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Undesirable Elements: Secret Survivors, the latest installment from the Ping Chong and Co. theater company, is a stunning exploration of childhood sexual abuse and its lifelong effects. Written and directed by Ping Chong & Co.ʼs Associate Director, Sara Zatz, it depicts the personal experiences of five child sexual abuse survivors who share their stories in their entirety for the first time. In a question-and-answer session following a reading of this work in New York City in May, Project Coordinator and creator Amita Swadhin explained that, although sexual abuse is an epidemic problem in the US, most mass media representations of abuse deal with the issue at a safely fictional remove. Amita wanted to bring the intensity, diversity and prevalence of the problem directly to audiences while creating a space for other survivors to share their stories.

Secret Survivors, then, is a theatrical performance about sexual abuse told by the survivors themselves. A childrenʼs song sets the stage, transporting the audience back to their own playground years. As childhood permeates this adult theater, the long talons of abuse are slowly revealed. Like a quilt, the monologue fragments are stitched together across the stage, cuttings of personal history sewn together by the chorus and the poignant music of one of the survivors.

A woman tells about the romance of her parents, both immigrants from India, in Ohio, hoping to build upon their dreams with their two daughters. At age four, the father would become her abuser. Her mother dismissed her story. The little girl blocked the abuse by creating her own world outside her home. Though she has struggled through it all, she excelled in her education. She shares, "I carry with me only one physical scar. Here on my lip, where he once bit me."

Another shares, "I will never have any children." Her well-to-do parents loved her, but their careers always demanded their full attention. Not until her childcare provider was arrested did they recognize the behavioral changes that accompanied her enrollment in the town daycare. Years of therapy could not unleash her deep-seated memories.

One man explains how he devoted his life to social justice issues because of his loving familyʼs influence. Later in life he realized that he was losing jobs and friends because of his promiscuity with women. Exerting his masculinity, the way society showed him, was his own form of resistance. This is how he responded to the abuse he endured from a friend of the older son of his babysitter. He kept this a secret until a friend told him about her rape by an older boyfriend.

Next, a survivor shares how she found acceptance of her adopted family in Queens by making everyone laugh. Her older adopted brother abused her almost immediately upon her arrival to her new home. She found a voice in her music and poetry. Her life changed after being asked to become a part of an artistsʼ collective. This is how she finally healed. Midway through the performance, she sings a song to her adoptive mother, who had refused to confront the abuse by her birth son. The experience is gut-wrenching for the audience.

It is hard to describe the cumulative power of these stories. They thread through the surrounding contexts of structural violence, economic strata, racial tensions, sexual orientation and the intersections of the storytellersʼ numerous identities. In fact, it inevitably speaks to the audienceʼs numerous identities. Specific moments awake a different part of oneself - the instincts of a mother, a sister, a member of a family, the duty of a public servant, the experiences of a woman or person of color, the vulnerability and resilience of a child, the role of a friend, a teacher, a social worker. One will find themselves in deep reflection about broken systems and structures just as much as remember oneʼs own closeness to sexual abuse or its prospects.

The stories serve as a reminder that child abuse can happen to anyone. One will walk away feeling like taking action so that it does NOT happen to another child. Yet one is struck, as the narratives pass, by an overwhelming truth. Despite the early trauma, despite the long and bitter influence these episodes of abuse can inflict on its victims, these survivors who are sharing before you have survived, have mastered the forces of destruction that might have overcome them, are, in the very moment of the performance, embodying hope, asserting with each utterance their liberation from the experiences that might have chained them.

Many artistic attempts to scale the cliffs of abuse, like other social justice motivated work, can feel like the art has taken a back seat to the message. This is not the case in Secret Survivors, partly because it falls under the Undesirable Elements umbrella of projects, which has since 1992 put on productions that deal with a wide range of oral histories. Secret Survivors has taken full advantage of the template developed in the Undesirable Elements series. Each survivor tells his or her own story in a series of linked monologues, and is bolstered in his or her telling by the choral participation of fellow actors. The choral element, a throwback to the Greek dramas, is particularly effective in at once highlighting these moments of high trauma even as it reveals the community of support these survivors have later carved out for themselves.

