Disrupting For Good: Another Nudge to Action

Last September, I wrote A Nudge to Action because September always feels like a fresh start after a summer of softer schedules, and I tend to have some restless, renewed energy that I’m ready to direct…somewhere. 

Today, I have a new word to share with you that comes with another inherent nudge to action. And as I dug into it this week to learn more, I think I also found what I’ve been searching for for a while now: how to articulate why these shifts in how we work that I’ve been writing about are so vital. 

The word is acuerpar.

This word is from Lorena Cabnal, an Indigenous activist from Guatemala, and it came to me through Leila Billing, via Ettie Bailey-King. (And here’s a neat article by Elena Coll about acuerpar and two other Latin American terms to introduce into our vocabulary.)

Acuerpar is a “central political term in the vocabulary of decolonial feminist resistance in Central America.”

It means “to embody, giving one’s body. The political act of showing up, physically, for the fight.”

Ettie says “Acuerpar is about political participation. It’s about recognizing: your problem is my problem.”

Elena writes, it’s “putting our bodies where our tweets are.”

It goes beyond solidarity. 

Where solidarity is a posture, acuerpar is a practice.

Is it just semantics? Maybe, but I don’t think so. 

Through these articles, I see a typical (white woman’s) journey into becoming aware of the world around her, maybe from a personal experience or maybe due to reading a Brene Brown book, leading to a purposeful cultivation of empathy. After a negative experience and/or soul-seeking, this may be reframed as saviourism, which may lead to dipping out, or, alternatively, moving deeper, to solidarity. And then I see acuepar as the next step as we move deeper still. 

Why acuepar has captured my imagination
Lorena writes, “Acuerpar [is the] personal and collective action of our bodies outraged at the injustices experienced by other bodies. It is about summoning ourselves to provide each other with political energy to resist and act against the multiple patriarchal, colonial, racist, and capitalist oppressions. […] It provides us with closeness and collective outrage but also revitalization and new strength, allowing us to regain joy without losing our outrage.”

Elena elaborates: “This political act of ‘embodiment’ serves two purposes: on one hand, it gives physicality to the fight, which gathers public attention and puts pressure on institutions. But it also brings us together and allows us to feel supported and understood. It allows us to gather strength from each other and regain some vigour to continue fighting, even when it feels like we have nothing else to give.”

I’ve written quite a bit here about shifting from charity to solidarity. And from saviourism to justice, and independence to interconnectedness, and buy-in to co-ownership, and a number of shifts that I think we need to make collectively as disruptors. 

I mean, maybe it’s semantics, but in the word acuerpar, I find a call to make sure these shifts are not just thought exercises but that we embody them as well. And where we have embodied them as postures, to now embody them as practices. 

And I also find a deeper why for all of these shifts:

Because this is a long game, and this is the only way to do this work sustainably and effectively. It’s burnout prevention.

Because this is a way to do this necessary work together with joy. We don’t have to be martyrs about it.

Because this gives us the strength to actually accomplish the changes we seek, not just go down as being on the right side of history.

What do you think? Have you heard this word before? Does it feel different than solidarity to you? How do you feel about differentiating between postures and practices? I’d love to hear from you.