Arts in Immigrant Communities Preconference

Willie Stewart was born in England to Jamaican parents and the family moved to Jamaica when Willie was a young boy. His love of music lead to an illustrious career as a member of the popular band Inner Circle, touring with Byron Lee & the Dragonaires as their youngest member, and 23 years as a director and member of the internationally-known band Third World, Jamaica's most successful act next to Bob Marley.

After playing successfully with Third World, Stewart's desire to work with children and give back to the community, coupled with his expertise in the world of percussion instruments stirred a desire in his head and heart to help heal — the world! — with music.

This session will provide an overview of a broad range of funding programs serving immigrant and refugee communities with a focus on first-hand “lessons learned” from both successes and challenges faced by program officers working in this sector. The session will be followed by a moderated discussion inviting participants to continue sharing their stories and expand the shared knowledge base.

The immigrant experience involves movement, often characterized by genocide, de-territorialization, exile, and economical, political, and social marginalization. While the impetus for immigration is often times traumatic, the process of moving and crossing borders compounds the upheaval, especially for those that migrate without documentation.

Whether contemporary, traditional, or popular, arts emerging from immigrant communities can shape the popular imagination of those communities, while disrupting and challenge social norms. In this session, we will discuss some of the issues that artists address in the process of making art and claiming public space. Creating a new context in the diaspora to practice art and culture, finding community collaborators, taking responsibility for cultural expressions that represent communities in new contexts, and sharing with those outside of one's community are just a few issues that immigrant artists and cultural practitioners address. These artists/practitioners represent a diverse set of experiences and working conditions, covering a panorama of ideas and knowledge systems that serves as an important foundation for the healing of recent or historic traumas and for the creation of individual, family, and community-wide wellbeing.