Adong Judith: How I use art to bridge misunderstanding
Adong Judith: Wie man mit Kunst Missverständnisse überbrückt
Adong Judith uses art as a vehicle to drive social change and trains aspiring makers to create art that dares to ask serious questions. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
who tells social-change stories,
Veränderung erzählt,
uns berühren und bewegen.
touch and move us.
und lehren uns, einfühlsam zu sein.
and teach us to empathize.
of disadvantaged groups,
benachteiligter Gruppen.
die viele ugandische Künstler
away from social, political theater
Theater fernhielt,
by former Ugandan president, Idi Amin.
ugandischen Präsidenten Idi Amin.
I am breaking the silence
Ich breche das Schweigen
conversations on taboo issues,
"Schweigen ist Gold" die Faustregel ist.
is the rule of thumb.
and challenge our minds to think,
zum Nachdenken herausfordern,
is its often one-sided nature
ist sein oft einseitiger Charakter,
alternative Ansichten macht,
who see issues differently
die Probleme anders ansehen,
sellout or plain stupid.
oder schlichtweg dumm ansehen lässt.
only in different fields.
auf unterschiedlichen Gebieten.
"stay in your truth" is misleading.
"Bleibe bei deiner Wahrheit" irreführend.
dass die Person, die man im Unrecht wähnt,
you believe is wrong
avenues of conversations.
to touch, humanize
um zu berühren, vermenschlichen
to the conversation table
an den Gesprächstisch zu kriegen,
will not magically solve all problems.
nicht auf magische Art und Weise
to create avenues
Wege zu schaffen,
many of humanity's problems.
vieler Menschheitsprobleme zu arbeiten.
of the Northern Uganda war
mit Opfern des Nord-Uganda-Kriegs
and Joseph Kony's LRA rebel group,
und der Rebellengruppe von Joseph Kony,
political leaders, religious leaders,
religiöse und kulturelle Führer,
and transitional justice leadership
die Führung der Übergangsjustiz zusammen
of justice for war crime victims --
Gerechtigkeit für Kriegsverbrechensopfer –
in the history of Uganda.
in der Geschichte Ugandas.
cover them all right now.
alle abdecken kann.
to sit at the table
an einen Tisch zu sitzen
zum Ausdruck, die sie erlitten,
the big injustice they suffered
of the war perpetrators.
der Kriegsverbrecher erleichterte.
acknowledged the victims' pain
erkannte den Schmerz der Opfer an
behind their flawed approaches.
ihren mangelhaften Ansätzen.
that has stayed with me
die mir weiterhin präsent ist,
tour of the play,
Norduganda-Tour des Stücks
von Joseph Kony vorstellte.
feeling disappointed,
dass ich enttäuscht gehe
inappropriate laughter.
unangebracht betrachteten Lachen.
entstamme Verlegenheit
was a laughter of embarrassment
of his own embarrassment.
seiner eigenen Verlegenheit.
in den Schauspielern auf der Bühne
of his past actions.
seiner früheren Taten.
a more powerfully uniting truth
verbindende Wahrheit
meiner amerikanischen Freunde geschockt
would be shocked at my ignorance
like lasagna, for instance.
Gerichten, wie zum Beispiel Lasagne.
about malakwang,
aus meiner Kultur,
richer and fuller individuals.
Individuen auseinander.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Adong Judith - Playwright, filmmakerAdong Judith uses art as a vehicle to drive social change and trains aspiring makers to create art that dares to ask serious questions.
Why you should listen
Founder and artistic director of Silent Voices Uganda, a nonprofit performing arts company, Adong Judith creates art that provokes meaningful conversation on issues often considered taboo.
Notable among her training programs is the annual Summer Theater Directors Apprenticeship, a two-tier program that combines production and training of ten aspiring theater directors. Originally only for Ugandans, Judith has opened the 2018 and future apprenticeships to aspiring theater directors across the African continent, who she believes share the same challenges in practicum gaps.
In 2018, Judith will be in residence at Illinois State University, where she will direct her 2016 social media buzz-stirring play, Ga-AD!, which explores spirituality and the place of women in Pentecostal churches. Her first social change play, Silent Voices, which she wrote after accidentally encountering the inescapable stories of war crime victims in her hometown of Gulu, developed at Sundance Institute’s Theater Lab, received its world premiere in 2012 at the National Theater of Uganda and was described by the Ugandan media as "the spiritual rebirth of theater since its decline due to political persecution of artists by the Idi Amin regime."
Adong’s plays are taught at Ivy League Universities including Dartmouth College and Princeton University, and she recently signed a contract with Methuen Publishers UK to publish Silent Voices in an anthology of Contemporary African Women Playwrights.
Adong Judith | Speaker | TED.com