Where UnLearning Begins with Thomas Warfield

Thomas Warfield is a man of many hats. He is an international star, a dancer, choreographer, singer, pianist, teacher, and advocate. It is his passion for equality, justice and loving one another that is (aside from his vibrant and colorful wardrobe) most striking and what lead me to a conversation with him around systemic oppression and the unlearning that needs to happen within our society.

While unlearning is necessary from deep within our social constructs, it begins with us as individuals. Making space for yourself is where unlearning begins. That is the unlearning we need most of all. Creating space for people to be their own. “You can’t tell them who to be,” Warfield urges. Among Thomas’ many credits, is a social science class he taught called "Social Individual Identity."

“We are all playing a role that we are taught to play. From the time we are born, as a boy you are given the message of blue, trucks, army men and if you’re a girl you get pink, dresses, hair accessories. Right off the bat, before you can even walk, the message of who you’re supposed to be is already told to you. It’s a whole system that locks you into a room. In school, the teacher knows everything, and you know nothing. There’s all of these messages that you have to decipher and as you decipher them, they are being put into your identity.”

When someone comes along and challenges our beliefs of what should and shouldn’t be, it begins to poke holes in our world and those beliefs that have been instilled in us for so long. For some, it’s an uncomfortable experience. Some people see it as an intrusion on their own existence. But where did we get lost in this belief that one can’t exist alongside the other? The existence of transgender people does not decimate the existence of cis people. A little girl deciding that she likes blue and playing with cars doesn’t take away from those that like pink and playing dress-up. We often use our differences and things we don’t understand as barriers, rather than treating them as individual identities that should be embraced. Thomas shares a story of a time when he was performing as the only Black person in a Chinese dance company. He wasn’t familiar with the area or the language, but on a chance to explore, he decided to ride the train in a remote area of China. He got off at a train station and came across a young Chinese girl sitting alone on the side of the road drawing in the dirt with a stick. When

Thomas approached, he could see that the girl was clearly petrified, and he instantly understood how foreign and unusual he must’ve seemed to this little girl. He smiled. He slowly inched his way toward her and then he picked up a stick and started drawing in the sand with her. By the time another train came, the girl was drawing with him and when he left, she smiled and waved good-bye. It took him years to realize that that single moment in time with a stranger was the meaning behind the saying “we are all one.”

“There were so many barriers,” Warfield explains. “The language, adult and child, Black and Chinese, so many ways we were not ever going to connect and yet I knew her more profoundly than some of the people I see every day. If we could all take a minute and look beyond our differences and just embrace the moments we have together and find that way to connect, we could begin the journey of unlearning. At the end of the day, its not about our sexual orientation, our gender, our age, our religion, or the color of our skin. It’s about the human connection and recognizing that we are all one.”

Reader, I invite you to participate in an exercise Thomas says he would have his students do in his class. Close your eyes. Feel your individual fingers. Feel your thumb. Feel how they are all separate. They are all individuals. The fingers each have their own place and the thumb is all the way over to one side. But, feel how they come together in the center. In the center of your hand they all become one. Envision yourself as one of these digits- whether you are gay or straight, Black or white, conservative or liberal, cis or trans, male or female. You may feel like the thumb - separate from all the others. But you are still connected, and you still belong. “Without your thumb,” Thomas puts into perspective,

“You can’t grab and hold onto this cup. You need the thumb to work with the fingers.” We are all needed. We all are an essential part of this life. When we can learn to coexist as one and embrace ourselves and each other as the beautiful individuals we are, real unlearning can begin.

Written By: Amanda Moulton-Proctor