Here’s our video link: DANCERaction Project

DANCERaction Project

By Elizabeth Teh, Melvin Pang & Xuezhen Narayanan

Our project is based on the interaction with foreign workers at HealthServe which led us to the idea of doing a dance exchange culture for our final project. Using dance as our main platform for interaction, it allows us to exchange body movements through visuals rather than verbal communications. With dance, we get to use body gestures and body languages as our main form of communication. We get to know look at their bodies react and how they portray themselves in person. We compiled a series of videos ranging from our very first bonding game with the foreign workers, to a tour around their dormitories and to a short dance routine that we taught the foreign workers together with our classmates.

Through the videos, it displayed an overview of the night, showing how much fun and joy it was to be around the foreign workers which none of us would have thought it would have been this enjoyable. It was an amazing experience having to interact with these foreign workers to know about their life and all the hardships they put through just to earn a living.

1.Write a narrative of how your idea developed. (Begin by giving some response to the 1^st dance and games night)

Our professor, Ms Joan Marie Kelly, suggested foreign workers as our main topic for our final year project. Then in return, this experience gave the whole class a pleasant surprise as we get to know how wonderful these foreign workers actually are in view.

In the beginning, we were quite hesitant and unsure on what activities we will be doing with them. It all started when Prof Kelly prompted us about teaching a short dance routine to the foreign workers to break the ice before narrowing down into smaller groups. Fortunately, Melvin and Xuezhen have dance background thus we agreed to come up with a short dance routine to share with the foreign workers. And so, on our first visit, we conducted a dance session for the foreign workers and our classmates.

With the dance we did on our first visit, we were keen to find out more about our foreign workers’ dance culture. That was when we decided to venture further into dance for our project. Hence, we came up with the “DANCERaction” project. “DANCERaction” simply means, “We are DANCERs in action”, which also defines our main purpose of the project that is “a dance interaction”.

Fortunately for us, before we even started teaching the routine, we got the ball rolling with interactive games to hype everyone up. Thus, the teaching of the dance routine went really well.The foreign workers were filled with enthusiasm even though some were dancing for their first time, they gave it their all and put in 100% effort in following the steps without bothering about how they look and just wanted to have fun and enjoy themselves to the fullest. We ended the dance session with the whole group breaking up into 4 smaller groups to showcase what they have learnt. After which, we decided to do the Americans’ ‘Soul Train’, which was something new to all of us. We basically had to line up in rows of two with a partner on the opposite end and we had to dance freestyle across the room with any moves we could possibly think of at that very moment. It was really an unforgettable night!

Photo by Scott Nathaniel Lim

Before proceeding on with the idea for the final project, we reflected back on our first visit to HealthServe and realized that dance actually created our first interacting experience with the foreign workers. Thus, we wanted to know how they can express themselves in different genres of dance, such as Contemporary Dance and Hip Hop Dance as these genres were not showcased in their countries. We collaborated with the foreign workers and managed to have them to show us the types of dance they did in their countries for example, the Lungi Dance and the Hindu Dance.

 

2. What about our meet-ups and the conversations you had created the interest in the area you ended up researching? Use your documentation photos etc.to explain this process.

During our first meet-up, we played games and taught them dance, but we did not have much chance to actually have a proper conversation with them due to the limited amount of time. Thankfully, Prof Kelly decided to have more visits.

Photo by Scott Nathaniel Lim

For the second meet-up, Prof Kelly decided to bring our fellow foreign workers out to a nearby Indian cafeteria for us to have dinner with them. Bringing them out to dinner allowed us to understand more about them like their favourite food in the cafeteria. We took the initiatives to sit with the foreign workers for dinner and the outcome was remarkable. They are actually extremely open-minded and friendly. Some of them were willing to share about their families, their stay in Singapore and even their love relationships. With all the heart-to-heart talks, we got to appreciate about our daily life of living in Singapore. There were things that nobody will ever know unless we asked about it privately. What caught our attention was that they had to fork out about $16,000 for a year contract to work in Singapore. We were astonished by the amount as with what they earned each month, it is barely enough to support themselves here.

Most of them like how Singapore is safe and democratic. Interestingly, we found out that some of them used to dance back at their homeland during their leisure time. Therefore, we decided to incorporate a dance game into our final project where we get to exchange dance cultures with them. We hoped that they can have fun through games and also share with us their knowledge of dance. We went back to research on the different genres that they might not have tried before, such as hip hop, contemporary dance and locking dance.
3.Discuss your exchange with the foreign workers.

We have been to HealthServe for three times and each time we made new friends.

Photo By Elizabeth Teh

Elizabeth: On the first visit, I took the courage to step out of my comfort zone and interacted with Raman, one of the eldest foreign workers. He shared with me that he did not like dancing as he thinks he is old and inflexible. However, during the dance session, he showed great energy, trying his best to imitate the dance moves and most importantly, to have fun. During the break time, he shared with me about his daughter and her passion for Indian dance.

