What is Dance4Life?
Dance4Life started out as a direct response to the fact that HIV and AIDS are hitting the world’s young people the hardest. Of the 12,000 people infected every day, more than half are under 25 years old.
Today’s generation of young people don’t know a world without AIDS, but do live in a world changed by it. Even so, many still lack comprehensive and correct knowledge about HIV and AIDS and how to prevent infection. World leaders agreed in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) that this situation was unacceptable and that young people have the right to education, information and access to services that could protect them. However the situation still continues.
Dance4Life actively involves youth all around the world in pushing back HIV and AIDS and fighting the stigma and taboos surrounding them. Youth can participate in Dance4Life through Dance4Life Schools Project and Act4Life, which isn’t about boring books, preaching or homework – it’s about dance, music, drumming, videos, and you – standing up for what you believe in.
There are four parts to the project:
 - The Dance4Life Tour Team visits schools - musicians, dancers (to teach the worldwide Dance4Life Drill!), peer educators and young people living with HIV – holding workshops about HIV and AIDS with video presentations, discussions, peer education, and dance. For all the youth attending, the experience is personal, interactive and moving, and leads to:
 - Act4Life – Actually doing something like becoming a volunteer, raising funds for HIV and AIDS prevention projects, raising awareness amongst friends, family and community and anything else you can think of.
 - The life skills programme is all about learning more about HIV, sexuality and prevention, human rights, the relationship between drug abuse and HIV etc. And about learning important skills such as negotiation skills (NO is NO) and communication skills.
 - The grand finale of the Schools Project is the worldwide mega Dance4Life Event every 2 years on the Saturday before World AIDS Day (next event on 29 November 2008!).
With a growing number of countries joining the Dance4Life Event every 2 years, the Saturday before World AIDS Day in 2014 will be the last chance for a visible call to action – one year before the MDGs should be realised. One million young people all over the globe will dance together for life, inspiring the media, companies and each other, and reminding world leaders of the promises they made regarding the MDGs.
Between 2006 and 2014 we aim to have one million ‘Agents of Change’ and supporters of Dance4Life. Are you a supporter of Dance4Life? Run through this checklist and find out!:
- you’re between 13 and 25 years old
- you’re involved in Dance4Life
- you truly believe that your involvement can make a real and positive contribution to pushing back HIV and AIDS.
- you contribute in a positive and active way by doing one or more of the following: - your ‘lifestyle’ is a healthy one – you look after yourself responsibly, and you have correct information about HIV and AIDS
- you raise awareness with those around you about the themes of Dance4Life
- you are actively involved and raise money and/or awareness to help stop the spread of HIV and AIDS
Are you an agent of change and D4L supporter? Then go to Facebook or MySpace and leave us a message about what your are doing!
Do you want to do something active? Then read about Act4Life.
Do you want to see Dance4Life in action? Then watch the moodclip.
Do you want more information about: supporting Dance4Life; Dance4Life Schools Projects; participating countries; donations; HIV and AIDS facts and figures; Ambassadors; News.
- “Dance is a universal language. Dance is freedom, dance is exhilaration, dance is life. Young people deserve care, protection, condoms. Please don’t let them dance alone.”
Desmond Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, South Africa
“The way Dance4Life engages young people around the world to do something about the HIV/AIDS problem is very powerful. They offer young people an attractive way to do something themselves, and reward them with a spectacular event. The combination of serious content and entertainment assures that Dance4Life gets young people on the move.”
DJ Tiësto, Dance4Life Ambassador
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