"In what ways has your cultural identity informed your work as a dance educator?"

Memory:

"Soy Dominicana, y de pura cepaaa!" my mom sings along with Johnny Ventura. She's cooking white rice, red beans, Y Pollo guisao. I'm in the living room of our 1-bedroom Washington Heights apartment dancing to the music like I always am: in my green, flowy, skirt; hair down and wild around my face, by myself. I don't know all the lyrics, but I know what this phrase means. “I’m Dominican, and purely so!”. I sing along too. At 5 years old, I internalize these words. 

Memory:

I walk over to the back wall of my third-grade classroom and point to an island on the huge map. "I don't see it," he says. I tell him it's on the same island as Haiti, close to Puerto Rico gesturing toward the Caribbean Sea. "I've never heard of it,” he laughs, “I think you're making it up!". I look back at the map in confusion. I point again, urging him to look closer. Mexico was over on the left, how could he mix them up? "Alright everyone, please take your seats" my teacher insists. I wonder if gringos in the suburbs don't travel to other places in the world to visit their grandparents like I do. "Whatever Ma-JERK-a, you’re still a Mexican," he says as he walks away. I take my seat in silence. I wish I were somewhere dancing instead. At 8 years old, I internalize these words. 

Memory:

"Maaaan, You're black..." she says, through laughs. I stop laughing. I look down at my skin and see whiteness, but I say nothing. Everyone else agrees enthusiastically. My Black friends proceed to list all of the ways: I know the music, the fashion, the movies & TV shows, I know the language, I eat similar foods, and most importantly…I can dance. I never feel American unless I'm with my friends, and they all insist I am one of them. At home, I am reminded of my natural citizenship. I speak Spanish with my parents, but it never feels quite Dominican enough. The white boys in school (and even some white teachers) bullied me up until the 6th grade. The Puerto Rican girls I met there never seemed to like me. At 18, I internalize these words.

I Just Wanted To Dance

As Latinx Heritage Month comes to a close, I can’t help but reflect on the experiences that have helped shape my identity and how it affects my life and work. I’m a dancer, performer, choreographer, and dance teacher. I claim all of these things now, but it took a long time to step into each of those titles. It was especially difficult to call myself a teacher. The truth is, I never wanted to teach. I just wanted to dance. I've always wanted to dance. It was my safe place—where I felt the most like myself. Mis padres son Dominicanos, y de pura cepa. I'm American-born. A bridge between worlds. This was something I didn't understand like I do now. I didn’t understand how frequently this experience would show up in my life, and I definitely didn’t think it was anything worth sharing. My earliest memories involve dancing alone in the living room to whatever my parents played loudly over the sound system. As a first-generation American, I grew up listening to everything from Merengue to Motown, from Reggeton to Rock, from Disco to Dancehall, my eclectic palette for music nurtured before I could put a sentence together. At that point in my young life, everything was about music, and what I wanted to do most was dance. My body knew that it NEEDED to dance. But as the story goes, immigrant parents rarely have the resources for things like dance lessons, so I didn't get my wish until I was an adult.

My family moved a lot in my formative years, and at 7 years old, I ended up in the suburbs of New York. I hated it. It may not seem like a big stretch- moving from the city to the ‘burbs I mean. We were still in NY after all. But the culture shock was colossal. I began experiencing Xenophobia at my predominantly white school due to my “weird name” and heavy accent. There were so many incidents I don’t fully remember, but can’t seem to forget at the same time. Compounded with the abuse I was experiencing at home, music became my refuge and sole outlet for the trauma. I played instruments, I sang in the choir, I would do anything that kept me away from the house, and immersed in music. Though I loved learning about music, something still felt incomplete. I was still yearning for dance. I didn’t yet have my own room, so to upkeep my little solo dancing ritual, I had to find unoccupied spaces at home where I could turn to my boombox or CD player and find freedom. There was nothing in the world that made me feel safe and OK like moving to music.

It seemed like I was always looking for safety and belonging. When I did manage to make friends at my schools upstate, the only groups that fully accepted me happened to be Afro-Caribbean and Black American. By this time, my musical ethos expanded and I was well-versed in mainstream Hip-hop and R&B music. I was especially into learning Hip-hop and R&B music video choreography. This was how I discovered movement I connected with and began experimenting with creating my own choreography, something I often did with friends. In my junior year of high school, it happened. Someone started a student-led dance team, and I got the courage to audition. I wasn’t formally trained and knew nothing about dance technique or foundation, but luckily for this team, that didn’t matter. I made the team, and finally found what I had been missing- the space to step into my natural talent, and a group where I felt included. Eventually, I would become co-captain of the team, and helped co-create dances for home game sporting events and school functions. We even got to perform at the local college for an AND 1 celebrity basketball game. I became completey submerged with dance, and I was completely obsessed!

So What Changed?

There was never a moment where I thought that I’d be afraid of dance. It never occurred to me that dance could be something intimidating…that is until I decided to take dance seriously. I went away to college and again joined the dance team at school, eventually becoming co-captain. This felt familiar. Comfortable. Safe. Everyone in the crew became fast friends. They grew to be my home away from home. When we were presented with the opportunity of a paid performance, it was then I realized that I could make a career out of my passion. I had no idea how or what it would take, just that it was possible. My thoughts reverted back to my younger self wanting to take dance lessons, and decided it was time to make it happen. Somehow, I got the idea in my head that I was light years behind other “real” dancers, and needed to catch up if I was ever going to be a professional. After some time, I met someone around campus who just happened to open a small dance school across the street from my alma mater. She would invite my team to dance in her company and would go on to mentor me for the next decade. It seemed like fate, honestly. I had fulfilled my duties as a daughter to my parents by not only completing high school, but college too. I had paid the immigrant family first-generation American tax. As far as I was concerned, it was time to focus on what I wanted. As I began to study dance and learn about the industry though, I started to question my relationship with my first love. I second-guessed my gifts and questioned my decision. I loved the way dance helped me make important connections to my culture and lived experiences, but I hated the implications that I needed to change those things about myself to fit in. I internalized the messaging that I wasn’t enough. I couldn’t bring myself to fully adopt the persona of a “dancer”.

