Core positioning statement
Folkloric Dance and Mariachi music share a positive, joyous view of Mexican culture.
There is no better way to introduce someone to Mexican culture that by witnessing a high-quality performance. Folkloric dance opens doors of cultural understanding and encourages people to embrace Mexicans and other Hispanics in Michigan. Within the Hispanic/Latino community, cultural performance and arts education increases pride and positive ethnic self-identity, and keeps these traditions vibrantly alive.
The Hispanic/Latino population of Michigan is growing — and 24% of that group is Mexican. This increases the importance of promoting a positive, inclusive view of Hispanic culture in our state.
Cultural arts help young people to learn and to believe in themselves.
At EBFE, we prepare and guide our students for success. Our work is holistic, encompassing not only cultural performing arts but higher-ed preparation, career skills, financial literacy, community service, and much, much more.
Music and dance are important ways that children learn — and make learning fun. The discipline of practice improves executive functioning including memory, reasoning, flexibility and problem solving, which are critical to both academic and life success. In these programs, children also develop important social and emotional skills, increase vocabulary, and are more inspired to learn in school. Scientific studies show that music, dance, and visual arts significantly lower the toxic stress levels of children, reducing cortisol in the blood — so even on the most basic physical level, EBFE improves student’s lives and futures, particularly those who live in economically stressed families.
EBFE also helps children to be ready to learn by giving them a positive sense of themselves and by feeling connected to and embraced by their own community.
We open doors for community development using music and dance.
EBFE contributes to a more connected, creative, and compassionate community in Flint and across Michigan. Through music and dance, we reach across difference and promote community healing. EBFE has had a significant impact upon the Flint water crisis, counting Latinos in the 2020 Census, encouraging vaccination against Covid-19 (which struck Black and Brown people severely), and increasing literacy and school-readiness for Hispanic children.
Q & A
What is EBFE?
El Ballet Folklorico Estudiantil is a non-profit organization whose mission is to increase self-confidence and leadership for diverse youth through education, practice of cultural heritage, values, arts and performance of Mexican traditions.
Founded in 1988, it is Michigan’s premiere Folkloric dance company and a proud carrier of this important Mexican tradition.
What is folkloric dance?
Mexican folk dance is one of the most joyous and most visual aspects of Mexican culture. The bright costumes, flowing skirts, elaborate embroidery, headgear, and the intricate steps danced to Mariachi music, flutes and drums, evokes Mexican culture as nothing else can. Folkloric dance has deep roots in Mexico’s indigenous history and has been influenced by Spanish and African traditions as well. There are many different dances from Mexico’s diverse regions, each with unique footwork, having differing stomps or heel toe points, and choreography. It is a very theatrical dance tradition, which continues to evolve with influences from modern pop culture.
What is Mariachi music?
Beginning as regional Mexican music in the 18th century, Mariachi became the musical style most associated with Mexico in the early 20th century as it became an urban phenomenon. In 2011, UNESCO recognized mariachi as an Intangible Cultural Heritage, joining six other entries on the Mexican list of that category. Mariachi song styles and instrumentals include rancheras, corridos, cumbias, boleros, ballads, jarabes, marches, polkas, waltzes and other forms. Songs tell stories about love, betrayal, death, politics, revolutionary heroes and machismo. Musicians wear colorful charro outfits.
The mariachi music program of EBFE was formed in 2014 and has since grown from a 5-piece band to a 12-piece group that is much in demand.
How does El Ballet Folklorico Estudiantil carry on these traditions?
EBFE celebrates and preserves these important aspects of Mexican culture in three ways.
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EDUCATION: educates Hispanic Youth through quality instruction in Mexican folkloric dance and music. Mexican folkloric dance is offered to beginners, intermediate and adult learners. Music classes include mariachi ensembles and private lessons in voice, violin, guitar, trumpet and piano, and a summer Mariachi Camp for grades 4-8.
