Cinematic Arts Film Studies Ph.D. candidate Hannah Bonner was recently published in a special edition of South Central Review: #MeToo, Moving Forward

The following is an excerpt article, Performing in the Arches in the Present: Exploring Feminist Performance Art, The Politics of (In)Visibility, and the Archive of #MeToo and #TimesUp:

WHAT IS THE ONTOLOGY OF AN ARCHIVE THAT is (re)currently occurring in the present tense? On October 16th, 2017 my Facebook feed reverberated with the echo of "#MeToo" as countless friends electronically recorded (and, thus, digitally archived and curated) their experiences regarding gas lighting, sexual assault, rape, and/or sexual violence. In the wake of Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein's and actor Kevin Spacey's multiple accusations of rape, a global outpouring of individuals on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter brought the hashtag #MeToo (originally coined by Tarana Burke in 2006) again to the cultural fore. Subsequently, actresses and activists including Reese Witherspoon, America Ferrera, Tracee Ellis Ross, and Natalie Portman created the initiative #TimesUp whose epigraph states: "The clock has run out on sexual assault, harassment and inequality in the workplace. It's time to do something about it." In addition to persistently using these hashtags on social media, in interviews with Oprah Winfrey, and even at award ceremonies such as the 2018 Golden Globes, the coalition created their own type of performance art by crafting a "black out" to address systematic abuses of power. The "black out" asked individuals to wear all black in solidarity with the movement, photograph themselves in their black garb, and post to social media with the hashtag #MeToo and/or #TimesUp. One could also consider this movement, with its concurrent political and sartorial message, as not just a performance art, but a performance archive.