When Wang (王), 24, went to jail three years ago, he had no idea he would end up in a bid to break a record for most inmates dancing together. Wang is one of more than 2,000 inmates in Changhua Prison who routinely take part in mass dancing sessions as part of a larger program aimed at reforming prisoners through art and creativity.
“I’ve made new friends since I joined the drills in July,” said Wang, incarcerated for seven years for robbery, speaking to a reporter on condition that only his family name be revealed. “I feel happier now than before.”
The culmination of the twice-weekly dance practice was a mass Lunar New Year performance given by 2,011 prisoners in front of Minister of Justice Tseng Yung-fu (曾勇夫) to the tune of a famous song by local pop diva Chang Hui-mei (張惠妹), also known as A-mei.
Photo: AFP
“I believe we’ve created a new record,” said a proud Tai Shou-nan, who as warden has responsibility for 2,724 inmates, all of them in their late teens or 20s.
This was a veiled reference to a recent Internet sensation created when 1,200 Philippine inmates were caught on video dancing to late superstar Michael Jackson’s hit This is It.
However, for Tai it is more than a question of breaking records. The prison’s program, unique among Taiwan’s 48 detention centers, is based on a belief in the transforming powers of art.
“Through continued contact with art, whatever its form, inmates will be able to boost their confidence, while nurturing a feeling of honor,” Tai said. “We think of Changhua Prison as a jail of art.”
The prison houses eight different performing ensembles, with instruments ranging from harmonica to the traditional two-stringed fiddles. One group also performs Taiwanese puppet theater.
One of the prisoners-turned-performers is 25-year-old Pan (潘), who has taken up percussion and practices with a 19-member group in three-hour sessions three days a week.
“I feel I’m confident now as my drum-beating technique keeps improving,” said Pan, who also asked to be identified only by his family name.
The drum group has performed during a religious festival in the coastal township where the prison is located and at a celebration held in the justice ministry building in downtown Taipei.
“Performing before a lot of people and winning applause from them is a kind of feeling I’ve never had before,” Pan said.
The jail has also organized groups that practice calligraphy and painting, or engage in old trades such as noodle making, furniture carpentry and even the production of traditional Chinese lanterns.
“In the beginning, we had to hire experts to teach the inmates how to make lanterns, but now they’ve become so skilled at it that they can beat their teachers,” a jail official said on condition of anonymity.
Academics support what the prison is trying to do, saying that through the art programs, inmates are able to fulfill their lives.
“In many cases, they were abandoned by society before -doing something not tolerated by the general public,” said Chang Wei-an (張維安), a sociologist at National Tsing Hua University in Hsinchu city. “Programs like these may enable them to become part of society again and live normal lives once they finish their terms.”
Pan, the drummer, was a high school dropout when he killed a person about a decade ago. He was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2004. He finished his high school programs in jail and is now awaiting parole.
He said drumming taught him to concentrate more on the tasks at hand, while helping him control his temper.
“My mind has become calm,” he said with a smile.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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