Kristin Hayter is a classically trained multi-instrumental musician who goes under the moniker Lingua Ignota (Latin for "unknown language"). She specifically chose this moniker because of her interest in glossolalia or ecstatic language, relating it the idea of a "possession" or God speaking through a body.
Her music is largely reflective of her experience as a survivor of domestic abuse. After escaping a toxic relationship, she took up reading multiple self help books aimed at battered women, and found that there were common themes of gentleness, self love, and taking up hobbies as coping mechanisms. She felt that these enforced patriarchal ideals and standards of femininity, and instead sought to explore the more unsavory aspects of survivor experiences as well as the dynamics of The Abuser vs The Battered, such as rage, despair, and the want for vengeance and retribution through her music. She did explore these aspects through academia, but she had this to say: “By the time I got to Brown, I think the work became too confrontational for academia and they didn’t like it very much. I actually wanted to get a Ph.D. and submitted some of the work that I did in graduate school and I didn’t get accepted anywhere.” It's worth noting her music draws many parallels to religion, and is also fueled by her psychology studies.
On stage, Lingua Ignota is known for its energetic and expressionistic live performances, and typically includes a keyboard with a "believe survivors" sticker and a video projection of violent, beautiful and biblical imagery. Hayter usually loses control of her body on stage, often hitting herself with objects and leaving bruises. Hayter describes her live performances as an "exorcism" in that, similar to her interest in Hildegard of Bingen's "Lingua Ignota" language given to her by God, she feels like a "conduit" with her performance flowing through her. She says, "I very much try to get to a place where [the performance] no longer feels like me, and where something else is moving through me, whether that's my abuser, or God, or something that can create a voice I wouldn't have myself." Repeatedly performing music about violence and surviving abusers is emotionally taxing on her, but Hayter says she is motivated when other survivors tell her how much her music deeply resonates with them.
Lingua Ignota / Kristin Hayter
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