'Voice and Choice' - Development of a mobile application to enable the deaf dancers in Cambodia

I am currently working on a research project to explore the use of empathic and user-led research design methods to develop an initial concept for the creation of a mobile application to enable the deaf dancers I work with in Cambodia to independently record workshops plans, which will therefore give them more voice and more choice in their work.

The Epic Encounters Company at Epic Arts in Cambodia create dance and theatre based on issues facing Cambodia and then perform them for the community and international audiences. The Epic Encounters Company also deliver inclusive movement based lessons throughout Cambodia and abroad to both children and adults.

The Epic Encounters Company work together to develop movement based lessons that they then deliver independently. Most of the team members are illiterate and cannot record their lessons plans in writing. Currently they record their lessons plans in note form using stick-figure drawings and sketches or their lessons plans are recorded for them by support staff and then collated on a computer before being printed out and give to them.

Epic Arts believes in supporting all its staff and students to be independent and creative and continuously explores methods to enable people with disabilities to be independent within their roles. The ‘Epic Arts Communication Policy’ states, “We believed in clear, accessible, high quality and inclusive communication for everyone. We celebrate the languages in use within our organisation and embrace inclusive communication in written, spoken or signed form.” (Epic Arts Inclusion Policy. 2014). ‘The Epic Arts Manifesto’ also emphasizes the importance placed on inclusive and accessible communication methods by stating that, “Every person should be enabled to understand information and instructions through communication in all its different forms.” (The Epic Arts Manifesto. 2015). Currently the methods available to Epic Encounters to plan and record movement based lessons are time consuming, at times ineffective and do not enable the performers to communicate and record independently.

I was recently commissioned to undertake a study into the way that people with disabilities access the media in Cambodia and the study revealed that 97% of all staff and students surveyed at Epic Arts use a smart phone or tablet and are very familiar with the use of mobile applications. Epic Encounters have access to an iPad and use this sometimes to video and photograph sign language to use when recording lessons plans. The performers use the iPad to photograph sign words or other images that represent activities and then a staff support member will add these images to a lesson plan document to help the performers to remember activities planned. This mobile application development project aims to explore the possibilities of incorporating photography and/or video in to a simple mobile application that could enable the performers to create their own plans independent of any assistance.

As the mobile application will be used by the performers and other arts teachers who are training within Epic Arts, it is essential that the users themselves are involved in the design process. So, this week I conducted the first focus group with the dancers to hear their voices and choices around their personal needs and requirements regarding a planning app. Here is a video of the session;

Working with a graphic designer, I hope to create some initial designs for an app that can be made in to a reality in the future. An app like this will bring great benefit to the dancers and arts teachers at Epic Arts and it also has the potential to be used by other artists worldwide who have limited reading and writing skills, but who wish to use a simple image based method to independently record lesson plans or activity plans. The mobile application could be used in a number of ways including enabling users to create daily plans and timetables of activities or lesson plans in a simple format. 

'Voice and Choice' - 'Hopes and Fears' Project with Alice Fox from the University of Brighton

This month I was very lucky to work with Alice Fox from the University of Brighton. Alice is the founder of the Inclusive Arts MA course at the university and also a Board member for Epic Arts. Alice and fellow researcher, Duncan Bullen, worked with students and staff in Cambodia to uncover their hopes and fears.

Using rubber stamps, these hopes and fears were captured and then used to create art work and an installation of 'hope' that encircled one of the buildings at the Epic Arts centre in Cambodia.

The whole project was focused on giving space to hear peoples voices and thoughts and on providing opportunities to speak, share and communicate desired and fears.

Here is a video of the project:

The hopes that staff and students shared were;

• Artist
• Dancer
• Performer
• Sign language teacher
• Grocery seller
• New ideas
• Art teacher
• Job in government
• Singer and songwriter 
• Musician 
• Khmer /English translator
• Share my ideas
• To do something wonderful
• Trust myself
• Learn khmer traditional art
• Computer/office work
• Healthy
• My own house
• Workshop leader
• Move to Phnom Penh
• Own shop 
• Make a family
• Be a manager
• Growth
• A greater leader
• More experience
• Work and skills
• Epic Arts to become stronger
• More children at Epic Arts
• Empathy 
• Peace

The fears shared were; 

• No Job
• Afraid and scared
• Illness
• No money
• Hopeless
• Anger of other people
• Miss my mother
• Fear of failing
• No time to study
• Loss of nature due to buildings
• Loss of traditional Khmer art
• Treatment fees
• Go Far from family
• Uncertainty
• Over power of government
• Safety on road
• Climate changeIntolerance
• Isolation

'Voice and Choice' - Picture Timetables and Computer Skills

This week I have been exploring further the development of Savy and Sokun at Epic Arts, as they uncover what they feel they need to learn in order to lead the Epic Encounters team effectively. 