Melvin & Elizabeth: We also interacted with the youngest foreign worker, Habib. He was extremely outgoing and understanding towards his brothers. He mentioned that his work ends early most of the time. Thus he was able to be at HealthServe to set up before we arrive. On the second visit, we had dinner with Sadak. He shared with us about his family and his love relationship. He mentioned that he was unable to stay with us throughout for our future visits as his contract had ended and has to travel back to Bangladesh after that night.

Xuezhen: We decided to venture further, instead of teaching them our dance, we get them to show us some of their type of dance as well. Body contact is something which we will not even think about when it comes to foreign workers, but we were so glad to be given this chance to exchange something we have in common, body language. Thank you Prof Kelly for giving us inspirations to our project relating to body gestures.

4.How did you initially see the foreign workers? Did you even consider their experience before our meet-ups?

To be honest, working or communicating with foreign workers had never crossed our mind. When we heard about the project that required interacting with the foreign workers, we can’t help but wondered about the communication barrier we would have especially with all the negative impressions of them from our friends.

Hearing from word of mouth, we know that foreign workers are here to earn some income for their families back in their home country. We never thought about the process of them coming to Singapore would be tough, not adding on their accommodation yet. Frankly speaking, we do see them as less knowledgeable people coming to Singapore to work hard instead of smart. However, we always have the thought of going up to them to ask about their lives.

 

5.Along your journey what to, and when did you change your ideas/plans in response to what you learned/experienced or observed from contact with the foreign workers? Describe your response.

Before it all started, Elizabeth actually planned a few ice-breaking games to create a good start between the foreign workers and us. However, when we arrived at HealthServe, we did not expect the foreign workers to arrive at different timings due to their different jobs in different companies. Thus, the games were not carried out, however we managed to play impromptu games which surprised me to how excited the foreign workers were when they are playing the game. We felt satisfied being able to share the same environment and play games together.

After interacting with them on the first day, we realized that they were rather chatty and active even after a long day of work. They were eager to share their life stories and also excited to know about our life. We never knew how tough it was for them to even get to Singapore to work till Tim elaborated about their personal lives which we would never thought of asking.

We’ve learned that they are actually so much nicer than what we thought. The moment you speak to them, they are more than willing to share their life stories, and some are even willing to share about their family background. Making me feel so comfortable speaking to them and so welcomed when we visited them at their accommodation.

On the first day of our visit, Xuezhen and Melvin taught them a short dance routine whereby Melvin used his phone to play the music for the routine. It was when we were about to leave, that one of them came running to Melvin, asking if he had forgotten to take his phone and left it on the table. He was really grateful for his kind gratitude. In Singapore, once you misplaced your phone, 80% of the time, you wouldn’t get it back. That was when we realized that they have much more integrity than most Singaporeans even though they are struggling just to earn $400 a month for a living and to support their family.

 

6.What new knowledge did you gain from the interaction with the foreign workers and the action you took executing your project?

From the interaction with them, we have learnt that they love to express themselves verbally. When we tried our DANCERaction project, they were easily distracted by their surroundings especially when it was not their turn to dance. During the interview session on the dance genres they have tried, although they lackvocabularies, they tried their best to explain and elaborate their answers. One thing we like about them is that they are not afraid of being embarrassed by how they look while doing the routine. They gave their best even though certain moves were hard to follow.

 

7.What did you gain or what are the strengths/weaknesses/ differences & responses to learning that does not follow the conventional path of lecture/ tutorial and studio practice: learning by creating experiences beyond the classroom? a. how did you feel about creating a project where there was to clear path to follow–where you had to develop a unique path?

After creating the project “DANCERaction”, we felt like it was an accomplishment as we would never thought of communicating and sharing our thoughts with foreign workers. We appreciate their kindness and activeness towards us during our visits.

Being able to explore outside the classroom and coming out of our comfort zone were great opportunities for us to gain new experiences. Following the conventional way has its pros and cons, where we get to research on different styles of art and make things our way instead of using other artists’ work as reference. However, our ideas may not be shared extensively. We will not improve our knowledge of art without experiencing it ourselves.

The strength is that, the emotions and interactions with foreign workers are something we will never get to experience from a textbook or just by staying in the studio. Creating conversations and asking whatever questions we want to ask will not be easy if we do not take a step out to approach the foreign workers. Although, this whole process requiresa lot of time and effort, we are thankful that we were given an opportunity to communicate with them, knowing more about their life experiences.

We are grateful to have this experience to be able to interact with the foreign workers. Working on this project has widen our creativity as to how to make it interesting and impactful. It was definitely an amazing experience for us and hopefully it was the same for the foreign workers.