I started teaching for the same reason most dancers do: I needed the money. Like with most art forms, dance doesn’t pay much. Dance jobs or gigs are few and far between, giving life to the “starving artist” trope. It’s almost impossible to have a career as an artist without supplementing your income in some way. It was especially difficult to do this in the economies that followed the housing market crash of 2008, and the Pandemic in 2020. I started teaching kids for small organizations in exchange for training and a small wage. For a while, it felt just like any job: It paid (some of) the bills, and I dreaded doing it. I was disconnected from teaching and I almost disconnected from dance as well. What I didn’t understand at the time, was that I got little fulfillment from teaching because I did not believe I had anything valuable to share. Who am I to tell others what to do? Who would listen to me? WHY would they listen to me? I’ve struggled tremendously with my confidence, masking my true feelings and pushing through them to show up the way the world needed me to. Teaching was just another way I did that. Sure, it was technically dance. I preferred this over having a desk job. But it wasn’t until I began tapping into, and then sharing, parts of myself through my teachings that everything changed. It finally clicked for me: what I was missing wasn’t just dance, it was community and connection.

Interconnectedness Through Dance

If you let it, the industry will have you believe that dance is about booking jobs. Arguably, when we decided to pursue a dance career, that IS what we were looking to do. Everyone needs to make a living, and what better way than doing what you love, right? What I have learned in the 15 years I’ve been doing this professionally is that all art, no matter which form you choose, under a capitalist system is just a job. This system holds us hostage to the ideas of hustle, money, and celebrity, and while it can be fun to have experiences like backup dancing for your favorite recording artist, or performing at the most glamorous award shows, the true magic of dance lies in the connections you make with other human beings, and especially with yourself.

The deep study of dance teaches us that it has always been inextricably linked to human development. Historically, dance has been an important tool for creating community, celebrating important milestones, communicating dire information, expressing radical joy, and organizing revolutions. Scientifically, we understand that dance is medicinal, therapeutic, and healing. Dance is how many groups worship and show devotion to their spiritual guides. Dance is how cultures around the world pass down generations of tradition. Not until the invention of classical (and classist) styles like Ballet in the 16th century did dance become a source of entertainment for the royal courts. Since then, we’ve witnessed many dance forms grow to abandon their natural design, continuing to become solely for amusement. That’s not to say dance should NOT be entertaining. It absolutely can and should be. However, it’s not lost on me that the hierarchy of classist structures have leaked into our cultural norms. I find it difficult to celebrate being “Latinx” knowing that sensual Bachata is a thing. Seeing how the structures of Salsa are basically Ballroom dance. Watching Hip-hop devolve on TikTok has been heartbreaking. What’s important to remember is that dance is so much more than a fun thing to do on a stage or in front of a camera. Dance saved my life time and time again. It offered me belonging when I felt abandoned. It brought me community, and helped me connect to my true self. When I finally understood this, I was able to accept the immense responsibility that is teaching. It’s never about the steps in my classes, it’s about the time we spend together. It’s about the energy we exchange with each other, and the energies we transmute in that time. It’s about the laughs that come up when we go off topic, or the feeling of accomplishment you get when you hit a move in just the right way. Yes, I care about the progress of my students as dancers (I still nerd out about movement!), but I also really care about the progress of my people.

Memory:

There's commotion in the hallways and my students burst through the doors, enraged. I turn startled, and ask what's happening.  "Nah miss, these goya bean ass bitches think that they can..." I stop her and her friend abruptly. I make them all sit. I teach dance at a charter school in Brooklyn. There are about 15 students enrolled in my dance class, but today only 6 are here. They tell me the "Spanish" girls were fighting with them in the halls. They call them “guala guala” over and over. I am silent. I listen. They are cursing and ready to fight. Eventually, I intervene and try to reason with them. “I’m not sure what happened, but do you REALLY need to call them that? How would you feel if they called you the "N-word"? They, of course, don't see any parallels. I get it. It's not quite the same. I try a different question: "OK…What do you think of me? Am I a 'Goya bean'? Am I 'guala guala'"? They tell me I'm different. I'm not "like them". They believe this is a compliment. I realize I won't be following my lesson plan for the day. I invite them to sit in a circle, and for the rest of the class, we just talk. I let them express everything they feel as raw as it comes out. I don't flinch when they drop F-bombs. I say nothing when they get comfortable and the sex and relationship stuff comes up. I just let them be. When I finally do speak, I make sure I’m careful with my words. We often discussed the intersections of culture in our classes, and this felt like a good time to put it into practice. I try to tell them things that I hope validate their feelings as young, Black-American high school girls, but I also point out how hurtful the things they said were. I hoped they would walk away from the conversation with a better understanding of how we were ALL connected through the African diaspora and that although they were entitled to hurt feelings, there are ways to disagree without tearing each other down. When there are 10 minutes left in class, one of the girls jumps up and asks if she can put on some music and just dance until class is over. And of course, they can. There's always time to dance.