Snap Snap Snap
The tiny ways we affirm each other
I recently attended a lovely talk and literary reading. And after a particularly powerful passage, the audience sighed a big sigh of recognition (you know that feeling, right?) and then a number of people broke out into snaps.
Snap snap snap. Snap snap snap.
The sound rose up quickly, then it faded just as fast.
Snapping is a lovely, clicking sound that’s much subtler than a clap or holler. Snapping as a loving gesture seems to have its roots in poetry readings and slams, but I hear it outside poetry circles too now.
A snap doesn’t take up aural space, it doesn’t disrupt, but it makes its presence known, and quite subtly. This is not the snap-snap that calls the waiter (“hey! garçon!”), it’s the snap-snap that says, “I feel you. You’re speaking my truth. Say more.”
The snap is the Twitter fav before there were Twitter favs, it’s the like before Facebook could like, the little heart that floats up on a great Tumblr post. It’s the clickity-click of moral support. It’s a micro gesture of affirmation. It’s a microaffirmation.
Writing about microaggressions in the work place, MIT economist Mary Rowe pointed out that there’s a way to reduce their effects: microaffirmations. Rowe defined microaffirmations as small acts that “occur wherever people wish to help others to succeed.”
Just like microaggressions, they don’t look like much, but they still matter. Their effect is cumulative, and that effect can be social: like microaggressions, people learn from their environments and learn from each other.
Over time, lots of tiny messages of affirmation can make a difference.
Jeff Chang, author of the new book Who We Be, said something recently in The Huffington Post that stuck with me:
There was an article on Medium this week about “the nod” — I remember in college I would hang out with a lot of black activists and I would notice that every time they passed another black student on campus they’d nod, and I’d go, “Oh, do you know them? Who’s that? I see them around all the time.” And they’d go, “I actually don’t know.” I’d ask “So why do you do that?” and they’d say “Well, you do. You just do it.” Or when someone is on stage and they’re performing and someone in the audience goes “I see you!” I’d always think about those kinds of cultural practices as being critical to solidarity-building.
The Nod is a tiny affirmation, too. It’s a moment of recognition and good will. As Musa Okwonga, author of that Medium post, described it, the Nod says “More power to you, and all the very best.” It’s a great example.
This past summer, I spoke about microaffirmations in the context of activism and the internet, and for a while now I’ve been paying close attention to how these little actions manifest in daily life. Once I started looking, I started seeing them everywhere.
Emotional, positive sighs. Mmmmm.
A friendly smile.
A thumbs up.
A quick hug.
A short “I love you” to a friend before parting ways.
The Nod.
Snaps of approbation. Natch.
And there are the microaffirmations of our online lives too. They are no less powerful when use effectively, and they extend the power of affirmation across geography and time.
A star, a fav, a like. What you did just now? That was great.
Strategically-placed emoji. ❤☺
Tagging a friend in a photo they’re not in. A way to say I miss you.
A short “You’re awesome!” Tweet. Even better if it’s for no real reason.
Sharing a nice article they wrote. Not a hint, I swear ;)
Changing your photo icon to show solidarity. Your movement matters to me.
A hashtag of support.
I’m sure there are many, many others we can think of.
The world is full of microaggressions. When the word took hold in recent years, there were looks of recognition across the web. Microaggression theory, coined by Chester M. Pierce in the 1970s in the US, is touching us again in the 2010s, and maybe globally.
We have a word for these tiny acts of inequality, and in making a word, we can more easily identify them and their effects. We can more easily create metaphors to help people understand, to help each other understand.
Little words matter. Little gestures matter. Tiny inequalities matter. That’s what microaggression theory teaches us.
If the theory stopped there, it might be overwhelming. How do you stop microaggressions? How do you stop the ache? So many microaggressions are unconscious and unintended. You can call them out, but there’s always another one, there’s always another reminder.
But just as we have a word for the ways we hurt each other, we have a word for the tiny kindnesses that lift each other up. There is a yin to the yang. And the more I look, the more I see a world filled with lovely microaffirmations. Some of the closest knit, most effective groups do it.
We send these microaffirmations in so many little ways, so quickly and ephemerally that we don’t always think about them. But they are always there. And, like Chang said, they’re a key part of building solidarity. The work of social change can start with the tiny changes in our hearts and minds.
Little actions like the snap or the Nod are tiny moments of recognition, tiny acts of understanding that can help restore balance to the Force (of inequality). They, too, can accumulate over time. They don’t change the world, no, but maybe they change our world.
Snap-snap. Nod. Mmmm. ❤. You’re awesome. #YourLifeMatters.
Microaffirmations never seem like much by themselves, but then you hear them, you see them, you feel them quiver in your heart. And that’s when you know.
Snap snap snap. Snap snap snap.
“I feel you, friend. I get you. You’re not alone.”
