iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

I just finished my second theoretical chapter! That means I have two core dissertation chapters down, and two more to go. It’s not perfect and still needs some more work, but I’m halfway done. Now I celebrate with cheesecake lol

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

The relationships between dancers is central, so that’s the part that excites me the most.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

I do most of the grounding work in my introduction and background chapter, so the densest chapters are still ahead of me. My dissertation explores how Black women cultivate sacred relationships with their own bodies, other dancers, and the divine through liturgical dance & pole dance.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

Thank you, but I’ll leave the reading to my committee. At this point, their perspective is the only one that matters.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

I just finished my rough draft of the first theoretical chapter of my dissertation!

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Yesterday, I received my final conference presentation acceptance! Catch me presenting in November at the annual meetings for the National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA), the American Anthropological Association (AAA), and American Academy of Religion (AAR).

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

Part of writing within Black feminist and womanist traditions is recognizing fiction as a source, alongside scholarly books and articles.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

I should be asleep but I’m up staring at my bookshelf, trying to figure out where to fit my favorite novels about Black women and the most recent novels I’ve read about Black women into my dissertation.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

I got my last grant/fellowship rejection today. That means I’ve been rejected from all 11 that I applied for. I take rejection as redirection though, and I’m shifting my energy now to applying for jobs for when I finish my PhD.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

It means even more now that my dad has passed and he was the one who filled in most of the information. I’ve been looking for a similar one and found this one on Amazon a few weeks ago. It was first published in 1998. They don’t make baby books like this anymore.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

My baby book is one of my most prized possessions because it feels like a love letter from my parents to me. In it, they tell me who they are, their hopes, dreams, and prayers for my life, and trace my growing up.

Yellow book with a little Black baby and the words “Baby’s Heritage” on the front

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

For my March Substack, I returned to Dr. Eddie Glaude, Jr.’s article “The Black Church Is Dead” and talk about how it’s still relevant. Also, as Black people leave the church, we need to think more energetically about what it means to create church at the pole studio, in the yoga class, etc.

open.substack.com

The Black Church is On Life Support

In 2010, Dr.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 31/03/2026

My latest book review for @sojo.net is out! “Who are the ancestors shaping our lives, churches, and nations? And what are they saying to us? These are the questions Rev. William H. Lamar IV invites us to reflect on in Ancestors.” sojo.net/sojoshare/Nz...

sojo.net

What Are Our ‘Ancestors’ Saying to Us?

AME pastor William H. Lamar IV writes about the ones who journey with us.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

I finished listening to “Kin” on my way to Duke’s Feminist Theory Workshop. Dr. Erica Edwards is currently talking about “Sula” in her keynote speech, and now I’m interested in what it would look like to read “Kin” and “Sula” together.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

Also, last night I worked on the part of my dissertation where I discuss why I’m interested in using Communion (the regular definitions and the sacrament) to think about my work and why the core chapters are named for phrases from both the communion liturgy and the communion scripture.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

However, I’m not the best person to conduct that research, and it might require discussing some things that intentionally go unnamed and unaddressed in Black church spaces.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

But the lines weren’t always as clearly defined. Just based off growing up in dance ministry spaces, I think mime becomes a space for queer religious expression.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

Mime (white face, white gloves, on a Black body) developed alongside dance ministries and in some ways got pushed as the more masculine form of expression in Black religious spaces. Women dance, and men mime.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

There are things that are related to my dissertation that I’ve decided will be included as interludes. One of them will briefly discuss mime, flags, and pageantry. They’re things that are related to dance ministry but warrant their own project.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

I don’t know how many words I’ve written today, but I currently have over 4,000 words of my dissertation written. Today I focused on the background of my project and my research sites.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

Tomorrow I am preaching on creating spaces of freedom while living under empire from the Gospel of Luke and the life of Fannie Lou Hamer.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 04/03/2026

To graduate in May, I need to have a complete draft of my dissertation by the end of January. I’m about to really be in the house until then.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 02/03/2026

This weekend, I shared on my PhD research at the AAR-Southeast Conference. My presentation was entitled “Sacred Rituals of Healing and Freedom: Liturgical Dance and Pole Dance in the U.S. South.” I am so excited for all of the forms that my research will take in the coming years!

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 22/02/2026

My first presentation on my PhD research went well! I’m glad it I was able to kick it off with an embodied workshop where I could bring my full self, the minister, the liturgical dance scholar, the liturgical dancer, and the pole dancer.

