Shibboleth

Nine times out of ten, a 548-foot long hairline crack in the floor of a historic building would be a major cause for concern. But in 2007, Colombian artist Doris Salcedo altered the floor of Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London, creating a temporary installation titled Shibboleth. The name of the artwork refers to a hegemonic test of nationality, whereby choosing a specific word or phrase can distinguish “outsiders,” because their first language makes it difficult to pronounce certain letters or words in the language of the country they have immigrated to. A shibboleth is a nativist test and profiling method used to dehumanize and rank the “other” as less than. It is significant of an “us versus them” mentality.

Salcedo is ambiguous about the process she employed to make the large crack in the floor, but fairly explicit in the meaning of her work, stating that: “It represents borders, the experience of immigrants, the experience of segregation, the experience of racial hatred. It is the experience of a Third World person coming into the heart of Europe. For example, the space which illegal immigrants occupy is a negative space. And so this piece is a negative space.”

Almost immediately after Trump’s second term began, the United States accelerated its enforcement of immigration, with a violent and chaotic profiling of individuals. Human beings are being singled out for how they look, speak or how their names appear on their identification documents. Masked ICE agents are haphazardly separating parents from children, sending them to harsh detention centers that resemble labor and concentration camps; or to foreign countries they are not even from. It is the largest detainment of immigrants in the history of the United States with no signs of slowing down.

The brutality exhibited by ICE has been well documented, and the outrage has been rightfully channeled through widespread condemnation and protests. Bigoted, white supremacist rhetoric is commonplace within the Trump administration. They use fear mongering and ignorant stereotypes about foreigners to galvanize support for their barbarous actions. But rather than being lured into the divisiveness that the administration seeks to stoke, a large faction of the collective culture resisting this detrimental ideology is choosing to respond with expressions of empathy and empowerment. The latter is making an impact in shaping public consciousness around ICE and the Trump regime’s callousness. The language of care and compassion is winning. Diverse signs of joy, love and unity are proliferating all across the nation.

The artistic experience invites plurality, as well as independence. Everyone approaches art with individual insights and perspectives. Coming together to view or create art entails an intricate sharing of personal qualities in an effort to make unifying connections with others. Art can make us aware of obstacles and pathways, and express forms of resiliency that challenge inhumanity. Salcedo’s Shibboleth is indicative of an act of cultural rebellion, by disrupting the traditional appearance and function of an architectural structure and shifting the way we interact with it in light of the transformation. It suggests that bold actions with an underlying message of care and compassion are effective modes of connectivity and raising awareness for reparative justice. We are seeing many accounts of such boldness with millions of diverse citizens gathering to express their concern and opposition to the dehumanization of immigrants and other marginalized and oppressed groups.