CREATIVE PERFORMANCE AS RESILIENCE

Alek and Kaif’s stories show that creative self-expression can be a pathway to imagining new futures. They demonstrate how creative performance is future-oriented on a topical level: looking towards either near or distant futures and the potentialities that exist with or without further human intervention. For Alek, he is focused on an eminent future: a version of the future where refugees are treated with greater dignity in the asylum-seeking camps where temporary shelter is found. For Kaif, he imagines a more distant, and yet still imminent, speculative version of the future; where the effects of climate change have become so severe that sea levels have risen to the point that the famous Dam Square monument has drowned. Resilience in these performances reveals itself through the acceptance and admission to explore alternative situations. As a term, ‘resiliency’ captures the creative mindset that exists to speculate about the future and describes a method of experimentation with said futures. In doing so, Alek and Kaif’s stories showcase the connection between forging new lives and navigating uncertain futures. As humans, I believe we are constantly looking for ways to adapt and evolve in new environments.

Often, normative views of resilience entail bestowing the concept in the present in reference to past events. Many a times, it is after a perceived obstacle has been overcome or a challenge has been faced that resilience is attributed to those involved. Yet, these ethnographic examples suggest resiliency possesses a future-orientation and can hinge on other temporal orientations. Both performers prepared for their respective upcoming performance with anticipation, showing how creative performance is future-oriented in that it requires preparation and rehearsal. Bryant and Knight posit that anticipation is a temporal orientation that allows us to conceptually pull the future towards us through executing actions in the present time space (Bryant & Knight 2019).

At the same time, rehearsal and practice are elements composing the process of imagining futures – a form of creatively cultivating resilience. In individual and collective ways, research participants were engaged with rehearsing a version of the future: practicing the performance; aiming to adjust and refine the level of emotion, intonation, hand gestures and bodily movements they wish to express at the time of (future) performance. This reflected a type of future-making exercise that Joachim Halse utilized in his case study where users were asked to improvise and perform, first with dolls then with acting out themselves, how they would engage a new waste management system at their work location (Halse 2013). Therefore, Kaif and Alek here too demonstrate a degree of “corporeal materiality” where the body itself becomes the materials involved in a type of future-making. Future-making has often been defined by giving tangible form to abstract imaginings or visions of the future (Halse 2013). In this scenario, if we think of performers’ respective bodies as the materials, they are engaged with a method of “future-doing”.

As a process that is rehearsed, tweaked, and then vocalized, performance is an accessible opportunity to “voice” aspirations (Hirschman 1970, in Appadurai 2013). In addition to the future being a mere subject matter topic for theatrical performance, both performers flex their vocational aspirations as creatives within the Netherlands: Alek experiments with a new vocational identity as an actor, while Kaif reinforces a professional identity as a creative writer. Thus, creative performance becomes an outlet and opportunity to find an accessible way to “voice” their aspirational vocational identities (Hirschman 1970, in Appadurai 2013).

Having been forced to relocate to a new country out of fear of persecution and violence, for Kaif, the process of integration is not far removed from a process of reinvention. While he previously had an unsatisfying career as a HR administrator at a major Syrian bank, Kaif experiments with his writing, seeking opportunities for publication and performance, while also enrolling in a social work degree to keep options open. I do not share this example to emphasize the individualism of Kaif’s experience. I recognize that much literature on the topic of resilience connected to refugees seeks to draw attention to the role of community and credit “the contextual and social factors that support individual resilience” (Balfour et al. 2015, 18). This pair of refugees shows a need to express and vocalize their experience, demonstrating a method of also participating in democracy to highlight what a desirable future might look like for them and for the collective community.

By getting involved in each of these stage performances, both Kaif and Alek are exercising their “voice” (Hirschman 1970 cited in Appadurai 2013, 183-6) in a literal and both metaphorical way of representing themselves, gaining audible strength, and conviction with each performance. Appadurai insists:

Voice is vital to any engagement with the poor (and thus with poverty), since one of their gravest lacks is the lack of resources with which to give “voice,” [Hirschman 1970] that is, to express their views and get results directed at their own welfare in the political debates that surround wealth and welfare in all societies. (Appadurai 2013, 183)

To start with Alek, through his involvement in the play, he is exercising his metaphorical, creative “voice” to express his views and desired results to change the treatment of refugees in asylum-seekers’ camps. In this way he is maximizing an opportunity to engage with an audience to express his metaphorical “voice”. For Kaif, his writings and monologue engage with already unknowable futures to accept and speculate what might occur if our collective actions do not change.

