Overview
Dance for World Community (DWC) is a partnership-based initiative launched in 2009 by José Mateo Ballet Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts, The project leverages dance’s intrinsic ability to bring communities together, build trust across diverse groups and strengthen community cohesion to assemble diverse groups through a number of dance-based events. Dance for World Community has been expanding and repositioning the traditional role of dance in local communities, broadening participation and raising awareness about social and environmental issues that threaten populations at home and around the globe. With the recent initiation of its Global Network it encourages dance practitioners everywhere to consider dance’s untapped potential as a powerful force that canoe used to influence public opinion, behavior and policy. DWC’s ongoing impact in the Greater Boston areas provides exemplary evidence of the efficacy and sustainability of the project’s Local Partnership Model.
Background
Dance for World Community was conceived by Cuban-born choreographer Jose Mateo after more than twenty years into his leadership as Director of José Mateo Ballet Theatre (JMBT). At its founding in 1986, the ballet organization was conventionally structured as a school and a professional performance company, quickly gained a reputation for excellence and much praise for its pioneering work increasing access, equitable inclusion and diversity in ballet. The introduction of DWC transformed the ballet organization. The new programmatic component made more explicit JMBT’s commitment to its values and mission, allowed the organization to significantly broadened its reach and ultimately distinguished the organization from the typical model of its day.
The vision for DWC challenged the organization to extend well beyond increasing and diversifying participation within the traditionally insular and closed world of ballet. The project creates new opportunities for local dance troupes, choreographers and instructors of many different dance forms, increasing their exposure to broader audiences and supporters. Collectively, the scores of participating groups presented the area’s first broad picture of Greater Boston’s dance scene, explicitly rich in diversity and vitality. Many have created new bonds among themselves, and greater cohesion of the community as a whole.
Furthermore, DWC highlights new possibilities for cultivating dance’s vast potential as a vehicle for positive social change, the programs are presented as awareness-raising events that advocate for solutions to issues that matter to the participants and the audiences they serve. In this way, DWC challenges the biased assumptions about the dance in America as a politically quiescent, disinterested or even escapist sector, whose role is largely irrelevant to the important civic conversations about our complicated, contemporary global society.
The DWC Local Partnership Model: A Framework for Repositioning Dance in Your Community
The DWC Local Partnership Model is the framework for the project that was customized for Greater Boston based on the particular dance ecology of the area and its relationship to the broader community. There were of course many factors to consider — size and scope of the area’s dance community, political dynamics and available resources, just to name a few. As all of these factors will vary from municipality to municipality, it follows that any dance entity committed to expanding the role of dance in its community will have to formulate a model of its own that can best serve its area’s prospective participants and audiences.
Contact us to request a consultation about creating a customized model that can best serve your community today!
If you are someone who actively participates in a dance practice and who cares deeply about the issues that matter to our communities, consider learning more about the DWC Partnership Model. Perhaps you can boldly take the necessary leadership in your local community to organize a broad-based effort capable of expanding and repositioning, in some purposeful way, the role of dance in your area.
DWC staff, based in Cambridge, can help you evaluate a programmatic and support framework that would best serve your community and assess the feasibility of building the necessary partnership infrastructure. To request an initial conversation to about the prospects for building a customized DWC Local Model for your municipality, write info@danceforworldcommunity.org.
Prototypical DWC Programs implemented in Cambridge, 2009-2025
The programmatic blueprint for the Cambridge Partnership Model consisted of a number of discrete programs each designed to reach targeted segments of Greater Boston’s dance landscape that were often operating independently, some deliberately functioning as insular, siloed entities, others working in unwanted isolation or visibility. A principle strategy was to design as many different programs as would be needed to attract and engage diverse participants — from the professionally trained artist to the dance enthusiasts by avocation, including choreographers, administrators, scholars, therapists and students — and, relying on the unifying capacity of the practice, begin to demonstrate and talk about the intrinsic power of dance to connect and its possibilities as a potential platform for advocacy and powerful force for activism..
