act normal by nancy viva davis halifax

Poems that evoke lives lost to our shared present, contesting normative claims that separate bodies into categories and institutions.

i might never be no-one that shiny / the beauty of a sequin'd self / what was stitched into heaven's drop

The poems in act normal use illegibility and wilful uncertainty to evade the grasp of the normative, as endured by those institutionalized by, and through, the concept of normalcy.

act normalstarts in an institution where children categorized and constructed as intellectually inferior are placed into custodial care. These poems are inquisitive, articulating the entanglements of lives across categories of difference particularly the lives of those who as children were considered to be other or less than human. Drawing upon conversations, archival materials, court cases, legislation, transcripts, and case histories, among other sources, nancy davis halifax's poems destabilize categories of meaning understanding disability and difference as "undecidability."

act normalis a movement of "feelingthought," unsettling normative expectations and inviting readers to re-orient from the normative task of assuming the safety of consensual interpretation, while risking, cherishing, and performing non-indifference. (From McGill-Queen's University Press)

nancy viva davis halifax is a poet and associate professor in critical disability studies in the Faculty of Health at York University. act normal is their second collection, after their 2015 book hook.