Coupled with the excitement of trying something new, theatre becomes a participatory act of democracy, where performers are voting for what an alternative future might look like for them and the collective. Public performance is used as an explicit example by Appadurai that can captivate audiences to seek future change. Similarly, Damery and Mescoli connect the arts to political engagement, stating:

In spite of structural constraints, art is a means (and a product) through which migrants, independent from their legal status, participate in the local socio-cultural life and elaborate concrete claims concerning their own situation as well as global concerns that are related to it—such as migration governance and politics. Art practice constitutes a creative political engagement in the local context (Salzbrunn 2014) and also a way for people to find belonging without caveats (Martiniello 2018). (Damery & Mescoli 2019, 14)

Investigating resilience can be mistaken as an opportunity to investigate the empowerment of audiences to withstand social change or overcome adversity, fundamentally overlooking the possibility to see resilience as a way of evolving to inspire more change that allows for certain aspects to flourish.

Yet, citizenship also influences the boundaries by which we perceive and interpret artistic intervention as well. Cultural theorist Nancy Adajania uses the concept of ‘performative citizenship’ to draw attention to this and explains it as a “crossover from symbolic to actual political action, and the production of a newly aware and self-critical community that can transcend the traditional boundaries of group identity” (Adajania 2015, 40). As ethnographers, this concept ushers our positionality and relationship to the subject matter at hand to the forefront, to (re)consider how our status impacts the lens by which we see performance. For example, Alek is among forty cast members comprising the ensemble, excluding the actors, musicians and past ensemble members who had to drop out of the play when coronavirus hit. Their rehearsals and interaction with the play is seen as an act of ‘performative citizenship’, by bringing awareness to the treatment of asylum-seekers and forming a new group identity as a cast ensemble. Ironically, the play is in fact on the topic of refugees – a controversial matter related to the very nature of citizenship itself. Ariella Azoulay draws on her expertise following Islamic and Palestinian projects to discuss the citizenry boundaries of the body politic in re-affirming nation-state identity. Azoulay proposes:

In the same vein, citizenship in differential political contexts cannot be understood just as an optional theme for political discussion and artistic intervention. Citizenship is what defines the relationship between the protagonists involved in the production and consumption of art—i.e., artists and spectators alike—and what is reproduced through it. (Azoulay 2015, 70-71)

As ethnographers, it is equally importantly to consider the positional lens we adopt in understanding artistic interventions and the production of creative performance. To see creative performance as a method of resilience means allowing for the aspirations expressed through the creative practices in question to stem from experimentation; and recognition of such vocalizations occurring against the backdrop of uncertainty and despite anticipated change. I note that similar lessons can be drawn from the practice of design fiction, as ways of engaging with fictitious future scenarios, to aid speculations and spur political action (see Gonzatto et al. 2013; Salazar et al. 2017).

PROCESSES OF RESILIENCE VERSUS SYSTEMS OF ASSIMILATION

Seeking out resistance or resiliency was not initialling one of the main goals of this ethnographic research. As a researcher, I set out to understand how refugees engaged with temporal orientations towards the future and pursued their vocational aspirations. But discussions around aspirations undoubtedly involved observations around how do refugees enact their vocational aspirations.

In The Future As Cultural Fact, Appadurai warns against the ‘ethics of probability’: ways of thinking, feeling, and acting that depend on statistical and probabilities tied to the growth of capitalism, profits from catastrophe or disaster (Appadurai 2013, 295). Appadurai argues in favour of the need to nurture their ‘capacity to aspire’ (Appadurai 2013). The fluid uncertainty that refugees face in the Netherlands and lack of economic resources, irrefutably places them in a vulnerable position more susceptible to these ethics of probability. When viewing resilience as a processual form, the ‘capacity to aspire’ which may be considered weakened during their migratory experience, can be reframed as something potentially neither lost nor stolen but tucked away during the migratory experience.

Thus, resiliency is shown as a slow process that takes time to nurture and grow. It is rehearsed and practiced repeatedly, reinforced, and strengthened like a monologue committed to memory. However, there are systems of assimilation at play in the Netherlands that apply pressure on those to adapt and learn that suits rather not their creative pursuits or vocational aspirations, but what works for the existing system already. Resilience can be collective and individual and, as these examples have shown, engaging audiences to react and inspire action to change future outcomes, challenging existing systems of assimilation, and allowing for the vocalization of creative self-expression to experiment with different futures. As ethnographers, we must look at what may or could be changed (as a reactive process), but also what we want to stay the same and keep constant within our lives. Where are the opportunities to grow “roots” (Pink & Seale 2017) that keep us planted in new ground that is fertile for experimentation? Broadly speaking, where do our interlocutors seek consistency, opportunities to act and enact their desired future? How are those opportunities for consistency in contrast for the experimentation that sprouts a desire for change too?

