Beadwork as a Decolonial Methodology in Social Media Research
Using beadwork and affective analyses my research engages joy in the social media storywork, pedagogy, and networks of Two-Spirit beaders. My PhD final project is a beaded kirivöö (traditional Estonian belt) which encodes hypertextual knowledge as a mnemonic practice of theoretical re-storying, and as a connection to space/place. It combines Estonian patterns and techniques learned from Indigenous artists in what is now known as Canada and the US. Celebrating beading as an Indigenous rhetoric of joy does not ignore histories of racialized and gendered settler colonial violence, but centers living Indigenous artists whose flourishing resists ongoing colonial violences.