The power of an open conversation about such a taboo topic can often feel like a blow to the stomach. But, this unique performance has many layers. Though at times it leaves you hopeless, each narrative evokes a variety of feelings and emotions, for these survivors are real. They candidly share their multiple identities by voicing small vignettes of their lifetime journeys. "What is justice?" they ask -- each one gives their definition. The audience is left to ponder on this question too; days, even months after experiencing the performance.
Secret Survivors is a wake-up call about an issue that is too often kept hidden, a cancerous monster that needs to be addressed. It is a remarkable work that must be experienced by everyone, because 1 in 4 female-bodied and 1 in 6 male-bodied people are currently victimized. It is an epidemic problem that survivor Amita Swadhin is committed to solving. The performance is only the beginning of what has turned into her life-long journey.

For more information on Secret Survivors, visit www.secretsurvivors.org.

 By Ale Carvalho

^{Social Entrepreneurship and Non-Linear Dynamics: Chaos Theory in Service of Social Change}

^{(and while at it, let's borrow Heisenberg's Principle of Uncertainty too)}

Main thesis -   Powerful ideas implemented in the simplest form and in the smallest contexts possible have the potential to produce butterfly effects either by themselves or with the aid of a minimum set of enablers.

Today I was at the United Nations Development Programme talking amenities to Charles, a senior staff member from the Environment and Energy Group. Very cool guy. The topic of my upcoming Haiti trip came about, and we started discussing innovative approaches to care after a harsh disaster. Our conversation revolved around the care for the soul, care for the heart, and care for the spirit - not only the body as mainstream efforts so narrowly focus on. Music popped up as a venue, and we exchanged ideas for at least 20 minutes.

Charles then mentioned a small grassroots group in Kenya that started a soccer league and was using soccer as a way to bring self-esteem and life guidance to underprivileged kids. And he went on to say that they eventually became something big, with recognition and reach outside of the borders of Kenya.

That thought amazed me. How can such a tiny little effort, in such a tiny little place in Kenya, somehow reached the voices of two people at the United Nations in New York? and suddenly their work was being cherished and discussed by two people miles and miles away?

Eureka. That's the Butterfly Effect through a lens of Social Change. When powerful ideas with sufficient key enablers grow and reach the Tipping Point of Social Breakthrough (TPSB), oh my! they spread like wildfire around the community, city and sometimes world, changing mindsets and influencing new initiatives that will further positive impact.

Good ideas are highly contagious, resilient, and only perish when one stops believing on them, either because they weren't successful in producing the desired measurable effects or simply because the brain that generated the thought stop believing in it. And quit honestly, inventors of new things - be them prototypes or new ideas - are well known for being very stubborn to accept that the numbers were fair and clean when assessing their inventions and tend to continue spending time and even money on a condemned project. So in the end, as Plato would love to hear, ideas - like gods or deities - only die if you stop believing them.

So we should have a beautiful incubator of butterflies. Released around the globe with the minimum necessary, in the form of proof-of-concepts that may eventually become full-fledged projects or organizations, and who knows? Wingflaps in Cambodia, Kenya, Chad, Rio de Janeiro, Cuba, Mexico, Prague, Australia, and many other places in the world - and so sorry conventional wisdom: we have a big hurricane of change coming from all sides and been picked up by many different entrepreneurs that will advance, refine, and make the thought more elegant by adding new lessons learned.

 How many of them ideas will generate hurricanes? How many of them will die? Impossible to know beforehand. Heisenberg's Principle of Uncertainty. But do we have any choice but to have faith and launch?... see what happens? That's the thrill of Social Entrepreneurship. Ultimately a Leap of Faith into the unknown.  That's the thrill of life. That's something worth living for.

