After the touch of violence : transforming the affects of violence in displaced communities through dance improvisation

Abstract

I arrived in San Jose, capital city of Costa Rica, on July 4, 2019, to deliver four weeks of dance improvisation and meditation to Nicaraguan people fleeing from persecution and human rights violations. With the support of the Higginson Leadership Award (Queen's University Belfast) and a network of grassroots organisations based in Costa Rica, my plan was to facilitate tools for wellbeing to a displaced community. My initial thought was that dance improvisation and meditation practice could contribute to a humanitarian aid programme as a resource for supporting people who had lived through traumatic events, but my experience working with exiles would shift my thinking.