By Mitchell Polman

America’s pop culture exports are the boon and bane of the country’s reputation abroad. But there is one cost-effective way to change people’s perceptions of American society. It is to show people abroad an aspect of American life and culture that is very different from what they are exposed to when they turn on their television sets. Through its public diplomacy programs, the Department of State works to educate foreign publics about aspects of American culture that they otherwise may never see or hear. For example, few people overseas are aware of the fact that the U.S. is considered an innovator in the field of contemporary dance. A new State Department-sponsored initiative that is set to begin early next year will work to change that.

DanceMotion USA, a program coordinated by State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) will send three contemporary dance companies to three countries each in different regions of the world. The State Department’s key contractor for this program is one you don’t often hear about in government circles — the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). The dance companies, which are first nominated by a committee of private citizens from the world of dance, and then confirmed by State, are Evidence, a Dance Company of Brooklyn; ODC/Dance of San Francisco, and Urban Bush Women of Brooklyn. Evidence will be touring Nigeria, Senegal, and South Africa. ODC/Dance will be touring Burma, Indonesia, and Thailand. Urban Bush Women, doing the South American tour, will visit Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela.

Dance tour cultural programs have, in recent years, been out of favor because of the outdated belief that they are intended only for elite audiences. The program is the culmination of several years’ worth of trial and error and experimentation on State’s part with an eye towards making dance programs more accessible to a broad audience. DanceMotion USA companies will perform for general audiences, hold workshops with dancers that are open to the public, bring education materials, and create websites to help foreign audiences continue learning after the American companies head for home. Ms. Karen Brooks Hopkins of BAM says that the companies will bring with them overseas videos on American dance and other educational materials, and that they will leave them with their local sponsors.

Moving further away from the idea of contemporary dance as only an elite art form, DanceMotion USA is designed to help build relationships on a personal level. Ms. Colombia Barrosse of the Department of State says that “21st century public diplomacy is not only performances, but direct connection.” These dance programs are valuable, she says, because they make it possible to “explore and engage audiences without an interpreter.” Ms. Barrosse notes that many workshop participants in host countries “may not have had a chance to have a conversation with an American in the past.” She says that DanceMotion embodies a “two-way street approach to cultural diplomacy,” since both sides are learning about each other’s culture, society, and artistic methods. Ms. Hopkins of BAM points out that in some of the countries to be visited, such as Burma and Venezuela, the United States has a “very limited diplomatic relationship” and “less day to day interaction through the arts.” She feels that programs such as DanceMotion USA “create opportunity for dance companies to bring a positive message” and “put forward a message of goodwill.”

This goodwill takes a good deal of organizational skill. Dance programs are more challenging than, say, orchestral tours, because of issues involving stages, flooring, and the sheer size of a dance ensemble. BAM, which has worked with visiting dance tours in the past, is for the first time organizing a tour for several American companies overseas. Financial support for the program’s educational materials is coming mostly from the Pfizer corporation, with State’s ECA providing the rest of the funding. The total program cost is a little more than $998,000 for FY2009 (the funds were allocated in FY2008, but budgeted for FY2009-10). That is out of an overall budget for ECA of $533,000,000 for FY2009 of which $8,500,000 is dedicated towards cultural affairs programming.

At first glance, dance programs may seem to be an unlikely tool for shaping the perceptions that citizens of other countries have of America. However, dance performances and workshops do have an intimacy and directness that helps people meet and get to know Americans on a personal level. Clearly, if the meetings and the performances on foreign stages are memorable enough, they will have an impact on foreign participants’ perceptions of America that will last long after the curtain falls.

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