Introduction

Abstract

This special section is a small window into the role Cuban performing arts play in engaging citizens in a sense of place and in promoting better understanding and commitment to environmental issues and activism. The two performances and the poetry reading, transcribed and with video links, do not represent the broad diversity and complexity of Cuban performing arts. Nor does this section represent the extensive outreach through specific agencies concerning environmental issues in the country, for example, Fundación Antonio Núñez Jiménez de la Naturaleza y el Hombre, a nongovernmental scientific and cultural institution dedicated to the research and promotion of environmental protection. The goal of this special section is to offer a venue for Cuban writers, actors, and artists who often use their art as a means to engage audiences about their concepts of and commitment to home and the environmental opportunities and challenges they face. Over the last three years, we, Melinda Levin and David Taylor, have had the good fortune of traveling to Cuba three times to develop collaborative relationships with faculty in the Geography Department at the University of Havana and with organizations such as UNEAC (National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba) and El Consejo Nacional de las Artes Escénicas del Ministerio de Cultura de Cuba (C.N.A.E. or Artes Escenicas), in part for the purpose of developing a Study Abroad class focused on Sustainability in Cuba. In May 2014, 21 students and four faculty from the University of North Texas (Biology, Geography, Documentary Film, and Literary Studies) traveled to Cuba to meet with and learn from Cuban professors, city historians, scientists, sustainability experts, and artists to better understand Cuba's unique situation in sustainability in the Western hemisphere. During this visit, we were invited by Artes Escenicas to return to Cuba to work with them to film theatre groups and performing artists engaged in environmental awareness.