A pole in front of a screen that has the words “Fix Me Jesus” Pole Dance. In front are eight smiling Black women.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

That matters because she hasn’t always loved her body, but through pole, she’s learning to love her body. I so relate to that.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

Tonight the quote that made me tear up came from one of my pole dance friends. She talked about how she loves pole because she’s in a place where she gets to dance with people of al shapes and sizes.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 19/02/2026

I’ve realized that when I present on my PhD research, I have to practice at least once at home, not because I need the practice but because I’m sensitive and talking about Black women getting free and finding healing through dance makes me emotional. I get all my tears out when I practice at home.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 14/02/2026

I’m in my pole dancing to spirituals era. For my embodied workshop next Saturday, I’m ending with a pole dance to “Fix Me, Jesus.” Also, I just started my pole competition piece which pays homage to Alvin Ailey’s Revelations.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

I’m interested in what happens when we gather together in community and engage in rituals of remembrance. Communion is communal/relational, embodied, and spiritual/sacred, and so is pole dance.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

My current dissertation title is “Sacred Communions: Exploring Black Women’s Relationships through Dance.” Communion is a good term because it doesn’t have to be religious, but it is in the way that I use it. Communion also worked out better because I’m interested in relationships.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

I put that poem in the article I submitted on pole as a more liberating and alternative space to the Black Church for Black women and femmes, so hopefully they publish it. My family said baptism was doing too much though and was bordering on heresy, so I shifted to communion.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

When I started this project, I wrote a poem about a woman who goes to the altar to be baptized, except it’s not the altar but the pole studio, and she’s not baptized into Christianity but baptized into a journey that often includes a new name, a pole name.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

I’m in a new member’s class and they mentioned my dissertation title, except they don’t know they mentioned it because it’s one of the ordinances of this church (and most Baptist churches). I began with the idea of baptism and pole.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 11/02/2026

Also, all of these things are constantly buzzing around in my head as I do my research on liturgical (praise and worship) dance and pole dance.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 11/02/2026

I hope I can come back and tease out some of these thoughts when I’m done preparing for my February workshop and conference presentation. I am in the midst of reading about dance, Christianity, and repression in preparation for the workshop.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 11/02/2026

I have thoughts on how Western culture and Christianity have shaped some perceptions around dance. I have thoughts on who gets to determine which forms of dance are “appropriate.” I have thoughts on dance as a cultural and communal practice and ritual.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 11/02/2026

I’ve been thinking about the president’s post on Bad Bunny’s performance & how he named the dancing as “disgusting,” especially given young children were watching. I have thoughts on how the dancing bodies of people of color tend to be sexualized.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 06/02/2026

I’ve been thinking about genre in terms of my writing lately. I feel like the sweet spot for me is somewhere between creative nonfiction and scholarly article, but I have to figure out when to let the creative voice lead and when to let the scholarly voice lead.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/02/2026

It draws on the chapter of my dissertation that discusses kinship, community, and the relationships we develop in dance. For more info or to register, visit: bwsasymposium.vfairs.com

bwsasymposium.vfairs.com

We Hold the World Together

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/02/2026

On this first day of #BlackHistoryMonth, I’m excited to share that I’ll be presenting my research at the Black Women’s Studies Association Virtual Symposium. My presentation is entitled “ ‘I Feel Free”: Black Women, Dance, and the Labor of Care.” #BlackWomensStudies #Care #Dance

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 01/02/2026

I have spent the last two days just organizing my anthropology research notes. I have recorded voice notes, typed phone notes, journal notes, and a number of photos and videos. They all have to be labeled by date and location.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

Throughout the workshop, participants will be invited to participate in an embodied meditation, move through a spiritual dance exercise, and witness a pole dance.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

We’ll trace movement practices, from the ring shout to liturgical (praise and worship) dance to pole dance, as we interweave scholarly resources, oral histories, ethnography, and autoethnography.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

This workshop explores how dance forms practiced by Black Christian women in the United States have changed and evolved over time. We’ll reflect on their African roots, discuss the function of dance in the lives of Black Christian women today, and imagine Black Christian dance futures…

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 30/01/2026

For those in the NC Triangle area, I’ll be presenting on my PhD research for the first time in a few weeks at Duke University. I’ll be leading an embodied workshop entitled, “Fix Me Jesus: Blackness, Christianity, and Dance Through the Generations” at the Collegium of African Diaspora Dance.

cadd-online.org

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

I’m interested in how we might have a little church woman in us and a little blues woman in us, how we’re complex beings that don’t always fit easily into certain categories.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

Like the blues, pole dance becomes a space where Black women can embody sensual, sexual, and erotic freedom. While the blues women and the church women are often read in contrast, I think their contemporaries have more in common than we might realize.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

This is one of the histories that I think about in terms of my research. I’m interested in Black women who choose to participate in liturgical dance and pole dance in their leisure time and what it offers for them in terms of embodied freedom.

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Deirdre Jonese Austin @deirdrejonese.bsky.social · 24/01/2026

Blues music became a way for Black women to express themselves and free themselves from their daily conditions.

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