 

 

By Ralph Vacca

I'm no Jerry Maguire but I had you at "fellowship" didn't I? Understandably so... fellowships seem to be everywhere with new ones popping up as fast as those Facebook groups, 1 million people for [fill in the blank] (my favorite is the one to bring back Frankenberry cereal).

But in all seriousness there does seem to be a dramatic increase in fellowship opportunities. Specifically the fellowships I'm talking about are the ones around social entrepreneurship, social innovation, social change or whatever term you ascribe to that entails solving social problems. Even more specifically when I say fellowships, I mean finite developmental opportunities that provide practical experience in getting involved in the social change movement (think Teach for America).

So what's the deal with these social change fellowships? Rather than argue what is meant by social change, or label the fellowship explosion as a "fad" or "innovative", or even compare them with internships and volunteer opportunities, I'd like to plainly and simply ask two questions I've recently found myself thinking about as I try not to think about the cold slushy NYC weather.

First is the idea of how do fellowships serve as a catalyst to change an entire sector? Secondly, what are the implications for fellowships in recruiting locally or outside the local community?

So what got me thinking about fellowships? And no I won't make a Lord of the Rings joke here. What did it was my recent trip to Hubli, India this past January. Most probably have never heard of Hubli, but a friend described it best when she said it's like Ithaca, very lovely but not sure why you would visit. Anyway, I was there as part of an NYU course in International Social Impact Strategies, and I had the pleasure to learn more about an interesting fellowship called the Deshpande Fellows Program (DFP) housed at the Deshpande Center for Social Entrepreneurship (see image of cool building below).

In Hubli, in addition to permanently raising my tolerance for spicy food and watching Avatar in Hindi, I was inspired by the fellows in the DFP that were creating enterprises ranging from milk collection/distribution initiatives to security force services. Truly some very cool initiatives.

So... quick overview of DFP? Sure! DFP is a six-month program that trains and empowers locals (mostly those in the Karnataka region) to become social entrepreneurs and tackle mounting national social problems such as poverty, hunger and education. Through intense experiential learning the cohort of learners engage in projects that develop their entrepreneurial and leadership skills including how to use social media, devise business plans, and develop grassroots initiatives, etc.

So on to the first question I posed earlier. How do these fellowships serve as a catalyst to change an entire sector? Something that kept coming up was the challenge in getting the development sector in India to be more risk-friendly promoting innovation and new entrepreneurial ways of working. So in answering this we started to ask ourselves, should fellowships focus on preparing leaders to enter existing organization to bring about change from within or prepare entrepreneurs that will start new organizations that foster social entrepreneurship culture and innovation from the onset?

I likened the question to a romantic relationship where one asks themselves if they should work on changing a semi-functional relationship or start anew with someone else, this time knowing what works and what doesn't. Maybe not the best analogy but nonetheless relevant because what you face in trying to change organizations are people and a series of relationships that shape the organization's problem-solving approach. So therein lies the challenge for fellowship programs in that there seems to be a difference in preparing intrapreneurs with organizational change skills versus entrepreneurs that have enterprise birthing skills.

In line with thinking about the focus of the fellowship is also our second question, about the fellows themselves. What are the implications of fellowships recruiting locally versus outside the local community?

In learning about the DFP, it was inspiring to see the power of recruiting locals to address local issues. From being able to leverage the existing social capital they have within the communities being served, to inspiring a new generation of changemakers in children that see themselves in these leaders, the DFP made me wonder what would happen if Teach for America focused on cultivating local talent to work in schools being served? As we look to change pockets of the social sector through human capital development efforts (such as fellowships), how important is it that we focus on local talent that are not just passionate about social change, but often resonate with the issues on a personal level because they lived it, they understand it, and they are product of it.

So regardless of what answers you come to in pondering these questions on fellowships and social change, I'm sure we can all agree that having more change agents running around trying to make the world a better place can't be a bad thing. So to the social sector.... show me the fellowship!

