Expanding the boundaries of Edu-tainment and Theater Arts: Collabarating with African American and Hispanic communities to reduce health disparities

The purpose of this presentation is to describe and evaluate the ethical and cross-cultural challenges encountered when using an arts edu-tainment component with African American and Hispanic communities in Cleveland. In consultation with various stakeholders, we collaborated to identify the salient community health concerns and feasible actions needed to address them, Once these concerns were identified, the academic and community partners jointly decided on the format for the edu-tainment component. Community needs and culture largely determined the content and type of edu-tainment we utilized.

We conducted edu-tainment sessions in two diverse communities. We used local expertise, community-based arts resources and community residents to “produce” the edu-tainment. Through community dialogue sessions we learned how to effectively listen to multiple voices given cultural boundaries and personal borders.

We explore the lessons that we learned developing tailored edu-tainment as a tool to give voice, build capacity, and engage the community in addressing health disparities. Furthermore, this project provides innovative approaches to the use of edu-tainment in marginalized communities. Finally, in this project we explore the challenges that communities and academics encounter when trying to move beyond the descriptive phase of describing health disparities and instead begin to address change and works towards social action.