At Moving Life Stories, Immigrants Embody Their Stories Though Dance
Berkshire Pulse’s workshop encourages immigrants to physicalize their experiences and express their feelings.
Tom Truss, Moving Life Stories facilitator, with participants. All photos: video stills, Whimsy Media
Stories of pain. Stories of overcoming. Lived experiences, held by immigrants to this country, are being shared through Moving Life Stories (MLS), a creative movement class created for and geared toward the Berkshire immigrant population and their allies. For this workshop, the participant doesn't have to be multilingual; the language of movement is what tells the story, fostering connection, healing, and fun.
Berkshire Pulse, the dance and performing arts education center in Housatonic, Massachusetts, announces the return of its Moving Life Stories program, with workshops in Great Barrington and Pittsfield. It is a safe space where immigrants can exchange and share their experiences, and create something together, using movement as their language.
“The Moving Life Stories program grew from our most essential belief at Pulse, which is that dance can provide people from different cultures, ages and walks of life with ways to express themselves, find community connection, and to celebrate what makes us unique as individuals in a shared experience of inclusivity and respect,” says Berkshire Pulse Artistic Director and Founder, Bettina Montano.
The program started in 2019, when Pulse partnered with Volunteers in Medicine to connect with the immigrant community, and then in 2021, partnered with the Berkshire Immigrant Center for a series of MLS workshops held at their location. Along the way, Pulse partnered with LitNet and Latinas413, who provided support and partnership.
COVID interrupted the flow of sessions, but they started up again in 2021. Notices went out to the immigrant community, and participants readily showed up, eager to connect with others who have followed similar journeys.
Each session is based on a theme that’s then expressed in movement. Tom Truss, a performing artist and educator, is the Moving Life Stories facilitator, and notes that dance is abstract enough that a theme can be applied in so many ways, and used to articulate in a manner we can’t with words. Some weeks Truss might suggest a theme; other weeks the group will decide. Finding my place, forgiveness, making a garden, depicting my grandmother are subjects that have been explored through movement in past sessions.
Themes about finding sanctuary in a storm, or what was the hardest thing a person left behind, are emotional. “We have kids in the group who had 24 hours to pack, then their backpacks were burned by ICE,” Truss says. “Some left their entire family.” But, Truss says, “when people talk about something is deeply connected to their hearts, movement comes out, whether through gesture or play. The body holds so much information that if we really let it out, it’s a chance for it to get expressed.” There’s a lot of improvisation going on, physicalizing the experiences of the immigrant.
The workshop is free, childcare is provided, and transportation can be arranged. Most important, an interpreter is always present. Cristhian Cabrera, the interpreter, initially joined as a participant; he saw the notice in the Berkshire Immigrant Center’s newsletter and thought, “I like dancing. I’ll try it.” A digital banking services specialist at Greylock Federal Credit Union, he was working from home, and as a self-described people person, missed socializing terribly. After the first class, impressed by the group’s energy and finding it unique and powerful, he decided to keep going. This year, he was asked to serve as the interpreter for the Spanish speakers, but he’s still participating along with everyone else.
“I’m humbled I was chosen to help,” he says. “I see myself as a bridge. Some of the stories are very emotional, but I can empathize because I was in their shoes.”
At the end of last spring’s session, the group voted to put on a “sharing” — a performance at Chesterwood for family and friends. “We became sort of a little family ourselves,” Cabrera says. “We danced, took pictures, shared food.”
The experience has been transformative for Truss, the lead facilitator, as well. “There’s a willingness and joy that I experience with this group of people that I don’t get anywhere else in my life,” he says. And that experience is open to anyone. “You don’t have to be an immigrant to join us,” he says. “If you have any sense of curiosity, welcome.”
Fernando, a participant, likens Moving Life Stories to a little bit of magic. “If we are moving the same way, you get to be me for a little bit,” he says in the video. “I like that type of community – you can be the other, and they can be you. Movement helps you express things you don’t know how to say. Just seeing reactions – how many people laugh, how many people cry, that was a powerful thing, a very healing experience.”
The South County Series runs Fridays, Feb. 3-March 24, 6-8 p.m. at the South Berkshire Friends Meeting House, 280 State Road, Great Barrington, MA.
The Pittsfield series runs Tuesdays, April 4-May 23, 6-8 p.m. at the Pittsfield YMCA, 292 North St., Pittsfield, MA.
For more information, contact Berkshire Pulse or call (413) 274-6624.
Berkshire Pulse has made this program possible through the generosity of Mass Cultural Council, Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation, Lee Bank, Greylock Federal Credit Union, and TD Bank Charitable Foundation, as well as Dalton Cultural Council, Mount Washington Cultural Council, New Marlborough Cultural Council, Otis Cultural Council, Pittsfield Cultural Council, Sheffield Cultural Council, and Washington Cultural Council, local agencies which are supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency.
