Transmission NYC

The non-for-profit organization Transmission NYC was created this year. The work that led to its birth started well before. 

In 2015, James Price, 53, father of three, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). His job was taken away from him and his wife decided to leave him. 

In March 2020 the Coronavirus closed international borders. James was in Cheltenham, England, and I was in Moscow. What ensued was a muted, long stretch into the unknown. I thought of James often as we all began to feel isolation, fear, exasperation, and loss of control. We were now stepping into James’s territory. To heal, I began the project Transmission NYC with James. 

Transmission NYC is an online platform that heals people living with MS. Life becomes inherently difficult when you are disabled. Every little physical movement can be debilitating notwithstanding the damage done to morale. It is the perspective of loneliness that Transmission NYC addresses. It is a presence that speaks and creates dialogue to those who have nowhere to turn. 

If selected as winner, Transmission NYC would rapidly develop as an international, modern, and creative support group that would include everyone effected by autoimmune diseases.

I am a multi-cultural polyglot. Not only do I see cultures and languages being saved but also, I see trends of new, morphing languages coming to be. Each language and culture are a unique thought process to express one point of view. The mixture of them all allows us to experience many different points of views from the same angle. My work has been fueled with the mediums of language, culture, and their politics.  

Transmission NYC was prompted by a desire to keep my ailing friend James alert and thoughtful at the start of the pandemic. Fearing the worst, I quite frequently thought the unthinkable. In-kind, James was able to confine, create, and express himself. The daily correspondence between us opened doors for both of us. I then sent our entries to a few friends, who were given instructions to read and record a letter, or a large part of one. What followed was that the dialogue between James and me developed into a conversation with the reader. James and I could hear ourselves better, through the voice of another. The disconnection of author from voice became a powerful realignment of perspective, offering the ability to truly listen.

There are approximately 2.3 million people worldwide affected by MS. Half of them are in the United States. The existing MS support groups do not speak to everyone with MS. In some cases, it is worse. The groups segregate too harshly. It can isolate the very people who need support.  Currently, with Covid-19, everyone is alone. There is no future date for them or others in a similar predicament. 

Harvard Medical School has reported that an increasing number of Americans have a blood abnormality that indicates autoimmunity, where the immune system has created antibodies that could work against the body's own cells. Those with autoimmune diseases such as MS are more vulnerable to severe cases of Covid-19. Transmission NYC engages the MS community, as well as all of us, bridging the various cultures, of language, ancestry, and disability. 

Transmission NYC is an online platform that heals people living with MS through live dialogues. Anyone will be able to log in, listen in, participate, and connect. The organization wants to be the center of tolerance and understanding for people living with MS. This includes the carriers of MS just as much as their healthy counterparts. 

Transmission NYC is live, continuous, therapeutic communication. It generates and creates new conversations with a growing dialogue. 

Transmission NYC allows for text or audio excerpts to be uploaded and transcribed onto its web platform. The transcriptions, selected and read by participants, can choose to read selected parts of the transcription in any order desired. Once an author and reader choose their respective entries, they connect and can view each other’s entries. In many instances, one entry will be ready multiple times by different readers. 

The delivery of the audio recordings is organized through software, designed so that readers can communicate with each other, infinitely creating new narratives. All readers, times the sum of all the parts, will create thousands of ways to express themselves in Transmission NYC. The thought process behind each soundbite varies. Its course will answer why the different routes are needed to arrive at the same destination. The linear delivery of the practice is perturbed. Through this process we are quite literally taken within earshot of the disruptive manner MS has on people. 

When Transmission NYC began, it was intended for an audience of one, to keep my friend alert. In several months, James and I wrote a 140-page novella entitled Transmission. Excerpts of the novella are regularly sent to participants. The reaction is overwhelmingly positive. The creativity warms people to each other. Together, they create the greater goal. This approach of support brings everyone together, not just people affected by MS. 

I contacted people that make an impact on society. Paul Moakley, the editor at large at Time Magazine and James Wellford senior editor at Nat Geo feature on our board of directors. They have ample experience on the human condition. I am equally consulting with David Moinina Sengeh, a TED senior fellow, on his impact on society following his prosthetic limbs developed at MIT. With David, we are exploring programed communication as a tool for healing. 

In the next several weeks, I will travel to different MS societies in France, Belgium, Switzerland and Russia to further the project in different languages. Through technology and communication, Transmission NYC is becoming the support portal of the future. It does not discriminate disabilities and welcomes everyone to be a part of a brighter future.