More Information
Deshpande Fellows Program: http://www.deshpandefoundation.org/deshpande-fellowship-program.html
Ralph Vacca: http://www.nyu.edu/reynolds/grad/09_html/vacca.html

By Keren G. Raz, 2008 Fellow, NYU Law

There's a discussion taking place on the following website about how to define social entrepreneurship: http://whiteafrican.com/2009/09/01/social-entrepreneurs-and-socap-09/comment-page-1/#comment-154490

Yul-San Liem, a 2009 fellow, found a very interesting article that also included a definition of social entrepreneurship that I like...and it's also concrete enough to make sense to those who do not like buzz words or abstract vocabulary.

The definition is: Social entrepreneurship is the use of business to achieve social gain, as well as financial gain.

Here's the link to the article: http://www.acupuncturetoday.com/mpacms/at/article.php?id=31448

By Nathan Maton 

I recently interviewed Nathaniel Loewentheil (NL, pictured left) about the Roosevelt Institute, a student run policy organization he founded that now has over 7,000 students on 70 campuses. I think it represents a unique kind of social entrepreneurship, a type of which we have not heard much about in the NYU Reynolds Program-policy entrepreneurship. The Roosevelt Institute started as a national student-run think tank to inject young people's voices into the national policy debate and brought it to DC, where they have earned a place at the table on many progressive issues. I hope you enjoy the interview.

 

A reflection on Greg Mortenson, Three Cups of Tea, and CAI.

by Lizzie Hetzer

With a meek, modest, humble nature, Greg Mortenson radiates with a passion for education that bubbles just below the surface. Perhaps it's this mild and humble manner that allows Mortenson to so gently observe and respect the communities with which he has worked.

Mortenson's Central Asia Institute has the unique posture of working with communities to build ideal schools where much of the educational philosophy can be imagined, rather than fitted within an existing bureaucratic structure. While Mortenson could have taken any approach to education, CAI appears to have done the opposite of what is happening in the U.S. As hyper-standardization and rigid structure appear to be at the forefront of "education reform" in the States, Mortenson's organization builds community-owned schools in which communities have actual decision-making power, where spending is transparent. There is a contract with communities in which they decide how the schools will be governed.

Mortenson knows about the importance of listening. Asking: What are your community's priorities? Acknowledging the lived expertise of community members. While we privilege certain types of education and expression--for example written expression--these don't define education, knowledge, or intelligence. The ability to "read the world" can be just as powerful. Community members are experts in their lived experiences and can contribute to prioritizing and planning.

Educational theorist Paulo Freire pushes towards a theory of "dialogical action" when working with communities. He warns against falling prey to "cultural invasion" in which development workers and professionals come to solve all problems and develop solutions on their own. In Pedagogy of the Oppressed, he argues that often times, "professional" or "educated" individuals "do not listen to the people, but instead plan to teach them how to 'cast off the laziness which creates underdevelopment.' To these professionals, it seems absurd to consider the necessity of respecting the 'view of the world' held by the people." In order to be with communities rather than over or inside, we must recognize the importance of dialogue (sharing and listening) and appreciating the expertise of all participants in the process.

Mortenson made it clear that he believes communities are capability of running schools (tell this to the NYC Department of Ed!)

CAI schools are formed with community input that includes a focus on storytelling, culture, and languages. Storytelling can be a major stronghold within a community--in sharing and shaping history. In Local Acts, Jan Cohen Cruz, an Associate Professor at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and community-based artist, comments, "storytelling as a traditional form of education passes on values, practices, experience, and knowledge that affirm the collective identity of the group." Education and schooling have the potential to distance students and participants from their communities or allow them to form connections with the community, explore the community's history, and recognize the beauty and struggle that lies within. Often, schooling drives students to leave the community if we place a negative focus on the community. The only desirable possibility is to escape. It's important to recognize education's potential to build up communities and preserve and share their important histories.

Mortenson describes education as an act of engagement and experience. He references the need to smell, taste, touch, and feel. Theater of the Oppressed author, practitioner and theorist Augusto Boal translated Freire's popular education theories into participatory and theatrical games and exercises. Through participatory techniques, Boal challenges us to truly listen to what we hear, feel what we touch, and see what we are looking at. With the development of these senses, we can pursue Freire's concept of literacy, not only learning to read words, but to read the world through sensory experience and emotion. And finally, by reading and recognizing the world, we are called to challenge, transform and re-name it.

