Empowering deaf and hearing people through African dance
- Country:
- Ghana
- Organisations involved:
- African Footprint International
- Synopsis:
-
"I knew that I needed something to attract people so that they would come and hear my message...it's passion, but also pressure that makes you create. Sometimes people create to survive" Kweku Addison, Founder, African Footprint International.
Kweku Addison started working life teaching IT at a mainstream school in Cape Coast. He wanted to use the facilities at the school to make a difference to the lives of others. As the school resisted this, he looked into the community to find a more inclusive way to work.As a natural musician, who had performed at churches since childhood, Kweku knew that mainstream society believed that young deaf people couldn't participate in music or dance activities. As a firm believer that "anything is possible", - Kweku thought about how to challenge this assumption and African Footprint was born.
Links were made with the Cape Coast school for the Deaf and the Cape Coast Deaf Association and the idea of a self-help group was born. Primary needs were literacy, IT and vocational training, but there was also a huge need to build confidence and self-belief and raise awareness of the capacity of deaf people amongst hearing people.
African dance became the tool. Performing around Cape Coast attracted interest for the group and helped the deaf and hearing participants realise their unique talents and break down communication barriers.
The message of the group makes the social model of disability easy for people to understand. After watching the dancers perform, the audience are asked:
Come up here and dance with us, in the way that we do. Then we will ask you who is disabled?
This unique approach has attracted interest within Ghana and from other European countries. The group has performed at a DANIDA sponsored youth workshop in Ghana and links with Viataal in the Netherlands, AIFO in Italy and Fredericiaskolen in Denmark have led to various European tours for the group. As well as performing African music and dance at more mainstream theatre or dance venues, the group also held interactive workshops at mainstream and special schools.
African Footprint always tries to involve the audiences as much as possible. As Kweku commented "In Italy, we asked them to join us dancing and taught them some drumming tricks. In a Danish special school for deaf children, we spent more time with the children so we had a chance to teach them how to dance traditional African dances. They even performed with us!"
African Footprint self-sponsored their first visit to Denmark. Initially, the idea was that Danish deaf people could come to Africa to learn music and dance in the way that Danish hearing people have done for many years. Through work with staff and children in Fredericiaskolen, African Footprint were able to show that this would be possible and hopefully, one day, some of them will visit Ghana.
Thinking about how far the group has come since the early days, performing on the street in Cape Coast, Kweku commented "Who would have thought that deaf people in Europe would listen to and enjoy African music and drums? Who would have thought they would be able to move their bodies in that way? Who would have thought a deaf person could teach a hearing person to dance?"
- Recommendations:
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African Footprint International is looking to create opportunities to carry out similar activities both in Ghana and accross Europe in the future. They would like to:
- publicise the opportunity better and more widely. There are so many people who could enjoy and benefit from dancing and drumming with us
- make more deaf and hearing people understand how important the work is. African Footprint shows how much deaf people can teach hearing people and how easy it can be to work together.
- see more organisations for deaf and hearing people and for people with other disabilities get involved. The more people participate, the more inclusive our society.
To find out more, or to organise an African Footprint performance or workshop near you, please contact kwekuaddison@hotmail.com
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