Links to works mentioned and other resources:
The Power of Dance as Political Protest – Dance Magazine
Danza Azteca at Mariachi Plaza – Protest for #BLACKLIVEMATTER – YouTube
(SAD BOYS) (EXCERPT II) — MADBOOTS DANCE – YouTube
“Urban Tumbleweed” – Booking Dance 2020 – Vanessa Long Dance Co – YouTube
Aztec dance group uses art as activism in the wake of George Floyd’s death | KSTP.com
Ballez Company/Katy Pyle – YouTube
Dance as protest: 10 interesting works (danceinforma.com)
One Night Only: The Best of Broadway – NBC.com
Hundreds Of LGBTQ People Held A Dance Party Protest Outside Ivanka Trump’s Home | HuffPost
Detroit protesters dance to deal with the ‘trauma’ in downtown streets – mlive.com
Transcript:
It might be said that the creative arts are driven from the desire to make somebody feel something. Whether the artist intended for their work to make the viewer feel a certain way or whether they simply created it based on how they felt, art can still be a communicative experience. Art asks us to relate to it. To understand the message, to empathize, to be angry, to take action, to be compassionate. Though not a new idea, activism within the artistic dance community is thriving topic of discussion. Any sort of activism asks someone to feel compassion for the cause and act on it. Radical activism, as it is termed, employs the use of “nonviolent communication.” Dance as a form of activism seeks to communicate experiences and ideas often without vocal language in a way that is impactful and effective in protesting.
People move based on the desire to express. Dance therapist Rheba Vetter writes that “creative movement can be used as a process of uncovering and describing one’s lived experience through motion. Motions of the body provide a medium for the individual to connect with life in a personally meaningful manner…As a means of expression, creative movement enables transcendence of one’s inner being to an ‘other world.’ This ‘other world’ of deeply stored perceptions meets the immediate kinesthetic responses of movement.”
Our bodies move according to how our experiences have shaped us. Our movements are driven from our purpose to express. Dance and movement acts as the language to encompass ideas and emotions all at once in ways that can be universally understood with no need to translate or use the spoken word.
Bishop of Episcopal Church Katherine Schori says that our bodies are God’s blessing. God meets our bodily needs, so that we may use our bodies as tools for working towards justice and peace. In dance activism, the body is the medium through which discontent or sorrow may be expressed. The dancers themselves are working towards justice when they use dance as protest, and they are encouraging others to do the same.
Protesting through dance must have been around since human beings first danced around fires at night in defiance of the creatures seeking to take from them the same vitality that moved their feet. Perhaps better known is the Cakewalk dance of the African American slaves, who would dance in a way that mocked the white slave owners.
In the early 20th century, as modern dance was beginning to form into its own style from self-expression dance, African American dancers began to protest that they were not allowed to dance on white stages. If they were allowed, it was only because they were passing or lighter skinned, and they still were not allowed to perform original works. In defiance of this, dancers like Hemsley Winfield and Edna Guy created their own dance concerts just for African American dancers to perform their own works that were true to their self-expression. In 1945, Pearl Primus performed a solo to Lewis Allan’s poem “Strange Fruit,” protesting the horror of the Jim Crowe south.
But dance has not just been used to protest racial injustice. More recently, the art form has been used to protest many different forms of inequality and injustice.
In 2015, Madboots Dance performed a piece entitled Sad Boys which showed the cruelty of bullying and how people can allow bullying without even realizing it. The piece asks for people to not remain silent when they see another being treated wrongly.
Even environmental concerns are not forgotten. 2016 work Urban Tumbleweed from the Vanessa Long Dance Company focused on the plastic waste problem and called on business leaders and government figures to do something about the issue.
There has also been protest within the dance community itself. Gendered roles in ballet are becoming a thing of the past. Chase Johnsey who self-identifies as gender fluid and as a ballerina says that “an essential part of queerness is fluidity — between identities, expectations, definitions and that word no one likes, labels. And what is dance if not fluid?”
Katy Pyle, owner of the Ballez Dance Company, explores using the inversion and absence of gender within traditionally gendered ballets and in creating new pieces for their company. “Sleeping Beauty & the Beast,” is a ballet created by Pyle and their dancers that was performed in 2016. While it plays off characters from the two fairy stories, the first act of the ballet also focuses on union strikes in 1893, while the second act focuses on lesbian activism in 1993. The story is loosely based on Leslie Feinberg’s life, with the character of Beast representative of Feinberg.
Using dance in activism already transcends beyond just the artistic dance stage though. In recent years, people have taken to the streets to use dance as peaceful protest.
In 2017, members of the LGBTQ+ community held a dance party outside of Ivanka Trump’s house to encourage her to speak out against her father’s injustices when she claimed to be a supporter of the LGBTQ+ community.
In June of 2020, members of a Native American band in Mishawaka, led protestors in a traditional round dance before a statue of Christopher Columbus to call for its removal and promote education of true history.
In the same month, an Aztec dance group performed in the middle of peaceful protests surrounding the death of George Floyd. They said that their dance was to “bring Aztec culture and tradition to the masses, to help heal a hurting community.” Through their dance, the brought their support to the issue and sought to bring healing to those affected.
In the same month, protesters in Detroit danced and sang to protest the police brutality. Leader of the protest Jah-T Headd said that “This is not a peaceful march but we do not come from violence. They brought the violence. The reason why we are not labeling ourselves as ‘peaceful’ is because we have power in them being afraid of us and they know that.” Just because there were not violent interactions between people when they used the dance as protest, did not mean that the dance was not impactful. They wanted people to see them embracing their culture and showing pride in it as a way to engender respect, compassion, and justice.
In response to the many instances of dance used in protest for racial inequality in 2020, Brenda Dixon-Gottschild wrote, “Expressing a range of emotions, dancing protesters challenge the rigidity of a phalanx of policemen, grimly or joyfully responding to the unyielding stance of authority. Dancing in defiance of systemic injustice is a liberating alternative to oppression and a dramatic, possibly game-changing, resource in the “undoing racism” tool kit.” The peaceful protest of dance can be just as loud and disruptive as any forms of protest.
Each year, the Broadway community comes together to raise money for the Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS cause. The 2020 Best of Broadway fundraiser focused on raising money for the Broadway community who has been affected by the shutdown of theaters. The money will go to help those struggling with buying groceries, medication, or paying medical expenses. The actors, singers, musicians, and dancers brought their craft to the screen for entertainment, but their intentions were to incite compassion in the viewers.
The dance movements, the performers, the costumes, or the setting might individually be the act of protest in the dances. Likewise, the intention or theme of the dance as a whole might be the act of protest. The compassion of the performers and creators for the issue and the compassion felt by the viewers is meant to change hearts and minds and inspire the enactment of change.
Salem Compassion 