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PERFORMANCES: entertains audiences throughout Michigan with more than 60 folkloric dance and music concerts each year, performing in schools, festivals, and community events to a wide range of audiences, sharing Mexican culture and celebrating Mexican identity. Some performances are presented virtually.
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PROFESSIONAL WORKSHOPS: trains professional dancers and musicians in folkloric dance and music to ensure the future of this art form, offering workshops and internships, and participating in conferences and master classes in the U.S and Mexico.
What are EFBE’s educational programs and how do they help children?
While EFBE is focused upon traditional performing arts, the educational benefits are much broader. First and foremost is the importance of cultural identity and heritage for young people and adults. EBFE promotes community and ethnic pride. Students have produced several musical based on children’s literature with Hispanic themes:
Harvesting Hope — the story of Cesar Chavez
The Best Mariachi in the World
The Night of Las Posades (The Night of the Inns)
For each production, students read the story, drafted their own script incorporating traditional songs and dances, and present the play to the public.
EBFE also promotes literacy for Spanish speakers. Studies show that children who are read to in their first language have an easier time learning to read in their second language. The benefits are even greater for children who first learn to read in their native language. By developing early literacy skills in Spanish, EBFE also enhances children’s ability to learn to speak, read and write in English as well.
Music and dance are important ways that children learn. The discipline of practice improves executive functioning including memory, reasoning, flexibility and problem solving. In these programs, children also develop important social and emotional skills, increase vocabulary, and are more inspired to learn in school. Scientific studies show that music, dance, and visual arts significantly lower the toxic stress levels of children, reducing cortisol in the blood — so even on the most basic physical level, EBFE improves student’s lives and futures, particularly those who live in economically stressed families. EBFE also helps children to be ready to learn by giving them a positive sense of themselves and by feeling connected to and embraced by their own community.
Who supports EFBE?
The work of preserving and presenting these Mexican traditions has found widespread support, including grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Community Foundation of Greater Flint, the C. S. Mott Foundation, the A.G. BishopTrust, and from many individual donors. Public funding has come from Share Art Genesee Millage Funds and the Michigan Arts & Culture Council.
Earned revenue from ticket sales and workshop fees also provides revenue, but these are kept very affordable to allow as many people as possible to enjoy and to learn from EFBE.
How are Mexicans part of Michigan’s history and future?
Mexicans have been an important part of Michigan’s population since the early 20th century. They came to Michigan from Texas and later Central and Northern Mexico as agricultural workers, railroad workers, and for the automotive industry. The Mexican population waxed and waned with the economy: when there were jobs, men came to fill them; when agricultural seasons ended or economic slumps caused layoffs, they migrated back South. Gradually, the permanent population of Mexicans in Michigan increased. Michigan’s Hispanic/Latino population also includes many people from the Caribbean and Latin America, but Mexican remains the dominant Hispanic ethnicity.
Nationally, Hispanic/Latinos are nearly 19% of the U.S. population, more than 62 million people; and 62% of them are of Mexican heritage. Hispanic/Latino is the fastest-growing population group, accounting for 51% of entire U.S. population growth since 2010. In recent years, this population is increasing more from newborns, who are American citizens, than from new immigration; and 80% of U.S. Hispanic/Latinos are citizens, either through birth or naturalization. They are a significant and growing ethnicity in our nation.
Michigan is home to over 560,000 Hispanic/Latinos as of 2021, or 5.6% of Michigan’s population. In Lincoln Park and Holland, Hispanics are more than 24% of the population, and there are significant communities throughout the state with particular concentrations in Detroit, Grand Rapids, Pontiac and Flint.
What role has EBFE played in the Flint Community?
EBFE does more than teach performing arts. EBFE helped to form Latinos United for Flint (LUFF). This partnership of six Hispanic agencies or faith-based organizations that service Hispanics was formed as a response to the water crisis in Flint. Resources, water distribution and health information became available to residents, but the Hispanic community was not notified in a timely fashion due to all information provided through English-only media. Together, these organizations formed a coalition to pool resources and develop a timely network of information dissemination.