Below is a description with accompanying archives of the programs that were implemented. Although all of the programs proved capable of provoking the intended interest and impact, available resources are currently concentrated on strengthening The Annual Festival in Cambridge which remains DWC’s centerpiece. Other effective DWC Programs over the years have included “Talk About Dance” events, “Dance on Film”, “Dance Saturdays”, crisis response events such as “Cambridge for Haiti” and “Cambridge for Ukraine”, “Dance Against Racism” and Climate Change/Environmental Justice events such as “Emergency Meets” and “Choreographer-Scientist Collaborations”.
To learn more about any of the programs listed below, browse the the program archives. For further information contact info@danceforworldcommunity.org.
DWC Annual Festivals celebrate the rich diversity of Greater Boston’s dance sector and its valued contributions to the area’s cultural and economic vitality. The event is produced by JMBT in collaboration with local government, area businesses, dance organizations, other cultural agencies and social service/advocacy nonprofits. Performances and introductory-level classes are offered by over 60 local dance companies presented on multiple outdoor stages along Harvard Square’s Massachusetts Avenue and in JMBT studios. Over 20 local nonprofits display exhibits to engage attendees and raise awareness about important social and environmental issues. Offerings by local businesses, exhibiting artists and food vendors are also made available. The Festival is free to the public and attended by approximately 20,000 people.
Talk About Dance is a series of events that provides members of the dance community with opportunities to forge new bonds by sharing stories and exchanging ideas about the power of dance and its capacity to create positive social change. The events present panels and guest speakers to lead discussions about reasons and ways to expand the role of dance in education, leadership development, advocacy, civic engagement and other areas. The events conclude with facilitated, café-style conversations to create new connections among participants and strengthen cohesion of the local dance community.
Archives →
Dance On Film is a series of mini-festivals each presenting four or five film or video productions ranging from well-known movies highlighting a particular dance form to documentary films about less visible but noteworthy dance settings and personalities. These mini-film festivals are logistically challenging to organize but serve the valuable purpose of opening minds and educating viewers about historically important figures and events through dance-based stories about human passion, determination and resilience expressed in diverse forms of dance.
Dance Saturdays Is a series of events, held on Saturday nights at The Sanctuary Theatre, each showcasing a leading performance group from one of the many communities in Greater Boston’s diverse and culturally rich dance landscape. Performances are presented along with culturally-specific musical, visual, and culinary offerings to provide an immersive, celebratory experience for the broader community. Dance Saturdays introduces local audiences to the area’s dedicated stewards of Classical Indian Dance, Traditional Japanese Dance, Hip hop, Salsa, Traditional Greek Dance, Tap, Flamenco, Contemporary Dance Theatre, Ballet, and West African Dance, and other area dance communities.
Climate Change/Environmental Justice Events Series was initially focused on raising awareness about the imminent threats of climate change at a time when insufficient attention or credibility were being given to early warnings and mounting scientific evidence. By it’s second “Emergency Meet”, the series had begun to shift its focus more specifically on Environmental Justice, inviting scientists and other climate professionals to consort with members of the dance community as a novel way of engaging and raising awareness of new audiences about the inequities in environmental impacts and project planning. Environmental Sustainabilities, a term coined by Tufts Professor Julian Agyeman, was the theme of DWC Conference 2025, for which he delivered the keynote speech.
Crisis Response Events are gatherings hosted by DWC in response to unforeseen disasters. They are dance-based events that increase awareness, raise funds and prompt community action to help devastated populations. While DWC would seem well-poised to organize these events given its access to its partnership network, limitation of resources prevent the project from responding to the overwhelming number of deserving causes. To date, DWC has hosted “Relief for Haiti” after the island’s earthquake and “Cambridge for Ukraine” after the country’s invasion by Russian forces. These efforts were a clear demonstration that the dance sector can assume the necessary community leadership to organize key partners with whom to come to the assistance of those who suddenly and desperately need vital support.