Let’s talk about friendship!
When it comes to the occasionally complicated subject, Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman are pros.
Now, they’re exploring their bond in a new way with the memoirBig Friendship(out now).
Credit: Milan Zrnic; Elizabeth Spiridakis/Simon + Schuster
AMINATOU SOW:That’s a really good question.
It was interesting to realize that there was not a lot of robust research about adult friendships specifically.
Understanding that really started to make us understand why we were not finding the support that we needed.
Milan Zrnic
ANN FRIEDMAN:Wow.
How much time do you have?
One area where we had hoped to find research but didn’t is group dynamics and friendship.
Elizabeth Spiridakis/Simon + Schuster
Many of these questions are not something we could find research about.
That’s something we write about in the book.
Namely, that I would have fought a lot harder for a lot of friendships I was in.
Milan Zrnic
I wish I grew up in that world, but I did not grow up in that world.
How do you think friendship can be a tool to move conversations about political and social issues forward?
This is what I want my world to look like," and that is definitely political.
Jorge Riva
For most of us, it is also determined by these like factors in our world.
I do think that it’s less a tool than it is an opportunity.
That’s how I sort of see it.
Milan Zrnic
It’s often one that I have been surprised by.
That is where I get really excited about the potential in friendship.
That feels powerful to me, and it feels like there’s a lot of potential there.
Shine Theory has blown up into a huge thing.
How do you guys maintain your relationships with its original meaning?
Going back to your question about the political nature of friendship, Shine Theory is also very political.
We have tried to model what it is.
We maintain a website that is very clear about what it is.
We’re also really heartened that people who practice Shine Theory do that on their own.
Who wants something that is so significant to them to just be reduced to a marketing tool?
Would you guys mind sharing how you do navigate that throughout your friendship?
That’s often how the phrase comes up.
What I really hope people take from our chapter is that race is in the equation.
That’s very much wishful thinking.
Racial difference and the racism of the wider world is going to affect it.
If so, how?
SOW:I guess we’ll find out.
The truth is that we weren’t keeping anything from anyone.
Our friendship has always had a public component and a private component.
We really had to muddle through a lot of the stuff that was painful in our relationship.
The spoiler really is we’re still friends, we’re still very much big friends.
I think that’s the exercise most people are engaged in when they’re writing a memoir.
What do you hope readers take away from your novel?
SOW:I hope that people take away that friendship is really hard and rewarding.
And, to get permission to pick up the phone or email those people and talk about it.