EBFE also collaborated with LUFF to promote Census 2020 participation. EBFE developed virtual productions to promote the census with traditional music/dance. This format was so effective that the United Way sponsored EBFE to distribute Vaccination Awareness and Voter Education information, and the Ruth Mott Foundation supported the Richfield public service announcement program.
Three opportunities to learn about Hispanic and Mexican culture
Most ethnic groups have only one or two holidays to call their own — the Mexican community in the United States has three.
El Dia de los Muertos / The Day of the Dead
This is a Mexican holiday where families welcome back the souls of their deceased relatives for a brief reunion that includes food, drink and celebration. A blend of Mesoamerican ritual, European religion and Spanish culture, the holiday is celebrated each year from October 31 to November 2.
According to tradition, the gates of heaven are opened at midnight on October 31 and the spirits of children can rejoin their families for 24 hours. The spirits of adults can do the same on November 2. This holiday plays a central role in the Disney animated movie Coco.
El Dia de los Muertos is an ancient holiday, dating back 3,000 years to pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. The Aztecs and other Nahua people living in what is now central Mexico held a cyclical view of the universe, and saw death as an integral, ever-present part of life — and recognized a challenging journey of the soul to reach the final resting place. In Nahua rituals honoring the dead, family members provided food, water and tools to aid the deceased. This inspired the contemporary Day of the Dead practice in which people leave food or other offerings on their loved ones’ graves or set them out on makeshift altars called ofrendas in their homes.
In Mexico, the Catholic Church incorporated aspects of El Dia de los Muertos into All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day — which in turn are related to the more secular celebration of Halloween.
Cinco de Mayo
Cinco de Mayo, or the fifth of May, is a holiday that celebrates Mexican culture, music, history and foodways. When France threatened to invade Mexico, the Mexican Army defended their country in an unexpected, upset victory on May 5, 1862, known as the Battle of Puebla. Cinco de Mayo was immediately embraced by the Mexican community in California. The popularity of the holiday spread through other states in the 1960s, both to commemorate the victory of indigenous Mexicans over European invaders and to celebrate Mexican culture and heritage in the United States.
Today, revelers mark the occasion with parades, parties, mariachi music, Mexican folk dancing and traditional foods such as tacos and mole poblano. It is a day for people of Mexican heritage — and admirers of Mexican culture — to draw attention to the impact that Mexicans have had upon the United States.
Hispanic Heritage Month
National Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated from September 15 to October 15 each year. First recognized by Congress in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week, it became a month-long celebration in 1988. Hispanic Heritage Month coincides with national independence days in several Latin American countries: Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica celebrate theirs on Sept. 15, followed by Mexico on Sept. 16, Chile on Sept. 18 and Belize on Sept 21.
Hispanic Heritage Month recognizes the full diversity of the 62.5 million Hispanics in the United States — one of our fastest-growing population groups and 19% of the total U.S. population. Nearly 60% are people of Mexican origin, or 37.2 million in 2021. The next largest group is Puerto Rican, numbering 5.8 million. Six other groups have 1 million or more people each: Salvadorans, Cubans, Dominicans, Guatemalans, Colombians and Hondurans. In addition, by 2021, Spaniards accounted for just about 1 million U.S. Latinos. Despite all the publicity about immigration, in 2020 and 2021 virtually all Hispanic population growth has come from births. Fewer than a third of Mexican-origin Latinos (29%) were foreign born as of 2019. Nearly 60% of Mexicans are long-time U.S. residents and arrived more than 20 years ago.
Hispanics have played a significant role in American history since the late 19th century. Mexicans came to Michigan in the early 20th century as agricultural workers harvesting beets and as automotive workers. Today, more than 560,000 Michiganders are of Mexican origin, 5.6% of the state’s population.
Hispanic Heritage Month is a joyful time of celebrating music, dance, foodways and culture. It is also a time to focus upon education and social justice in the ongoing struggle for recognition and opportunity. It is a time to honor the close relationship of the United States with Mexico, Central America, South America and the Caribbean.