Asian Media Access News

Asian Media Access and CLUES have Joined Forces

Added 23 March 2002

Asian Media Access and CLUES have joined forces to train the Pan Asian and Hispanic youth in Tobacco Prevention.

Since last October, youth from Asian Media Access have been practicing Spanish with their new partners -- Chicano and Latino youth from CLUES (Chicano Latino Unidos En Servico). Besides they all young, energetic and call each other "Amigo!!", these two group of youth do share a deep concern about -- arising youth smoking rate, and they all take action -- wanting to stop them.

According to the 2000 US Census, the Asian Pacific and Latino/Chicano groups are two of the fastest growing minority populations in Minnesota (and in the US). They are rapidly changing the ethnic landscape of Minnesota. A substantial portion of these two populations are below the age of 20 and reside in lower income areas in the inner city. Recognizing the problem and also opportunities reside within the community, Asian Media Access and CLUES have teamed up to bring together Asian Pacific Islander youth and Chicano Latino youth from disadvantaged background to participate in a year long Bicultural Arts Education Training. The project is to encourage Pan Asian and Chicano/Latino youth to utilize media and the performing arts as tools for advocacy and civic participation as well as to explore social issues and engage in cross-cultural dialogue.

CLUES and AMA have jointly hosted a monthly training in leadership development, arts and tobacco prevention. The goal is to provide a venue for the youth to learn the smoking behaviors that exist in both the API and Chicano/Latino communities, and use arts to tackle tobacco issues. For example, in last December, Their main focus of the day was in the action. Using action, the youth learned about such things as communication, teamwork, and awareness. They learned how their bodies from head to toe would say a lot about their emotions and getting across what they wanted, in their case they were learning how to express what their feelings towards smoking was, through the use of their expression and gestures. One of the exercises that had the best response out of the youth was the Group Sculpture. This performing exercise placed the youth into different groups with each group posing in a different scenario relating to tobacco smoking. Then the Group Sculpture would transform into another Sculpture to present a solution to such smoking problem. The youth have great fun in posting the act, then transforming such problem into a positive solution.

Using arts to get prevention messages cross among youth audience, is just one of the goals in the Collaboration. Besides the prevention issues, both organizations hope this collaboration can provide an unique opportunity for both groups of youth to really experience the cultural diversity that we celebrate in the Twin Cities. Diversity needs openness, a willingness to understand and to embrace the differences of others at the same time understanding we have more in common with each other than there are differences. These joint-training activities represent a small but important step in fostering better relations among the various ethnic groups that make up our community.

The Collaboration between the two groups is a great success in all aspects -- it bridges the two different communities of color, but also successfully bridges the two different subjects -- Tobacco Prevention and Arts together.