The Archive of Refusal: Building Alternative Legacies

Sor Juana's works—her poems, her theological arguments, her letters—became an archive of her refusal and her vision. They persist, offering future generations proof that alternative ways of being were possible and chosen. For asexual and aromantic communities, building archives matters profoundly. When asexual and aromantic people share stories, contribute scholarship, create art, and document their lives, they build counter-archives to dominant narratives. These records become resources for younger asexual and aromantic people seeking to understand themselves, validate their experience, and imagine their futures. Sor Juana's archive told future women that female intellectual ambition was real, possible, and worthy. Contemporary asexual and aromantic archives—books, essays, social media communities, oral histories—serve similar functions: they assert that asexual and aromantic lives are real, diverse, meaningful, and worth recording. This concept emphasizes the ethical and political importance of asexual and aromantic people documenting and sharing their legacies. An archive of refusal becomes a gift to future generations: proof of alternative possibilities and permission to flourish beyond compulsory scripts.