PAKISTAN: United States brings a hip-hop troupe over from Chicago to Islamabad in a bid to help win hearts and minds in Pakistan

Record ID: 510538

  • Title: PAKISTAN: United States brings a hip-hop troupe over from Chicago to Islamabad in a bid to help win hearts and minds in Pakistan
  • Date: 16th November 2011
  • Summary: ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN (NOVEMBER 15, 2011) (REUTERS) DANCER PERFORMING ON STAGE AUDIENCE WATCHING AUDIENCE DANCING TO MUSIC
  • Embargoed: 1st December 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Pakistan, Pakistan
  • Country: Pakistan
  • Topics: International Relations,Entertainment,Quirky,Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA8FNK7FLYD4NG9EUVZGRQ7HTRO
  • Story Text: Considered by many Pakistanis to be public enemy number one, the United States has turned to music in an attempt to counter its highly unpopular image in the south Asian nation.
    As part of its cultural diplomacy programme, the U.S. embassy brought the FEW Collective, a hip-hop troupe from Chicago, to Islamabad, where they danced, rapped and recited poetry to a Westernised, educated elite audience of young Pakistanis.
    The group's 10-day trip is the latest by a number of musical acts sponsored by the State Department as part of its American Festival of the Arts, a cultural programme designed to promote exchanges between the people of the two countries.
    "I think it's a very interesting event because they want to bring a bit of their culture as well as they are using parts of our culture in their show as well, I've heard. And I think it's very interesting to show that they are not just an isolated people, America. There are some people there who are empathetic to the rest of the world and they want to come and mingle in and show what they have and show that they are not like, you know, completely against third world countries," said 21-year-old student Zainab.
    But FEW Collective has its work cut out. Only 12 percent of Pakistanis have a favorable opinion of the United States, according to a July poll by the Pew Research Center, while 73 percent have an unfavorable opinion and 16 percent don't know.
    The goal of the cultural initiative is to try and portray a more positive image of the U.S. to Pakistani youngsters.
    "A success to us is that we invite students we've never met before, they see a programme they've never seen before, they're exposed to a type of music perhaps they haven't heard before, and they walk away thinking 'gosh that was interesting, I really appreciate the fact that the embassy reached out to us, I appreciate the fact that they're interested in students, they're interested in people, that there's another level to the relationship'. It's not just government and government, military and military, it's people and people," said U.S. assistant cultural attache Jamie Martin.
    Such cultural events -- which have included the Ari Roland jazz group and country-pop star Mary McBride -- are part of a long-standing State Department tradition. Jazz greats Dizzy Gillespie and Dave Brubeck toured Pakistan in the late 1950s as part of the programme.
    Asad Jafri, a founder of the FEW collective, was born to Pakistani parents in Kuwait but taken to America's Midwest aged 10 when the 1991 Gulf War broke out. He said he grew up hating his Pakistani heritage.
    However, he was positive about the cultural programme.
    "I definitely think that the State Department's initiative to soften the image of Americans and America in Pakistan is working," he said.
    Other members of the troupe said they saw their purpose in Pakistan as not only representing the United States, but empowering young Pakistanis to find their own voices.
    "It's (hip hop) a movement of the people and it was an entire cultural movement. You know, it had music, a visual element, it had a sound element, a poetry element, it was an entire culture that came out and it was a culture of resistance, it's a culture of resistance to oppression," said lead vocalist Alsarah, who moved to the United States as a child after fleeing political oppression and war in Sudan and Yemen.
    Strong negative perceptions of the U.S. are often cited by the Pakistani military as one reason why Pakistan won't tackle militants in its wild border regions where Taliban groups plan attacks on NATO forces in Afghanistan.
    Rampant anti-Americanism in Pakistan also allows the government to avoid making needed -- but unpopular -- economic reforms demanded by international lending agencies, which are widely seen as aligned with the United States.
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