When we hear Greg Mortenson's story, his quest to build schools to promote peace, we are touched. Why can't education be like this in the States? Do we think we are too advanced for an education that promotes community and peace? How can we re-imagine education?

by David Russell

But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags
that Time cannot decay...

Craig Newmark, who spoke at the NYU Reynolds Programme in Social Entrepreneurship as part of the Social Entrepreneurship in the 21st Century Speaker Series on Wednesday joked that he was revealing his age by sharing this, one of his favourite lyrics. The relevance though is not his stubbornness in keeping to his original conception of a free online classifieds and listings service with no banner or pop-up advertising - despite the large sums of money that have been offered to him through the years from the likes of Microsoft. Some may see him as stubborn, but as he revealed in referring to the lyric, it is democracy that is his driving force.  

Founder and Customer Service Representative of Craigslist - Craig is a social entrepreneur with a difference. A self-confessed nerd, he is a man who enjoys not having to arise from his seat. But as he is showing, it is possible to change the world and start a revolution without necessarily leaving one's computer in this internet age.

Cragislist evolutionised the ability of people to connect online - a full decade before facebook was even a twinkle in Mark Zuckerberg's eye. The secret of the site's success - which clocks up over 10 billion page views a month - is its simplicity and dedicated focus. As Craig revealed "we know what we do well, and we treat people like we want to be treated."

Humble and modest, he spoke honestly about his ineptitude in managing people - and his realisation that it would be best for all concerned if he were to just concentrate on what he knows and does best, and enjoys most, responding to and helping Craigslist users. And as he admitted, with the site carrying his name, he has a vested interest in doing the job well..!

Craig admitted that it was partly by accident, rather than design, that he has created a concept that perfectly matches the Reynolds definition of a social entrepreneurial venture. It is scalable - now in 570 cities worldwide and continuing to spread, recently to Ramallah as Craig explained, due to the request of the mother of the owner of the coffee-shop at which he is a regular. It is sustainable - overheads are covered by the revenues generated by the only sections that charge for postings, brokers that post flat listings and businesses that post job vacancies (to which "erotic services" will soon be added, though with revenue raised going to non-profit organisations). And it is pattern breaking - democratising the paid-for classifieds section of newspapers.

It is this last point that has led to the often hostile reception that Craig has received from traditional media. He is now supporting the burgeoning field of citizen journalism - naming NYULocal, the venture of Reynolds Scholar Cody Brown, as a great example - but which no doubt will endear him even less with the old guard.

But the world is changing, for which Craig can claim some credit in his role as a technology advisor to Team Obama. As is media. And it is Craig that is helping to pave the way.

As Leonard Cohen went on to sing, which no doubt Craig wanted us to recognise....

I'm junk but I'm still holding up
this little wild bouquet:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

by Lizzie Hetzer

by Lizzie Hetzer

Trabian's post got me thinking about how change happens and why we do it. Social entreprenuership is neither a motivation, a means, nor an end.

I began to make some connections in a book called "Mime Spoke Here" by Tony Montanaro - one of the most celebrated mimes. Yes, it is a book about mime, and yes, it does connect to social change. 

Premise: Feeling the "tug"

The key to being a good mime (or an actor) is the understanding of the premise of our actions in everyday life. Yes, it's the actor's annoying question: "What's my motivation?" Motivation and premise determine an actor's credibility. In mime, the premise changes how you do something. In the SE world, the motivation for doing certain work will change how you do it.

A person who has mastered mime isolations (exercises) won't be a perfect mime until they've gotten the premise right. A mime attempting to create the illusion of a tug of war, needs to feel the tug before moving; if not, the movement looks fake. 

The premise is critical. As a changemaker, it's the tug of oppression, disparity, and inequality that influences the movement. WIthout the tug, the integrity of the movement is affected. 

