{"id":460,"date":"2018-10-04T23:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-10-04T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/?p=460"},"modified":"2025-06-11T10:09:17","modified_gmt":"2025-06-11T10:09:17","slug":"survivors-of-sex-trafficking-and-abuse-are-getting-a-second-chance-through-ballet-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/2018\/10\/04\/survivors-of-sex-trafficking-and-abuse-are-getting-a-second-chance-through-ballet-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Survivors of Sex Trafficking and Abuse Are Getting A Second Chance Through Ballet"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThey say that not all heroes wear capes. It\u2019s true: Some, like Meredith Harper Houston, wear leg warmers.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tA few years back, Houston, who is black, began thinking about how none of the students at her Los Angeles dance studio looked like her. Her desire to use dance to serve her community eventually led her to found The Swan Within<\/a>, an outreach organization that teaches ballet to girls in juvenile detention centers, many of whom have been sex trafficked.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019ve been a dancer my whole life,\u201d says Houston. \u201cI started at the age of 5; ironically the same age that I was sexually abused. I used dance as my vehicle out of the house.\u201d Today, Houston wants to give girls the same opportunity to escape their past, and use dance as a springboard to their future.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tWe talked to Houston about what it\u2019s like to teach students who\u2019ve experienced trauma, and how ballet is transforming her students\u2019 lives:\n<\/p>\n

\n

What Ballet Can Do For Trauma Survivors<\/h3>\n

\tMany of Houston\u2019s students have survived sex trafficking and\/or abuse.<\/small>
\n Courtesy Meredith Harper Houston<\/small><\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI wanted to work with girls who were victims of sex trauma because I know what it feels like to have an out-of-body experience,\u201d says Houston. \u201cI wanted them to have agency over their body, to feel pretty, to feel whimsical. I wanted little girls to be little girls instead of being hypersexualized. And with the extreme difficulty of the task at hand, this could be the time that they don\u2019t have to think about what they\u2019re going through. In ballet, we learn how to remain in grace. How can we use that in our everyday life?\u201d\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

How She Approaches Her Classes<\/h3>\n

\tHouston introduces her students to Michaela DePrince for inspiration.<\/small>
\n Courtesy Houston<\/small><\/p>\n

\n\tHouston\u2019s classes aren\u2019t what you\u2019d see in a typical ballet studio. She gives her students a ballet etiquette contract, outlining what will be asked of them\u2014but she allows them to amend their contracts, adding what they might want to hold her accountable to as a teacher. \u201cI let them have power from the beginning,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tShe also has them choreograph their own pieces. \u201cA lot of them are really intimidated about dancing, but giving them a space where they can create a piece, they feel more confident to go put themselves out there,\u201d she says. \u201cI do that so they can feel important and so we can see what is working in their minds, what genius is there. A couple of them have gone on to perform those pieces.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n\tBut teaching teenagers who\u2019ve experienced trauma poses its major challenges. \u201cThey are so used to defending themselves,\u201d says Houston. \u201cWhen you say, Point your toes, they\u2019re like, I did!\u201d\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

How She Includes LGBT Youth<\/h3>\n

\tHouston wants her class to be open to those who don\u2019t consider themselves feminine.<\/small>
\n Courtesy Houston<\/small><\/p>\n

\n\tHarper recognizes that ballet can feel like an unwelcoming environment for LGBT youth, so she\u2019s taken steps\u2014like offering different clothing options and introducing partnering classes\u2014to make her program inclusive of transgender teens as well as those who just don\u2019t feel comfortable wearing tutus. \u201cThe beautiful thing is that they are all accepting of each other,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

The Transformations She\u2019s Seen<\/h3>\n

\tGirls in rival gangs forge bonds in Houston\u2019s classes.<\/small>
\n Courtesy Houston<\/small><\/p>\n

\n\tOne of the most rewarding parts of the program, Houston says, is watching tensions between rival gang members dissolve through dance. \u201cWe find a way for them to break down the anger and the animosity to become supportive of each other,\u201d she says. \u201cBy the end they\u2019re friends. Just watching that will make you cry.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n\tHouston has awarded some girls with scholarships to continue training once they\u2019ve been released, one of whom will be coming on to serve as a peer youth counselor for The Swan Within. \u201cIt\u2019s everything we could have hoped for,\u201d says Houston.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

What\u2019s Next for The Swan Within<\/h3>\n

\tThe program is expanding to five new cities next year.<\/small>
\n Courtesy Houston<\/small><\/p>\n

\n\tNext year, The Swan Within will launch pilot programs in Las Vegas, New York City, Washington, DC, Atlanta and Miami. Houston is also interested in bringing her program to immigration detention centers in the Houston area, and partnering with dance studios and companies across the country to provide girls with training and scholarships once they\u2019re released.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tShe also wants to keep educating the public\u2014especially young girls\u2014about sex trafficking. Many of the girls she works with don\u2019t understand the extent of what happened to them, she says. She trains them about the dangers of social media, and how to avoid situations where recruitment happens. \u201cI want them to be able to walk into the world knowing that this was just a blip in time,\u201d she says.\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The post Survivors of Sex Trafficking and Abuse Are Getting A Second Chance Through Ballet<\/a> appeared first on Dance Magazine<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

They say that not all heroes wear capes. It\u2019s true: Some, like Meredith Harper Houston, wear leg warmers. A few years back, Houston, who is black, began thinking about how none of the students at her Los Angeles dance studio looked like her. Her desire to use dance to serve her community eventually led her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=460"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":514,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460\/revisions\/514"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}