voice:: the marred throat

What does it mean to map out the terrain of a marred, diasporic body?
Of a body in distress, of one that holds memories of struggle, the forgotten, the unnamed?
Of the inherent trans-ness of voice that cannot be defined or contained? 

This is an exercise in voicing the sonic body, a collective assemblage of breath and sound, from the individual to the collective. 

—

“호흡이 소리이고, 소리가 호흡이다” 

“breath is sound/pansori, and sound/pansori is breath.” 

I was continually reminded of this in my lessons – the circularity of breath, of energy from within, never expelled but sounded. Of sound always residing in body, waiting to be let out. 

Body of voice, body of drum. 

I was told to find the core of my body, the core of my sound. It all lays in the danjeon, my teacher says,
“Can’t you feel where that is?” 

A diagram narrating the flow of gi, circular from the danjeon to the top of the head and back down. The danjeon is regulated by the governing vessel meridian (독맥), which controls the flow of yang/fire/heat from the base of the body, through the back, and the top of the lips; and the conception vessel meridian (임맥), which controls the flow of eum/water/cold from the base of the pelvis up the top of the body to the lower lip. Notice how both meet at two points of the body: at the danjeon, and at the lips. 

Producing sound, in the case of pansori, is a practice of charting out one’s body, of a feeling-through of the continuous flow of breath and energy. The practice relies on a breathing below the navel, also referred to as the danjeon in traditional corean medicine. This breathing pattern is the foundation of pansori, in which energy flows circularly from the danjeon, approximately three to five centimeters below one’s belly, to the breath of the lung to the breath of the heart. This continuous flow of gi requires one to empty one’s body in order to create sound from breath. By expelling the breath, the singer allows their energy to course through from the danjeon, clearing the way for sound to resonate from their body and beyond.

The danjeon is known to be a human’s origin and root, the source of
nourishment and energy for the entire channel of the body.

What happens when a diasporic body, disjointed from their danjeon, their land of root, attempts to map out their breath, their sound? 

명창 (master pansori singer) 민혜성 (Min Hyesung’s) etchings of the five main sounds embodied in pansori. 

  • danjeon, otherwise referred to as the “lower dantian,” refers to the middle place in the body where energy is stored. from 단(丹), meaning “heat, energy” and 전(田), meaning “field, ground"