Finally, I return to arguments made by Panthea Lee, who observed and condemned how many ethnographers and researchers – herself included – are often complicit in assisting large companies and government bodies (organizations that are rich in resources and able to assert power and authority) to imagine future scenarios that benefit their interests. She asserts:

When these folks [those who work for companies and governments] are asking what the future should look like, we get the version of reality that we’re living in now. And I think we need to bring folks that have radical imaginations, that bring moral clarity and courage, to ask those questions. (Lee 2021)

Building upon the writings of anthropologist Anand Pandian, Lee goes to argue that it is our responsibility as ethnographers to listen to the radical imaginations of artists as social actors to write ethnographies that possesses moral clarity (Pandian 2019, cited in Lee 2021). I believe this type of moral clarity is meant to suggest a type of innocence that is untampered by the ‘ethics of probability’ that Appadurai is referring to: ideals and values that remain when not tied to the growth of capitalistic ventures. In this way, my research contributes to the current discourse tied to anthropology of the future and the benefits of future-oriented ethnographic studies from a bottom-up approach. By critically examining how refugees engage with creative performance, I encourage the EPIC community to reconsider how resiliency is often projected onto vulnerable populations and caught up on exclusionary dialogues of empowerment. Idolizing displaced groups can overlook how researchers think about rebounding as a process, but really thinking more critically about the benefits from reimagining (letting go of former expectations) to then speculate new scenarios. Instead, a bottoms-up approach has allowed commentary on how forced migrants exercise their own ‘capacity to aspire’ (Appadurai 2013) and search, and/or negotiate, for terms of recognition in their daily lives while seeking employment opportunities. Anthropological future studies can benefit from the contribution of even more ethnographic fieldwork that adopts an approach of resilience as a mindset to engaging with creative practices.

CONCLUSION

From the perspective of refugees in the Netherlands, resiliency is shown to be future-oriented and processual through creative experimentation and exploration. Once granted legal status, asylum-seekers and refugees in the Netherlands facing drastic degrees of uncertainty towards their future experiment with new aspirations while integrating into the Dutch economy. Refugees bring to life Appadurai’s ‘capacity to aspire’ through the processual steps involved in creative performance and the activation of their “voice” (Hirschman 1970, in Appadurai 2013). Despite going through what can be extreme mental health concerns, requiring intense therapy to deal with trauma, depression, anxiety and/or PTSD, there are accounts of people finding new forms of creative self-expression to experiment and play with new imagined futures. The anticipation and hope of multiple possible futures or alternative ways of living encourages ethnographers to acknowledge how vulnerable populations are inspired to dream and, by doing so, preserve and maintain a ‘capacity to aspire’ (Appadurai 2013).

By centering present creative practices and future uncertainty, this paper unpacks how we can advance the value of ethnography by learning to clue into hidden narratives of creative resilience among forcibly displaced migrants. I suggest that through the observation of creative arts-based practices, new narratives can emerge (which may be called a form of ‘design fiction’). Resiliency is not simply about adapting to a new life, but about pushing the boundaries of aspiration and experimenting with previously inaccessible or unimaginable futures due to circumstance. To borrow the words of fellow design anthropologist Thomas Binder, “Prototyping is not only a generative process of ideation. It is just as much a rehearsal of new practices” (Halse et al 2010, 180). “Prototyping” may very likely be a much more relevant and commonly heard term among the community of research practitioners connected to the EPIC. As we work alongside vast teams of strategists, designers, and engineers, I encourage practitioners to toil with how we leverage generative arts-based practices to engage with alternative futures. Where do we see the benefit of more processual steps that prepare us for the future and allow us to ‘grow roots’ that stabilize us in our practice and, perhaps more importantly, ground us in a common vision of the future?

Most of this paper is directed to employing resilience as a creative mindset which invokes further applications to methodology and how we engage with research participants in understanding their dreams and aspirations for the future. However, given the global influx of refugees as an issue of today, this paper also raises a question to ethnographers, how can we adjust our participation in systems that work beyond ‘integrating’ vulnerable populations by providing them with resources to voice their (creative) imaginations? While participatory arts programmes for those with refugee backgrounds have achieved greater public recognition and documentation in recent years (Balfour et al 2015), it would be a disservice to say that the insights from this paper are only applicable to forced migrants or new arrivals. How do we refrain from oversimplification, while honouring the agency and variety of stories of those most marginalized in society? I hope to facilitate discussion on ways that art and work can be combined that does not simply resist assimilation but participate alongside those pressures. I urge practitioners to adopt a mindset where resiliency is grounded in pursuit of aspirations, challenging a belief that adaptation, learning, and evolution sprout in defense of unwanted disruption.

Nicole Aleong (she/her) is a design anthropologist passionate about the intersection of futures thinking, innovative technology, systems design, and decoloniality. Originally from Vancouver, Canada she has several years of experience working as a strategic research consultant and professional moderator. She holds a MSc in Cultural and Social Anthropology, specializing in applied anthropology, from the University of Amsterdam and a BA in Anthropology from the University of British Columbia. www.nicolealeong.ca.

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