ABOUT SUMMER LEADERSHIP INSTITUTE
What is the Institute?
This 10-day intensive serves as the foundation for all of the company’s community engagement activities, and its learning is infused with UBW’s artistic process. Ultimately the Summer Leadership Institute (SLI) connects dance professionals and community-based artists in a learning experience to leverage the arts as a vehicle for social activism and civic engagement and to strengthen the national network of community arts practitioners. The SLI was born out of UBW’s first community engagement project in New Orleans in 1990, an artistic collaboration with community-based organizations to create an organized structure to support and assist in the development of community. The first four week Institute took place in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1997 and was re-launched in Brooklyn in 2004. In 2009 UBW moved the Institute to New Orleans.
Why New Orleans?
UBW relocated the SLI to New Orleans for a number of reasons. There was an expressed need for creative, collaborative approaches to the ongoing recovery that involve the artistic and cultural organizing communities. Relocating the SLI was our contribution to the city's re-building efforts in partnership with local artists and activists including ArtSpot Productions, Junebug Productions, 7th Ward Community Center with Neighborhood Housing Services, The People's Institute for Survival & Beyond, the Institute of Women and Ethnic Studies, Mondo Bizarro, Tulane University, Dillard University and alumni of the Institute. New Orleans has long-served as a creative inspiration for Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, UBW’s founder and artistic director, since the company held its first community engagement project there nearly ten years ago. New Orleans is also a uniquely rich cultural community and an important ancestral home of the African diaspora. In addition, UBW seeks to expand the geographical impact of the Institute and has made a multi-year commitment to return the SLI to New Orleans in 2010 and in 2011.
Click here to download 2009 SLI Executive Summary
For further information about the Summer Leadership Institute email sli@urbanbushwomen.org.
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