U.S. Mission India: Empowerment through Theater Workshop Series

We propose the development of a skills building workshop series to promote empowerment and engagement, using civil society and community. This should focus on under-served communities, especially in second-tier Indian cities, using theater and performance techniques. No large scale performance is required at any venue, but small performances should be generated, recorded, and prepared for broadcast through a variety of media platforms as part of the workshop.

The workshops will provide underserved local communities with techniques to build confidence, skills, increase a sense of community, and build linkages across communities and between peoples and institutions that normally do not interact. These linkages should include organizations in both India and the United States.

Target audiences will be identified by U.S. Mission India, and may include underserved youth in second tier cities, e.g. Lucknow. Youth might come from the full range of economic backgrounds, from street kids to students in better local academic institutions. We would identify second tier cities with input from our cultural programming staff at the embassy and four consulates (Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, and Hyderabad). It is not required that the workshops take place in all five consular districts; instead, the U.S. Mission will work with the program partner, local theater partners, and with other appropriate institutions to identify the priority locations for this project. The project should use traditional media, Facebook and Twitter as amplifiers, and will use such means as DVC, Livestream, Google, etc., to broadcast events.

We hope to foster a recognition among Indians that as their economic stature rises, the social and political inclusion of once marginalized groups will advance the interests that the U.S. and India have in common. The workshops can be used in a variety of ways beyond the direct engagement with the participants: as an occasion to bring together academics, business people and government officials, or in electronic form to provide a platform for discussion with Indians following us on social media or elsewhere. We see this also as one of many tools for engaging India’s 422 million-strong youth demographic, those under the age of eighteen.