The CT performers will be unmuted. The goal is ‘perspective on incarceration and its human costs’

It took Tracy Shumaker years to muster the courage to write about her experiences serving a 25-year sentence in prison.

“I walked in so broken,” she said. “Literally, I was worthless. I was ashamed to even talk to my own parents. I didn’t have the courage, I didn’t have my pieces together as myself to do something like that.”

Shumaker will be among several formerly incarcerated writers performing their own spoken-word pieces before an audience at Hartford’s Christ Church Cathedral House in an event called “Unmuting.”

It’s being staged by the Justice Dance Performance Project in partnership with Capital Community College’s Hartford Heritage program, and is a revival of a piece that was first produced at Trinity College in 2022. Unmuting explores the effect of the arts in prison, utilizing movement, song and spoken word.

“The pandemic taught us to mute and unmute our voices online while we were in isolation. Unmuting is the perfect metaphor for allowing marginalized voices to speak,” said Judy Dworin, JDPP’s executive director.

The event also includes perspectives from people who grew up while their parents were in prison, and showcases pieces by writers who are still incarcerated.

“Community members that were returning citizens became voices for those that were still in prison,” said Dworin. “So it’s the idea of the connection of those that are still there with those that are out, becoming voices for seeing incarceration through a more personal lens.”

Shumaker knows from painful personal experience how long the journey to self-expression can be.

While at York Correctional Institution she attended many performances by other inmates facilitated by JDPP before being persuaded to try it herself. The first time she sat down to respond to a writing prompt at a workshop, Shumaker wrote just 13 words. She was supported to get up and perform those 13 words for the group.

“The feeling is so indescribable,” she said. “You have these women that come in here and say, ‘you guys got this. You guys got a voice. You guys are all beautiful people.’”

She calls it the first step in an evolution to reclaiming her self-worth.

“That first meeting, it wasn’t like I was the new person coming in. It was like I was a person they were missing,” she said. “They made me feel like I belonged from the get-go.”

It took her seven more years to reach the place where she could use her writing to talk about her abusive marriage, in a piece called “One moment, one bullet, two lives, his and mine.”

“It’s basically a very short spoken word about the domestic violence of my marriage. And it was powerful because I didn’t have to go and describe my marriage, which I wasn’t ready for yet. But it gave an insight of my crime,” she said.

She has since developed a new piece that delves further into intimate partner violence, called “Yet I Stayed.”

Dworin said it’s stories like this from formerly incarcerated people across Connecticut that endure and become staples of JDPP’s public performances.

“Even though it’s her story, it’s so many other people’s stories,” Dworin said. “It’s the universality of what’s being said that I think is one of the most impactful aspects of the performance.”

Shumaker was released in 2022, after serving more than 18 years of her sentence. She was able to take part in the Trinity College performance of Unmuting that year while a resident at a halfway house. “I was literally brand new coming out. It was emotional,” she said.

“One of the goals of the work is to keep in touch with those that we work with inside when they come out,” said Dworin.”The expectation is that coming out is going to be freedom. And then all of a sudden, when they get back, very often coming home is even harder than being in prison.”

She says one of her aims in curating shows like Unmuting is to give audience members who have no connection with the justice system a new perspective on incarceration and its human costs.

“The arts are an incredible vehicle for this kind of work,” she said.

Unmuting will be performed Feb 27 at Christ Church Cathedral House Community Room, 45 Church St in Hartford at 12:30 pm and 5:30 pm. Tickets are free.