Studio McCutch

Meet Jelanii Kabita, a transgender man who dances to be free

Jelanii Kabita has dedicated his life to two simple principles: authenticity and dance. As his body syncs to the music, the boombox tattoo scrawled across his stomach dances along with each downbeat. It’s immediately clear that he was made to move.

“I dance to be free,” Kabita told Mic in an in-studio interview. “I dance to eat. I dance to live. I guess I perform dance to show other people that there’s other ways to express what’s going on inside of you.”

Kabita set himself on a path to freedom early on, after experiencing a rocky childhood in Kingston, New York. The 23-year-old first came out as bisexual to his mother in middle school. From that moment on, he endured severe abuse and was ultimately forced out of his home and into foster care. After finding his way to New York City, he found a sense of identity and belonging within the dance community.

Now, Kabita is the leader and founder of the Raiders of Concrete, a street dance crew composed of dancers from several different countries and backgrounds. Mic sat down with Kabita, who shared that he came out as transgender two years ago, and learned more about the story that brought him to where he is today. Read our interview with Jelanii. 

Dancers After Dark 

In the words of the artist Jordan Matter:

Dancers are dreamers. Many have left the comfort zone of a familiar life to pursue an ambition fraught with nearly impossible odds of success. They work countless hours over many years, driven not by profit or fame but by a quest to bring their dream world to reality. Etched into their bodies is extraordinary perseverance, and when stripped of their clothing we see each layer of muscle and every subtlety of physical expression. They are an inspiring embodiment of intense commitment to a life’s passion.

Dancers After Dark celebrates this optimism. It is about a willingness to say yes to the unlikely, the outrageous, the impractical. There is no obvious reason why any of these amazing performers would volunteer for this project. It was frequently very cold; it was usually late; it was dangerous, illegal, exhausting, and, of course, they’re naked. Yet they still said yes. Why? Because they shared my belief that if we leap, the net will appear. Often in life we have to run toward our goals blindfolded, trusting our instincts to guide us. These images represent our willingness to throw ourselves into the streets without fear of failure. Doing so led to beauty and exhilaration we could not have imagined.

Your body is an incredibly bizarre machine.