Internship Blog: Cynthia Caul, Post #1

‘Inclusive’ Community Development

First, the introductions: my name is Cynthia Caul, and I am interning this summer at City of Asylum. 

Me: I am a soon-to-be second-semester MID student, majoring in Nongovernmental Organizations and Civil Society.
  
City of Asylum:  City of Asylum: Pittsburgh is based in the city’s North Side. It is an organization committed to creating a community and platform for under-heard voices in Pittsburgh and around the world. The organization fulfills its mission by providing refuge to endangered literary writers from other countries, as well as by hosting art and community-based literary programs here in Pittsburgh that facilitate cross-cultural exchange.
   
City of Asylum and Me: This summer, I am assisting City of Asylum with their Summer on Sampsonia program. It is the second season of this program, which includes a number of free events (concerts, readings, theatre, etc.) designed to facilitate community development through thoughtful discussion and cultural understanding.
 

The first event of the summer just wrapped up last week: A (micro) history of world economics: danced. Beyond being a bit of a mouth-full to actually say, it is a devised, theatrical piece birthed out of the economic crises of 2007 by French playwright Pascal Rambert. It was written to illustrate, and arguably educate an audience, about our shared economic history—the timeline of events, concepts, and anxieties (or speculations) that led up to the crises.

Furthermore, the piece is designed to include and showcase the work of “real people” (i.e. not professional performers). This particular production included roughly 50 members of the disability community from all over Pittsburgh. They met daily for two weeks to write, learn choreography and lines, and ultimately create and perform a piece of art-- or perform hours of what Adam Smith would have classified as “unproductive labor” (Disclaimer: I would never have been able to make such a reference before seeing this play).

Photo credit: Brennan Maine

Community development is most effective when it’s inclusive—when it gives every community member equal opportunity to be involved in the planning and implementation. For this program, on the macro-level, this entailed efficient beneficiary targeting, effective communication, accessible facilities, and sufficient funding to make it all happen. On the micro-level, this meant ordering Ubers and Lyfts for participants without licenses or means of transportation. It meant providing dinner and cool refreshments for participants heading to rehearsals straight from work and stipends to cover parking and fuel expenses. It meant installing screens for closed-captioning, providing assistive audio devices and ESL interpreters. It meant listening and learning and adjusting accordingly. That has been the past two weeks for me.