The worldbuilding wisdom of ballroom culture
Activist, healer, creator, and ballroom culture historian Twiggy Pucci Garçon talked with Loam Listen host, Amirio Freeman on this week’s episode about the richness and reimagining of family, relationship, and care in the queer divinity of ballroom culture.
An ecosystem of mutuality and joy, ballroom culture transforms and expands traditional notions of family, persisting today as a testament to the worldbuilding legacy of Black and Brown trans women — and a vivid reflection of what is possible beyond the violence of dominant structures and norms: celebration, affirmation, mutual care, and love.
“Ballroom is innately divine.” ~Twiggy Pucci Garçon
Created in 1920s and 30s Harlem by queer Black and Brown community, ballroom culture was a response to the widespread homophobia and transphobia of the time. It was a sacred space for exploration, affirmation, and celebration of gender, sexuality, and self — and has been ever since.
Ballroom culture blossomed through the ensuing decades and coincided — both in chronology and spirit — with the civil rights movement of the 1960s.
Crystal LaBeija was driven by her own experience of appropriation, whitewashing, and racism that had dominated the drag ball scene to create her own ball, and later the first house: the House of LaBeija. Soon after, hers was joined by the House of Xtravaganza, House of La Wong, House of Brooklyn Ladies, and the House of Dupree.
The first five houses were created by Black and Brown trans women: Crystal LaBeija, Dorian Corey, Avis Pendarvis, Angie Xtravaganza, and Duchess La Wong as house mothers, birthed the house ball community.
Today, the ballroom community has expanded from its origins on the East coast to a global community — disrupting and expanding notions of family and standing in stark contrast to the violence of racism, homophobia, and transphobia its members faced firsthand. These beloved communities have created joy, celebration, and culture. They have also saved countless lives — including that of Twiggy Pucci Garçon.
Raised in a traditional southern Black church community that attempted to diminish her femininity and expression, Twiggy found her way to ballroom. But spirituality has always been her grounding — showing up in every part of her life, and shaped by her commitment to service. Ballroom became her ministry.
“Spirituality is about seeing, feeling, experiencing being in your own divinity and being in alignment with that divinity,” she says. “And always knowing that you know that you know that you know that you are connected to some sort of higher power.”
Expressions of divinity take shape within ballroom culture as extravagant self expression, reinforcing the link between spirituality and self — and in relationship, as houses deepen and expand traditional understandings of family and community.
“This idea of chosen family, this idea of gay family…is around a group of people who choose one another. That choose to be support for each other, choose to care for one another, choose to affirm and celebrate one another,” says Twiggy. “There’s so much power in that idea of being part of a family unit that is not actually attached in this … almost obligatory way of blood or genealogy but that day by day, moment by moment, month by month, year by year, you choose each other.”
To listen to this vibrant conversation between Amirio and Tucci, click here.
