In today’s episode, we are continuing our discussion on the civil rights movement and the performing arts. 

Growing up as a black woman during the civil rights movement, Elisabeth Clarke-Hasters started training as a classical ballet dancer in an environment rife with discrimination. But she found strength and inspiration in the power of the movement that defined her era, and the people who had come to embody its defiant spirit. 

She now boasts almost 40 years of stage experience as a dancer, having worked for renowned companies such as those of Maurice Béjart and Pina Bausch. Parallel to her stage work, Elisabeth also acts and teaches, and devotes much of her time towards anti-discrimination work in the performing arts. 

Today we are speaking to her about the legacy of the civil rights movement, the gestures that inspired her dance work, and the way our bodies continue to be politicised 40 years later. For Elisabeth, the world of performing arts is a natural medium for the fight against racism, though this is not a world immune to discrimination either. 

We hope you'll enjoy this conversation. 

Episode Credits:

Created by Farhad Mirza and Declan Mee

Guest Contributor: Elisabeth Clarke-Hasters

Sound and music: Farhad Mirza

Suggested reading:

Five Pioneering Black Ballerinas, New York Times. Black History and Dance in America, a story Civil Rights Strategies in the United States: Franziska Boas's Activist Use of Dance, 1933–1965

In today's episode, we are looking at the history and legacy of the 1960s civil rights movement in the US with respect to how it wielded the power of performance to trigger political change. We are more or less familiar with the ways in which politicians use performance to gain political power, but how do the marginalised use it to subvert power?

We ask: What is an 'authentic' performance?  What is the responsibility of the artist during moments of political strife? What is the banality of sublime virtuosity, and who is excluded from the utopias we create on stage. Our guests today are Elisabeth Clarke-Hasters - dancer, choreographer and teacher who now devotes her time to anti-discrimination coaching in the performing arts - and John-Paul Zaccarini, Professor of Performing Arts at Stockholm University, as well as a touring poet and former performer in dance and contemporary circus. He is the founder of Future Black Spaces, a project that invites artists of colour to share their experiences of otherness.

Our guest day is Joanna Bassi, a clown who has been active in the circus arena for many decades now. She is the 5th generation of a family of circus artists, many of whom were witnesses, saboteurs and survivors during several historical upheavals. In this conversation, she discusses the oral histories of travelling circus performers; the many different meanings, forms and traditions of resistance they cultivated, and the difficult choices they faced. We also look at contemporary forms of resistance and how the figure of the clown offers fascinating lessons in the art of subversion. 

Episode Credits: 

Created by: Farhad Mirza and Declan Mee Host: Farhad Mirza Guest Contributors: Joanna Bassi. Music and production: Farhad Mirza

Suggested Reading: 

How One Man Escaped The Holocaust And Saved His Family By Clowning, The Guardian. 

Laughter Keepers Exploring The Medicine Clown Tradition of the Wampanoag, by Mwalim.

Anti-authoritarian Clowning

On Resistance: A Philosophy of Defiance by Howard Caygill - Review, The Guardian. 

Clowns without Borders