A new play about borders has found an unusual way to transcend them: by integrating local experiences in each new place it is performed. When it travels Aug. 26 to Akwesasne, the Mohawk Nation territory divided by the U.S.-Canada border, the script will incorporate stories of local Mohawk people, some of whom will join the cast.
鈥淩oot Map,鈥 an international collaboration between Cornell University鈥檚 麻豆视频 and 麻豆视频 and Jadavpur University in Kolkata, India, interweaves stories from different cultures to explore the similarities people experience when encountering borders. It had its inaugural performance Jan. 27 in Kolkata, India, followed by performances in Ithaca, New York, and El Paso, Texas. In each city, local actors join the production, contributing new material to the script that reflects their experiences with borders.
鈥淭he script is dynamic,鈥 explains Abraham Francis, a member of the Mohawk Nation and a Cornell graduate student. 鈥淚n the Akwesasne production, our community, our elders and our youth, the people who hold these stories of pain and struggle with the border, will be expressed in relationship to those other stories in 鈥楻oot Map,鈥 and the script will be modified to situate it within Akwesasne.鈥
The collaborative play includes academics and artists with diverse cultural heritages across Asia, Africa, Europe, North America and South America. The Akwesasne production will include actors from New York and Kolkata. In addition to Francis, graduate students Samuel Bosco and Jayme Kilburn will travel to Akwesasne to perform.
Several intensive theater workshops with the local cast will be held at Akwesasne in August to gather material for the script and to familiarize the local actors with the production. The workshops will also cover improvisation, masks and other theater elements included in 鈥淩oot Map,鈥 according to producer Debra Castillo, director of Cornell鈥檚 Latina/o Studies Program, the Emerson Hinchliff Chair of Hispanic Studies and professor of comparative literature.
All the stories in 鈥淩oot Map鈥 are firsthand or from family members, said Rosalie Purvis, a doctoral student in Cornell鈥檚 Department of Performing and Media Arts, who served as primary writer of the play. During the initial writing process, which included the entire cast, 鈥渨e kept finding more and more commonalities in the tropes and images even though our experiences were in different landscapes and cultures,鈥 she said.
The stories the collaborators contributed are deeply personal. Francis grew up in Akwesasne, living in a nation divided by the U.S.-Canada border. Purvis is the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors and grew up partly in the Netherlands. Carolina Osorio Gil, Latina/o studies engagement coordinator at Cornell, came to the United States from Colombia when she was 4 years old, crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally (she is now a citizen). Despite difference experiences, crossing borders is a shared aesthetic, noted Purvis.
Osorio Gil pointed out that not everyone dealing with borders is a migrant. Like many other indigenous communities, Akwesasne has been divided by war and politics, and residents must deal with border agents on their land on a daily basis. 鈥淏orders are arbitrary. People don鈥檛 cross borders, borders cross people,鈥 said Osorio Gil.
Because the play incorporates nine languages, the music is an important component of the production. Originally written in Kolkata, the music will be reinterpreted by musicians in Akwesasne for the production.
鈥淥ur goal for the play is for it to supersede language,鈥 Purvis said, noting that meaning is communicated through music, gesture and emotion.
鈥淚n migration, we鈥檙e all exposed to languages we don鈥檛 understand, so the audience will encounter words they don鈥檛 understand. That鈥檚 an important part of the experience.鈥
Linda B. Glaser is a staff writer for the 麻豆视频 and 麻豆视频.
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