Rah Digga is set to open The NJ Dance Network, a facility in Downtown Newark, New Jersey meant to become a safe haven for at-risk youth in the city. Recently, Rah Digga spoke with HipHopDX about why she has become involved with the dance studio and what she’s hoping to accomplish through this campaign.
“I chose to launch this campaign for a number of reasons,” Rah Digga said in an exclusive statement to HipHopDX. “The main one being, I have a 17-year-old daughter and I’m tired of taking her to friends’ funerals. Newark is filled with talented kids, but most of them are a product of the environment. I know the one thing the good kids and the bad kids all love to do here and that’s dance to club music, so I’m building them a dance clubhouse right [in] downtown Newark. It will be a Breakin‘ style community center.”
Rah Digga also addressed the role of performance art in the development of a person’s social skills.
“A lot of these kids have problems in conventional school settings because they don’t come from conventional home settings,” Digga said. “Or maybe they’re just right-brainers that fancy the arts. Most of the times, kids use art and performance to express themselves when they can’t speak the words. It prepares that child to be a happier, healthier, more well-rounded adult.”
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Digga says she understands the importance of art in the life of children because music helped her in her formative years and beyond.
“Music was always a huge part of my life and I knew it would continue to be,” Digga said. “My love for the culture molded me into the person I am today. It’s nice to know I can use my love for the arts to actually save lives now.”
Rah Digga To Release “Hood House: So Jersey” EP
To help with this initiative, Rah Digga has launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds for the program. The rapper is also readying a mixtape, which she is slated to use to promote her campaign.
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“I am releasing [an] EP entitled Hood House: So Jersey, tentatively scheduled for December 2013,” Digga said in a statement on Kickstarter. “I will be releasing a series of videos for the EP to be packaged as a dance DVD, which casts participants of the NJ Dance Network. It is my hope that employing people directly from the community would be a great way to boost morale and offer them a chance to experience pop culture in a positive environment while utilizing his or her natural born talents.”
A promotional video for the initiative can be viewed below.
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