Miliwn o Ddawnswyr Cymraeg: A million Welsh dancers
Based in North Wales, Independent Dance Artist,
Angharad Harrop, addresses the role dance can play in providing opportunities for young people and families to use and learn Welsh outside the classroom
In 2017 the National Assembly for Wales released
CYMRAEG 2050: A Million Welsh Speakers.
The release of this strategy marked the 50th
anniversary of the first Welsh Language Act,
published in 1967, and outlines how the Welsh
Government will approach achieving the target of
a million Welsh speakers by 2050. Education is at
the heart of this proposal though, and beyond that,
there is the recognition that Welsh needs to live
and breathe beyond the classroom. Acknowledging
that for the possibility of a million Welsh speakers
by 2050 to become a reality, Welsh needs to be
“an integral element of all aspects of everyday life”
(1). This article will discuss the role dance can play
in achieving the aims of CYMRAEG 2050.
Price and Tamburelli highlight in their 2016
study how often Welsh can be viewed as a
“language limited to formal ‘high’ domains”
amongst adolescents. Their study also explains
that there is also an “inherent association of Welsh
with formality as well as tradition and patriotism”
(2) within this age group and that views such as
these can lead to cultural disengagement and
a reluctance to speak the language outside of
educational settings. CYMRAEG 2050 recognises
that these preconceptions can arise when there
are few opportunities for young people, living
in predominantly English speaking areas, to use
Welsh beyond the realms of their formal education.
Within the strategy to achieve a million Welsh
speakers emphasis is placed on the importance of
accessibility to Welsh language activities that build
and strengthen communities. Providing experiences
of value, such as those pertaining to dance
discussed within this article, to young people within
social and community environments can help to
prevent negative associations with the language
arising at formative ages.
There are many arts organisations working
throughout Wales providing opportunities
for people to use and learn Welsh within their
community through dance. I have been fortunate to
be involved in many projects that place the Welsh
language at the centre of community development
through dance.
Pontio, the Arts and Innovation Centre of Bangor
University, in Gwynedd is just one example of an
organisation that is ensuring provision of Welsh
language arts activity for the whole community.
Integrated into their artistic programme which
includes circus, dance, comedy, drama and opera
is BLAS, an ambitious participatory programme.
It offers young people the opportunity to be
involved in the arts within their community through
the medium of Welsh. BLAS has three strands
of activity: weekly drama workshops, health and
wellbeing arts projects and youth arts projects
that run in conjunction with professional companies
that visit Pontio.
One such company is balletLORENT who
first collaborated with Pontio in 2016 on their
production of Snow White. The cast of 11
professional dancers were joined on stage by
12 local children aged between 6 and 9. They
returned in 2018 to perform Rumplestiltkin with
an intergenerational cast of children and elderly
people. I worked with the children, selected
from local primary schools, in the run up to the
performance developing their skills and confidence
in dance. The children involved in the project came
from various language backgrounds, some spoke
Welsh at home and in school whilst others came
from non Welsh speaking homes and attended
either Welsh or English medium education. The
sessions were fun, energetic and directed through
Welsh. They encouraged the young people to form
new friendships and gain valuable experiences with
positive associations to the Welsh language.
Dance is well placed to help people of all ages
and abilities acquire language, as the language
that is being learnt is given meaningful context
through the movement. As linguists Gregory and
MacGahran point out, the use of movement to
teach language means that the “the language
represents a concept and no translation has been
involved, and there is no direct instruction of the
rules of the language. Instead students intuit the
rules from the language they are learning’(3).
The children attending the project who only
spoke Welsh in an educational environment were
given the opportunity to develop their language
skills outside of the classroom. Welsh is given
a meaningful context within their lives as they
socialise, make new friends and learn new skills
through the language.
The week before the performance balletLORENT
dancers, Natalie Trewinnard and Gavin Coward,
returned to bring the two generations of the
community cast together to rehearse their roles
in the show. The intergenerational aspect to this
project is particularly important to note as it
brought the young people on the project into
contact with elders in their community who speak
Welsh, an opportunity many may not normally
have. The older cast members who spoke Welsh
also felt valued and empowered that they have a
skill and knowledge they can bring through the
language by encouraging and fostering a love
for Welsh in a younger generations. Within the
whole group rehearsals leading up to the show a
community was created between all members of
the cast, the balletLORENT dancers, children and
the older generation. The collaboration between
BLAS and balletLORENT succeeded in creating
a community on stage. Although the language
of the rehearsals with the company was English,
the groundwork in developing and strengthening
the relationships between the children took place
through Welsh, giving both languages equal status
on the project. The relationships, formed through
dance, upon which the community of performers
was founded gave credence to the show and
resulted in heartfelt performances from all. This on
stage community has been able to strengthen the
off stage community and provided a lasting legacy
for the project within the relationships that have
been formed and the empowering experiences
that were felt. Many of the children involved have
since begun to attend the weekly BLAS sessions,
furthering their engagement with the Welsh
language outside of the school environment.
Providing opportunities such as these, to
be able to speak Welsh within the context of
performing with an internationally renown touring
company, gives value to how the young people
involved in the project view the status of the
Welsh language. Welsh does not become solely
the language of education but an integral part of
life as Welsh becomes the language of friendships
and memories that form our identity. There are
many organisations providing opportunities for
all to dance through the medium of Welsh within
their communities, Dawns i Bawb, Hijinx, Miri
Mawr, TRAC and Ribidirês to name a few. Through
their ongoing work and commitment to ensuring
Welsh language provision of dance activities for
all ages and abilities, dance can play a key role in
achieving the target of a million Welsh speakers.
These opportunities for all to experience the joy
of dancing with others through Welsh, allow for
a love of the language to emerge from embodied
experiences of passion and pride that bring
communities together.
Info
angharad.harrop@hotmail.com
www.angharadharrop.com
References
(1) Welsh Government (2017) CYMRAEG 2050: A Million
Welsh Speakers available at https://gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2018-12/cymraeg-2050-welsh-language-strategy.pdf
(2) Price, A and Tamburelli, M (2016) ‘Minority language
abandonment in Welsh-medium educated L2 male
adolescents: classroom, not chatroom’ Language, Culture
and Curriculum, Volume 29, 2019, Issue 2
(3) Gregory, G and MacGahran, J. (2015) ‘Learning
Language through Movement: An Introduction to TPR and
the Gouin Method’ in J. Reyhner, J, Martin, L. Lockard &
W.S. Gilbert. (Eds.). (2015). Honoring Our Elders: Culturally
Appropriate Approaches for Teaching Indigenous
Students (pp. 117-121). Flagstaff, AZ: Northern Arizona
University.
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