Translator: Tanya Cushman Reviewer: Cristina Bufi-Pöcksteiner
I hate labels.
Although I started early,
none of my history pointed to tap dancing being my eventual profession.
And none of the labels that I had growing up pointed to it either.
My parents are from Beirut, Lebanon.
Not a hotbed of tap dancing.
I myself was born in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada,
also not a hotbed of tap dancing.
So there was no cultural predisposition.
As a child, I thoroughly enjoyed play,
but I strove more for perfection
within the guidelines of the rules of any game.
Not the mark of an eccentric or out-of-the-box thinker.
In school, I went to the science and technology high school;
I did research in ichthyology,
and I eventually earned a degree
in computer animation for film special effects.
Not the career track of a performing artist.
To add, I ended my formal dance training at the age of ten.
None of that points to this,
my falling in love with tap dancing,
pursuing it as a career
and contributing to an art form
that's fundamentally American and highly improvisational.
My looks weren't helping either,
as I found myself falling in love with the kind of tap dancing
primarily associated with African-American performers.
Think Sammy Davis Jr. or Gregory Hines.
Tap dance itself is a label.
It's been out of the popular culture for many years,
so normally,
as it happens when I mention that I'm a tap dancer,
somebody says,
"Oh, you must do what Fred Astaire does, or did.
Or Gene Kelly, maybe."
And that's not to say that there weren't any other tap dancers
who had equally impressionable styles,
but the word "tap dancer" evokes images of Fred and Gene
because of the commercial platform that they had
and the cultural impact of their work.
Only problem is I don't dance like either of them.
And then there are the labels that others impose.
Take Stephanie from New York.
After a performance, she came up to me and said,
"I used to tap dance" -
which I thought was wonderful -
"but not like you.
No, you're great."
And I leave the conversation confused.
Or Linda, from Stockholm, in a similar exchange, said,
"I love to dance, but I'm not as good as you,
so I just enjoy it."
And again, I'm left with questions.
And then there's John, from London,
who said to me,
"I'm an engineer, so I'm not creative.
But I still enjoyed your performance."
I wish I could share with Stephanie
what my dancing looked like when I first began.
And the fact that all of tap dancing
is really only based on a few fundamental movements.
I wish I could share with Linda the joy I get from simply dancing
and how that joy has fueled my curiosity and my learning
throughout my whole career.
And John,
dear John,
(Laughter)
when did being an engineer make you not creative?
Seems like the word "creative" is almost as loaded as the word "love."
It's mysterious,
it's hard to pin down,
many of us feel like we'll never fully experience it,
and if we do happen to stumble upon it in a moment,
we doubt the experience.
And yet there's something so attractive about a space that fosters creativity,
and so we continue to study it in our attempts to understand it.
And yet there is John,
who threw in the towel just on account of his work.
Now, when I approach my work,
there are a number of considerations that I am confronted with every time
for me to fully understand and engage with the work that I'm about to do.
First, I have to understand the tradition that I'm working in.
I try to understand the historical context of the work.
I outline a keen purpose
and goals that I hope to achieve.
I identify key techniques
that will be used in the execution of the work
and have a mind for the accuracy of motion
that's going to be needed
in order to consider the work successfully executed.
Now ...
there are a few more.
I have to keep a mind on the communal knowledge of the audience
to see how the work might read.
And if it's a new work,
I have to be willing to see things
in a way that I might never have seen them before.
Now, aren't these the same considerations in any field of work?
Or asked a different way,
would John's experience of my performance have been any different
if he had considered himself to be creative?
I don't even consider myself to be creative.
I consider myself to be a problem solver,
searching for answers in a given context.
My questions have to deal with rhythmic and physical patterns,
the outcomes or the sounds and motions,
the shapes that bodies make in time and space,
and the context for me is tap dancing,
defined by the tradition of over a hundred years.
If the experience of work,
in its broadest, most fundamental sense,
is the same,
why do we have a culture
that promotes only particular personalities -
creative types for the arts,
analytic types for the sciences -
in the pursuit of those careers?
Why have we begun to self-select,
imposing limited labels on ourselves
and directing ourselves into silos?
What if we began to see
the creative side of the sciences,
math,
technology
and the analytic side of the arts?
(Cheers) (Applause)
What if that new perception changed how we define our labels?
How would that change our conversations?
How would that change our experiences?
What we allowed ourselves to engage in?
Even what we believe to be our own potential?
We might just find out
that in order for us to see ourselves most fully,
we have to disregard the labels and the definitions that we put on them
and the ones that we've put on ourselves.
At the very least,
John might not have felt the need to preface his compliment
of my experience of my work
with an excuse for being not creative.
And if you ever doubt the possibilities open to you,
just remember ...
that you saw a Lebanese Canadian
who studied ichthyology
and has a degree in computer animation for film special effects,
that ended his formal dance training at the age of ten
tap dance for you
while giving an analytic talk on the power of labels.
Thank you.
(Applause)