Exploring our shared struggle with displacement through dance, music, and community interviews

Rogue Gestures/Foreign Bodies uses bharatanatyam and experimental movement to examine the labor of South Asian immigrant women who came to the US after the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act. Inspired by the oral histories of Indian nurses who immigrated to the US due to labor shortages, choreographer Nadhi Thekkek, and her collaborators explore the heavy and enduring work of brown women and the worlds they traverse between. They ask, who puts a price on this labor? What is the cost of opportunity? Who gets to decide how foreign we are? Through community interviews, historical texts, and poetry, Rogue Gestures/Foreign Bodies negotiates these questions and examines what it means to belong in America.

Rogue Gestures/Foreign Bodies is an ensemble work of 7 dancers with a live original score by Roopa Mahadevan, Kalaisan Kalaichelvan, and others. This work premieres Dec. 9 - 11 at ODC Theater. Rogue Gestures/Foreign Bodies were created and produced by Nava Dance Theatre.

This work is supported in part by the Zellerbach Family Foundation, San Francisco Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Arts, the Center for Cultural Innovation, and the ODC Theater Opportunity Fund.

Photo of Lalli Venkat by Lara Kaur