This critical support paper outlines a background, as well as the theoretical and methodological considerations for my thesis performance, Inside Game. The title is taken from a common phrase used in capoeira as a creative, Brazilian martial art, and resistance form: one needs to have a good "inside game" by not backing away from one’s opponent, but instead by staying as physically close to them as possible. I borrowed this phrase to represent a capoeira value along with a reference to the 'inside game' of my own thoughts and personal history represented in this project. Capoeira provides the movement, musical, and ideological influence of this project, while I, as a CODA (Child Of Deaf Adults) share my personal history, that is, how I’ve come to interact with, embrace, and story tell through capoeira. The performance piece itself includes four sections, or movements guided by thematic material (“Relational Power”, “Conflict without Submission/Resolution”, “Self Knowledge/Celebration”, and “Joy in Conflict”,) bookended by two poems in American Sign Language. I have found capoeira to be a useful vehicle for my personal explorations. In this MFA project I am identifying myself as a Western woman who practices capoeira, as capoeira is not native to my home country of Canada. Furthermore, I am identify myself as a white, cisgendered woman in my study. I also use the term, CODA (Child of Deaf Adults), to define my identity, as this shapes my view of and relationship to capoeira. It is through this lens that I have fallen in love with capoeira and allowed it to change me. This paper engages with post-structuralism and postcolonialism, specifically Foucault's articulation of power relations, along with feminist expansions on these ideas, and “Borderland Theory”, as developed by Anzaldua (1987). These theoretical considerations are then applied to capoeira ideologies and ways of knowing, (specifically the capoeira concept of malicia) and how these concepts aid in the understanding and expression of marginalization and gendered violence experienced amongst Western women. This project explores what it personally means to be powerful on an individual level, and yet continue to be powerless in a society that treats femininity as “less than”. This project also engages with my own struggle with sexual assault, marginalization through being a CODA, my white privilege, and the messiness of intersectionality. This project explores living with, and not ‘solving’ oppressive and traumatic experiences. My hope is that this project will provide an example of how to engage with societal ideologies on a personal level, and in doing so, shed light on the deep-rooted effects of trauma perpetuated by oppressive societal structures present in North America.