Hip-hop star Dessa on how stories, songs and performance can bridge divides

Dessa was still a child of three or four when she discovered a love of words. “My mother was reading to me, and it had the word ‘fortnight’ in it,” said the Minneapolis-based rapper, singer and writer. “I stopped her and asked her to explain, and she did. And I just remember a thrill, like the way in which I understand the world had changed by knowing a new term. I had no idea you could cut up time that way.”

In the decades since, Dessa has made waves around the world by harnessing the power of words to tell stories as a hip-hop artist, singer and writer. In telling her stories – and listening to the stories of others – Dessa has come to appreciate their power to bring people together, even across the kinds of political and social divides found in America today.

Finding that common ground – or even just being able to accept differences with grace – was a theme at her recent Finding Forward speaker event at the University of St. Thomas, which aims to help audiences find common ground in divisive times. Facilitated by Dr. Liz Wilkinson, Associate Professor of English at the University of St. Thomas and director of Luann Dummer Center for Women, Dessa shared her thought on how sharing personal stories and being vulnerable is an important step towards mutual understanding.

“All of us have exactly two portals to the world, which affords you a really small view of the known human world,” Dessa said. “The only way to expand that is to essentially trade stories with other travelers and say, what was it like for you? A story allows you to engage, to understand the stakes, and you can feel it playing on your heart strings.”

Finding connections through shared understanding – and creativity

Connectivity can be elusive between people who don’t use language in the same way, however. In addition to vocabulary, Dessa was also empowered when she learned about storytelling devices such as themes, story arcs and patterns. But she quickly realized that a person’s life experience can dramatically change a story’s meaning.

“A book like ‘The Giving Tree’ [by Shel Silverstein], kids like that because there’s sort of forward propelling excitement as the pages turn,” Dessa said. “What’s the formulaic thing that the tree loses next? It loses a leaf, it loses a branch.”

Dessa found her common language in the world of hip-hop, especially its energy, personal and emotive lyrics, and – maybe most importantly – its high volume of words. “It you’re trying to deliver an autobiographical vignette, that’s like a 14.5 minute folk song,” she joked. Joining Minneapolis’s Doomtree label, she has released five albums and toured globally.

Finding common ground – even when it’s uncomfortable

Just as Dessa has been able to use her art to tell stories of her own life, she has become more receptive to the stories others tell in their own ways. When she performs, she says, “this is an affidavit about what the world looks like through [my] portal. I can say, hey, here’s what moves me.”

When she hears something that makes her angry, or uncomfortable, she tries to take a step back and understand the speaker is doing the same thing. “What is it like to be in their shoes? What are the best, most generous ways that you could understand their viewpoint and engage in it every once in a while?” she said. “There will be things in dudes’ portals that I don’t know about. I’m trying to approach it in that way of a humble exchange.”

Sometimes, it gives her an opportunity to both educate and learn. In the world of hip-hop, she has met performers whom she enjoyed offstage, but was shocked by the violence and misogyny in their performance. “I’m a visitor in this world, right? Am I going to pop in and say, let me police all of hip hop culture?” Instead, she said, she has to find a way to tell them how they made her feel. “I don’t get to storm off. I have to have a blushing conversation where I say, I think you can rap really good — and that really hurt my feelings. That’s a lot harder.”

Even when common ground can’t be found, Dessa said, it’s sometimes enough to just be kind to the extent you can. Her example in this case was an older neighbor who expressed racist beliefs. She was angry and hurt. But when she learned he was dying, even though there was no moment of reconciliation, she helped him with errands.

“Sometimes it’s just unsatisfying, basic human decency that’s asked of you,” she said. “You don’t get a happy redemption. The credits don’t roll with strings.”

“For a long time we were so concerned that being nice was granting [someone] permission to be a jerk,” she said. But the alternative — in her metaphor, unsheathing the “flaming sword” to smite wrongdoers — has not been effective. “Nobody is invited to change their minds by being the recipient of pointed fingers and invective. Sometimes you can affect change and sometimes you can just be nice.”

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