Human Race | Human Dance – Open Letter | 2016

Human Race/Human Dance

As to our human race, I feel we are entering a new phase in our relationship with each other, and with the planet that we seem to believe we own.

This new phase, sadly is about separation, is about building walls, and brings back echoes of our past mistakes, which is frightening to admit to our children who will be the future storytellers.

We must, as parents and as guardians of the new generation, try to nurture dance as one of the few remaining things that still encourage us to move together, because within its very action, it carries a sense of compassion, of curiosity, and of exchange.

Dancing still remains the most significant reasons why I still want to connect with the Other, why I want to listen to the Other, why I want to learn from the Other. And the ‘Other’ represents many things to many people – the spiritual, the earth, the other human beings that share this planet with us.

Ever since I was a child, and I saw Michael Jackson ad Fred Astaire on my parents’ television, I have dreamt often of telling epic stories: of us, of our journeys, our struggles, our endeavours, our accomplishments. And never before have we needed dance more than the present, to do just that.

We must collectively overcome this terrible phase, this phase that is consumed by fear, that is shaped by monitory gains, and that is determined to destroy that one thing that makes us so human… being social.

We have always been social creatures, it’s what makes us so powerful. And dance has been a huge part of that social exchange. We must, as guardians, break the very walls that are being built around us, and use every opportunity to open up dialogue again, regardless of colour, creed, gender or nationality. I feel dance reveals one’s character, who they really are inside.

Akram Khan