Groove With Me

Teens from Groove With Me

This past weekend, I spent some time with young ladies from Groove With Me - a non-profit organization in Harlem that offers free dance classes to girls. Over a two day period I conducted a Window Sex Project community workshop with their Teen Leaders group. Friday and Saturday, I spent time with 9 dynamic young ladies ages 14-18, who are smart, beautiful, fun, funny, and great movers. I am so glad I got a chance to briefly get to know them, and offer what I know about self-defense, activism, dance, and self-love. I also must shout out Abby, Meredith and Jamali, a staff that has turned Groove With Me into a home, where they deeply care about the safety and well being of these young women.

Friday: Discussion

We spent Friday afternoon talking about street harassment: What is it? What are our stories? How can we be safe? How can we respond? 

It was disheartening to hear their experiences of being followed, spoken to disrespectfully, and physically attacked - experiences that they have had, no doubt, because they are young girls. (Following/stalking seems to be a trend in the East Harlem area of the dance studio.) But it was also wonderful that we could provide the time and space for them to share, vent, encourage, ask questions, and learn what to do in future situations. I stressed the importance of sharing their story publicly, and directed them to resources like Hollaback! where they can map incidences of harassment as they occur.

We ended our session by going around the circle and completing the sentence "I see myself as...".  Just as we do in the evening length work, I wanted them to focus on how they want to be understood and perceived, as opposed to how others may perceive and label them. 


Saturday: Dance!

After a quick warm up, I taught the girls a phrase from The Window Sex Project section, "Margin to Center." Then we did a few task-based movement creation exercises. I asked them to:

• Map out their daily walk to school, and then to show me how they walk it when they are trying protect themselves and be safe.
• Think of the body part that attracts the most attention and create an 8 count movement phrase about it. 
• Walk forward and state their "I see myself as..." sentence.

We put together all the parts to Florence and the Machine's "Dog Days Are Over." The pop song served as an empowering anthem for them to walk through their daily routines, move their bodies freely, and assert who they are. Check out what we came up with: