Jinker, 2023-24.

From the Dictionary of Newfoundland English: a Jinker is the perception of women as "pollutants on the water,”  jinxes, bad omens. 

Jinker is a multidisciplinary project of performance, installation, storytelling and collaboration devoted to expanding and illuminating more complex narratives around women’s* labour and lives. As Jinker, I create performances in communities in Newfoundland and Scotland.  They take place in grocery stores, fish processing plants and public streets.  I wear elaborate, handmade garments made from materials from the fishery.   Whether as part of a parade down the main street or in more private works, the performances are based on the stories, actions, lives, and labour of women in each location. Spoken word is mixed with the sounds of the workplace as well as the sounds of original, handmade instruments. 

Historically, Jinker is a Newfoundland term for the age-old patriarchal story blaming a woman for the world’s misery. In this project, I become the Jinker and ingest the poison of this one-dimensional story that is designed to flatten women’s experience into a single role and I transmute it into power. Embracing my identity as an outcast, I can express what others fear to say aloud. This happens via live performances, videos and installations, as well as with conversation and storytelling.  The transmutation of blame, fear and erasure into power is the engine of the project.

Jinker also uses collaboration as a medium, beginning with women in my Newfoundland community and moving outward to Scotland which also has a largely unacknowledged histories of women working in the on- and off-shore fisheries, in particular. I create space to listen to and document the multiplicity of their stories in each location and on a website (currently in development). 

* Jinker stands in for anyone who identifies as a woman.

The Jinker project has been funded, in part, by a project grant from ArtsNL.

Photo credit: Heather Nolan unless otherwise noted.