This week, communication of events was high on the agenda after last weeks discussions on how best to communicate between Savy, Sokun and myself. In our last meeting we explored how we could all keep a check on our meetings and record roles and responsibilities. Both dancers expressed a desire for a personal notebook that was theirs to use in meetings. A simple request, but something that seemed to give value and importance to their new roles. A notebook that enabled independence; they could record things for themselves (in whatever way they wanted to) seemed to give them pride, ownership and a sense of responsibility in their roles.

Savy and Sokun with their note books

Due to many of the dancers, staff and students not be able to read and write, picture based timetables are a key element of communication at Epic Arts. Previously these have been made FOR the Epic Encounters team by someone else and, not BY them. As the dancers themselves do not select the images, it sometimes means they are left confused with what images meant. So Savy, Sokun and myself decided it would be much more effective for someone who uses the picture timetables themselves to make them for the rest of the team with some support.

Before we could begin to hand over the role of creating picture timetables for the team, we first had to tackle the fact that Savy has never used a computer before. Sokun has good skills in this area, so we decided that a bit of peer learning/teaching would work well here. So they set about working out together how they could make a picture timetable.

A picture timetable at Epic Arts

This exploration led to further discussions around the development of skills for the Epic Encounters team. Many only learnt to sign from the age of 15, so were unable to access education and as a result have limited reading and writing skills. Savy suggested that all the dancers could learn what he was doing on a computer....so this week Sokun has gone off to explore the small town of Kampot where we are based to see if he can find a teacher who is willing to teach a group of 8 dancers who are deaf how to use word, excel, send an email etc. These are all skills we take for granted, but for many people with disabilities in Cambodia, they are often not able to attend school and therefore do not have access to the development of these skills. 

The added difficulty here will be to find a teacher who believes that the dancers can in fact learn to use a computer, such is the attitude and perspectives surrounding people with disabilities here.

'Voice and Choice' - Enabling people with disabilities to become arts leaders

At Epic Arts we spend most of our time enabling and empowering people with and without disabilities to have a voice and make their own choices in a variety of contexts. This is our day to day work that 'just happens', its a reflection of our collective inclusive attitude and belief that every person is a creative genius and that every person counts! After attending the 'Living Arts in Post-Conflict Forum' in Phnom Penh last week, I was reminded about the power of enabling people who have been oppressed to become leaders and that it makes a huge impact on the development of both individuals and society as a whole and I felt inspired to record, in someway, how we do this!

Over the last three years I have developed methods of providing voice and choice to artist, leaders, managers and students in Cambodia with disabilities and those without, with the simple attitude that there is always a way and with a little time, space and adaptability those who previously have been told or made to feel like they 'can't' or 'won't' by society, the community, their family and their government, can in fact be enabled to discover for themselves that they 'can' and 'will'.

Over the next few months I am going to try and document the methods used to develop the leadership skills of one of our performers, Savy,  as he embarks on training to become a leader of the Epic Encounters performance team in Cambodia. Savy is deaf and does not read or write, he communicates in sign, (although Cambodian Sign has limited vocabulary), pictures and videos. At the moment he is a whizz at using a smart phone but has no computer based skills. He has been a performer for the past 5 years and recently he expressed a desire to learn about the administration of the performance team; learning our bookings, monitoring and touring systems to enable him to take on new roles in the future.

Savy

So we listened and responded.... With the help of Sokun (another performer in the team) who has strong admin and language skills, we will work together with Savy to explore how we can develop his skills, communicate with him effectively and enable him to have a voice and make his own choices whilst also acting as the voice for the other dancers in the company. 

Sokun

In the context of Cambodia this will have its additional challenges that I think will become clear throughout the process. But I hope that by in some way documenting this process others will be able to see how it is possible to give a voice and provide choice to a person to enable them to grow into an effective arts leader and prove to those who say 'You can't' and 'You won't' that they are very, very wrong!

The video below documents our first discussion with Savy about how he thinks we can begin to approach this development with him. I worked with Savy, Sokun and a sign translator and we used paper, sticky notes, drawings, English and Khmer (and a little bit of miming) to workout the best ways we can communicate, pass information, make a plan for learning and development, discover skills that need to be developed and use the skills of others to help us in this process;

Here are the final 'notes' from our conversation;