We think of it as a physical object, a token or a medium used to facilitate exchange. I give you this, then you give me that. It is a barrier, a means of satisfaction, a connotation of value and worth.

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It’s the name we have given the pieces of paper you keep folded in your pocket, the electronic numbers in your bank account, the record of your transactions on the blockchain.

 

Money is currency, but dig a little deeper and you will discover the concept is about so much more than transaction. Currency signifies acceptance. It proclaims popular agreement. It transports information. It creates then dismantles laws. It creates then dismantles establishments.

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The word itself is built on the Latin currentia. It brings to mind a current, doesn’t it? A river that flows with purposeful ease. I imagine this is why we associate currency with something that circulates, because it acts like a river. It moves from one place to the next, from bank to bank, as it were.

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Step into the channel where you will find stories that regard currency as certainty, disbelief, and hunger. Here are stories that twist and dream and uncover. Here are ideas that animate instruction. Voices that resist convention. Tales that rewrite themselves. Grasp what you can. Let go of what no longer serves you. Welcome to the brink of currency.

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—Nina Lohman