Transtraterrestrial

A two part book reimagining dark matter and the dark

Transtraterrestrial is an experimental book that documents Sage Ni’Ja Whitson’s groundbreaking performance pieces, blending African Diasporic practices with innovative methodologies to explore themes of gender, sexuality, race, and spirit. Divided into two parts–The Unarrival Experiments and Counterproposals–the work delves into the mysteries of dark matter, dark energy, and Blackness through a Black, Queer, and Transembodied lens.

In the performances of The Unarrival Experiments, the audience is led on a cosmic journey guided by the space conductor, Trans Trappist the Extraterrestrial. This section of the book traverses the dark as both an ancestor and embodied transgender technology, asking profound questions: How do you perceive what cannot be seen? What if Blackness refuses to arrive, existing in the realm of the unarrival? Counterproposals delves into Yorùbá Cosmology, astrophysics, and the concept of the “blackest black,” to explore a Black Futurity where queerness and transness are celebrated and centered. The book includes a fusion of letters, poems, photographs, and speculative writings. Color images throughout the book invite readers into the immersive worlds of performance and installation, offering a rich, layered experience of Whitson’s unique artistic vision.

What others are saying:

“Part poetry, part performance, part pedagogy, part programmatic itinerary and protocol for living, Transtraterrestrial is a meditation about blackness, about created things, about the relation between the living and the departed. Unsettling form, playing with modes of address, experimenting with genres of writing and visuality, Ni’Ja Whitson asks readers to journey with them through questions of identity, gender and breath”.  ~Ashon Crawley, University of Virginia

“By asking readers to examine the text in varied ways—the two parts are read back to back, with covers for each on both sides of the book and meeting in the center—Whitson challenges traditional approaches to narrative and scholarly work… Whitson’s book is a tactile experience. It is a volume to be held and carried around, with writing that calls for physical movement by its audience.”  ~Library Journal