YOUPHORIA: Multimodal Experience in Rave, Religion, and Personal Inquary Open Access

Abstract

This thesis examines how Black queer individuals use sensory experience to create meaningful, and at times spiritual, forms of life within Atlanta’s rave culture. Beginning from the question of how people excluded from, or inadequately included in, institutional religious spaces seek spiritual experience in secular ones, I argue that rave is not simply a site of escape or hedonism, but a space where sound, embodiment, memory, and collectivity generate alternative ways of knowing and belonging. Drawing on quare studies, sensory anthropology, and scholarship on Afro-diasporic ritual, I introduce YOUPHORIA as a concept for the Black queer possibility of finding genuine experience, self-expression, and collective joy in rave.

Methodologically, the project combines ethnomusicological and historical analysis, ethnographic fieldwork, and multimodal creative practice. It traces continuities between Afro-diasporic sonic ritual and contemporary rave culture, then grounds those connections in participant observation, autoethnographic reflection across Atlanta and London, and interviews with Black queer ravers in Atlanta. The project concludes with a mixtape and visual component that treat sound and creative practice not as supplements to analysis, but as analytic forms in themselves.

Ultimately, this thesis argues that Black queer rave participation functions as both an epistemological intervention and a practice of worldmaking, opening space for meaning, pleasure, and relationality beyond the limits of institutional life.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: Introduction — 1

1.1 A Brief History of Rave Culture — 2

1.2 Rave and Religion — 3

1.3 Researcher Positionality and Quare Studies — 5

1.4 Black and Brown Multisensoriality and Multimodality — 7

1.5 Chapter Outline and Project Specifications — 8

Chapter 2: Rave and Ritual: Afro-diasporic Sonic Lineages and Futures — 11

2.1 Church → Club — 11

2.2 Form, Sonic Lineages, and Acoustemology — 14

2.3 Affect, Sonic Inheritance, Dance, and Improvisation — 18

2.4 Invocation, Sonic Ritual, and Emplotted Affordance — 21

2.5 Towards a Transatlantic Futurism — 24

Chapter 3: TurNOIR: Temporality through Black Queer Participation in Atlanta’s Rave Culture, and A New Ritual Process — 26

3.1 Setting the Scene — 26

3.2 THE ANTICIPATION — Pregame — 32

3.3 CURATION — Setup — 36

3.4 THE MIND — Arrival — 41

3.5 THE BODY — The Dancefloor — 45

3.6 THE DARK — Obscurity — 48

3.7 MEMORY — Debrief — 51

3.8 CLOSING REMARK — Never Ending — 54

Chapter 4: Making a VIBE: Felt Applications in Multimodal Anthropology and Music Composition — 56

4.1 The Work in Praxis — 56

4.2 Method — 58

4.3 VIBE — 61

4.3.1 Prologue — 61

4.3.2 CULTURED — 62

4.3.2.1 TRACK NOTES — 62

4.3.2.2 VISUALS — 63

4.3.3 pre-ki — 65

4.3.3.1 TRACK NOTES — 65

4.3.3.2 VISUALS — 65

4.3.4 eat — 68

4.3.4.1 LYRICS — 68

4.3.4.2 TRACK NOTES — 69

4.3.5 safe to do so — 69

4.3.5.1 LYRICS — 69

4.3.5.2 TRACK NOTES — 70

4.3.6 otw — 71

4.3.6.1 TRACK NOTES — 71

4.3.6.2 VISUALS — 71

4.3.7 ISLAND — 72

4.3.7.1 LYRICS — 72

4.3.7.2 TRACK NOTES — 74

4.3.8 SWITCH — 74

4.3.8.1 LYRICS — 74

4.3.8.2 TRACK NOTES — 75

4.3.8.3 SLIDEDECK — 76

4.3.8.4 VISUALS — 80

4.3.9 smokin — 85

4.3.9.1 LYRICS — 85

4.3.9.2 TRACK NOTES — 86

4.3.10 dichotomy — 86

4.3.10.1 LYRICS — 86

4.3.10.2 TRACK NOTES — 87

4.3.11 GO!!! — 88

4.3.11.1 LYRICS — 88

4.3.11.2 TRACK NOTES — 89

4.4 AFTERWORD — 89

Chapter 5: Conclusion — 90

5.1 The Beginning — 90

5.2 On Epistemological Revolution — 90

5.3 On Collectivity — 92

5.4 Rave Anthropology and Ethics — 93

5.5 Unrepresentational Creation and Public Anthropology — 94

5.6 Limitations and Future Directions — 95

Bibliography — 97

About this Honors Thesis

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School	Emory College
Department	Anthropology
Degree	B.S.
Submission	Honors Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Anthropology, Cultural Religion, Philosophy of Black Studies
Keyword	Multimodality embodiment Sensory Anthropology Afro-diasporic sound Spirituality Atlanta Rave culture Black queer studies nightlife worldmaking
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Debra Vidali, Emory University
Committee Members	Devaka Premawardhana, Emory University Alix Chapman, Emory University Robert Paul, Emory University

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