering the participants through this learning process; and especially the lesbian collective. On the other side, it pursues a more general or global goal: generating a space of collective reflection about gender and power in society.
Elena was selected for the project “European Youth at the frontlines of active citizenship: A Roadmap towards a collective South-North-East-West Momentum” organized by Volunteers Centre Skopje and supported by European Commission due to Erasmus+ European Youth Together programme.
Who are you and what do you do?
– My name is Elena Ramírez, I’m 27 and was born in a little town near the sea in Malaga. Today I live in Barcelona. I work on applying philosophy through performance, aspiring to create spaces for social communication that nourish mutual understanding, helps the empowerment of minorities (in my case, the ‘lesbian’ collective), and mediates in society in order to build a collective philosophical thought about itself.
Explain your project.
– My project consists of creating a drag king workshop, addressed to any person regardless of their sex, gender identity or sexual orientation. It is a drag king workshop because inside drag practice it is still invisible and today there are a lack of spaces where you can find it. I think this lack of spaces is a very important matter, because in my experience, drag king has a strong potential of empowering the ‘dykes’ or ‘masculine’ woman, especially those who are lesbians, as me.
What is the goal of the workshop?
– The goal is twofold: on one side, to provide tools to learn to transform into drag king, empowering the participants through this learning process; especially the lesbian collective. On the other side, it pursues a more general or global goal: generating a space of collective reflection about gender and power in society.
To who is it addressed?
– To any person regardless of their sex, gender identity or sexual orientation. Nonetheless, as I said earlier, the biggest impact is on the lesbian community, since it is a community that is still invisible and needs to develop its own pride, and I feel the importance of contributing to create these spaces.
What impact do you think it will have?
– It has a big impact on the lesbian community, as I said above; and this impact generates a transformation that can later be reproduced in the participant’s lives and surroundings. But it also has a global impact, because it opens up a space for social dialogue and strength society’s capacity of auto transformation. The reality of women with ‘homosexual’ sexual orientation can, I believe, expand the general thinking about sex, gender and power relations in society. It is not necessary to be a lesbian in order to include this reality in the general vision that an individual has of society and the power relations that are found on it, and I think this inclusion generates a very much needed transformation in collective thinking.
Something you may want to add?
– This workshop wants to set a beginning for new supporting nets of lesbian community in Barcelona, setting a solid base for further organization of activities around gender and lesbian community. For instance: more specialized workshops, with invited talks, art festivals… Furthermore, it can serve as an encounter space for all ‘lesbian’ realities in Barcelona that are related to drag king, of which I have personal knowledge, but which have never been properly registered or archived. I seek to solidify the lesbian community in Barcelona, make it visible and loud, and get a clearer and better representation of it.
Elena Ramírez