Your premise also affects your wider audience. Montanaro says, "My ability to believe these things, these images, determines the clarity of my gestures and the integrity of my sketch. My belief ignites my audience's belief, and they join me in my adventures." Isn't that what social movements are all about?

Doing: There is no blueprint

The inventors of mime work and those great illusions that we enjoy - the tug of war, the ladder climb, the wall - didn't read a book to figure out how to create them. Instead, the inventors of this work studied real-life situations to understand the tangible forces causing the physical effects. 

They understood the importance of understanding not only the wall, but its forces. In fact, the physical object--for example, the wall--isn't what is most important at all in the mime illusion, but rather what that physical object does to you. Likewise, in the SE world, it's not just about understanding systems, markets, institutions, but what those things do to people. Understanding the effects help us to better interact with the object.

Montanaro talks about the good that comes from not reading the instructions. And the ability to "trust" and "thrust" -- feeling the outside force and "thrusting" against it. A just do it approach.

Character: Giving in to the work

In mime work, one has to create and thrust oneself into character. The character (like a cause or your work) has no life of its own - the actor breathes life into the character. 

Montanaro points out: "...when you do not loan all of yourself to your character, you have to treat your character as a separate entity and speculate on his/her feelings, thoughts, and behavior. While you're busy speculating on your character's behavior, you can never move and speak spontaneously. But if you "give in" to your character, if you let the character "get to you," then the correct thoughts, words, and actions will occur to you, as if by magic."

If we keep ourselves distanced from the work, we risk losing the spontaneous and invaluable actions and thoughts that can occur to us when we delve in, despite the risk.

In Short:

If Montanaro were asked about social change, I think he might say: Give in to the work and the risk, let it get to you, feel the tug, forget the instructions and use your experience as expertise.

by Trabian Shorters

Are Social Entrepreneurs indeed Earth's next best hope for survival, prosperity, utopia? Sure, why not. Believe what you choose to believe about it. It is just a term. It doesn't ultimately matter what you call the people who would rather do it than define it.

As someone who has been labeled a social entrepreneur, and then was asked to find social entrepreneurs for Ashoka, and now is asked to coach emergent social entrepreneurs for NYU's Reynolds Program in Social Entrepreneurship, I am most surprised by two things:

1. How fast one goes from 20-something aspirant as I was, to mentor material. That time flies much faster than you would imagine.
2. How calculated, cautious, and afraid the current generation of "changemakers" appears to me.

So maybe, as a mentor, I can earn my chops by having an opinion on that.

The desire to simultaneously "make a difference" and "earn a living" is admirable and good - but you do have to prioritize one over the other. There is no "program" for social change nor a meaningful life. You must already have that desire kindled inside of you. It is the root of courage. For some, the desire to make a difference smolders and for others it burns. The rest are faking. Like any true love, it is impossible to embrace "social change" from a safe distance.

So let's talk about "risk-management."

Your willingness to risk normally decreases as you age. That's why all those people who tell you that they will make their money first and then commit to changing the world are proven wrong 99% of the time. If you are too afraid to risk it now, that usually means that you plan to have far more to lose in the future.

I know that the many people who want to make social entrepreneurship a "field" say that we should have many levels of tolerance - from charismatic prodigy to nonprofit paper shuffler. Fine by me but let's not confuse wage-making with changemaking.

Social change is NOT a field. It is a calling - a profession in the original meaning of the word. You may be called by your faith, your conscience, your ancestors, or your circumstances but the optimistic belief and integrity of a zealous changemaker (by whatever label) is vital to human progress. That makes it sacred.

I like the way that John Gardner described it.

"[People] of integrity, by their very existence, rekindle the belief that as a people we can live above the level of moral squalor. We need that belief; a cynical community is a corrupt community."

I often encourage young people to fail big as soon as they possibly can because learning how to get back up is far more useful than learning how to never fall down. You would still be crawling if this were not inherently true. Think how limiting that life would be.

Time flies so how long should you crawl? Are you a changemaker by any name?