Quiet As It’s Kept  is a dance project that explores the intersection of historical sexual trauma, southern culture, and silence in the African-American community. As a point of departure, the program interprets the oral histories of black survivors of sexual abuse living in rural coastal North Carolina. The program incorporates dance, puppetry, and music rooted in the region’s traditional folk arts.

Quiet As It’s Kept directly addresses historical and systemic racism and trauma by centering the suppressed narratives of African-American sexual assault victims. By coming together to share stories, we give language, shape, and form to our experiences and the need for safety.

Quiet As It’s Kept will, through movement, storytelling, and reflection, fuse the arts into a reconciliation and revival process that empowers and gives voice to southern communities of color, helping them grapple with the sociopolitical causes and effects of their traumatization and to make multigenerational and transcultural connections through art.