A New Series: “Love Louder”
In the Editor’s Corner this week is Neema Avashia, writing about a new Salvation South series on Southerners who share their love for all God’s children in the loudest ways possible.
I don’t have to tell you that the volume on the negative narratives about Appalachia and the South is loud. New York Times and Netflix loud. The volume on hatred toward queer folks and immigrants and people of color in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia is legislature-loud.
And I don’t know how to get them to turn that volume down, because—let’s be honest—their narrative sells. It gets people elected, and it makes money. But it keeps us pitted against each other, which is exactly how folks in power want it to be.
And here’s the thing—culturally speaking, Southern folks are not ones to brag. They put their heads down, do good work, don’t expect recognition or reward for doing it. Being loud and proud about our work, or our love, isn’t really how most of us were raised.
But these are different times, and they require us to move in different ways. The quiet love for queer folks and Black folks and immigrants that lets you have them over for dinner, but doesn’t send you to the floor of the legislature to fight on their behalf? It’s not enough anymore. The quiet acknowledgement of good work isn’t enough either. Because we live in times where outsiders interpret silence as nonexistence. And where vulnerable communities at home feel silence as acquiescence to the violence directed at them.
In this moment, our home and the people who live here need us to be louder. They need us to make our love louder.
In this moment, our home, and the people who live here, need us to be louder. They need us to make our love louder. And that’s what this little corner at Salvation South seeks to do. To turn up the volume on love for the folks in our region who are fighting to make it a home for all of us. To make our resistance, our refusal to give up on our home, or the ability to feel belonging in this region, as visible and as vocal as we possibly can.
In this corner, we’re going to love louder. We’re going to challenge you to love louder, too. Because while we may not be able to shut down the negative narratives coming out of New York City, or coming out of our own legislatures, the one thing we sure as hell can do is make our volume so loud that you can’t hear the negative anymore.
So all you can hear is love.
Are There People or Organizations That Love Louder in Your Community?
Read “Love Louder” No. 2
As part of our “Love Louder” initiative, Neema Avashia interviews Rae Garringer about their groundbreaking oral history project celebrating LGBTQ+ lives in rural Appalachia.
Read “Love Louder” No. 1
The pandemic left communities in Eastern Kentucky fighting for survival and waiting on government responses that came too slowly, Misty Skaggs turned to the ancient principle of mutual aid.
About the author
Neema Avashia is the daughter of Indian immigrants and was born and raised in southern West Virginia. She has been an educator and activist in the Boston Public Schools since 2003, and was named a City of Boston Educator of the Year in 2013. Her first book, Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place, was published by West Virginia University Press in March 2022. It has been called “a timely collection that begins to fill the gap in literature focused mainly on the white male experience” by Ms. Magazine, and “a graceful exploration of identity, community, and contradictions,” by Scalawag. The book was named Best LGBTQ Memoir of 2022 by BookRiot, was one of the New York Public Library’s Best Books of 2022, and was a finalist for the New England Book Award, the Weatherford Award, and a Lambda Literary Award. She lives in Boston with her partner, Laura, and her daughter, Kahani.
- Neema Avashiahttps://www.salvationsouth.com/author/neema-avashia/
- Neema Avashiahttps://www.salvationsouth.com/author/neema-avashia/
- Neema Avashiahttps://www.salvationsouth.com/author/neema-avashia/
