Zackery Torres pushes to make the dance community an inclusive space for all gender identities

For Zackery Torres, sitting down and shutting up was never really an option. 

It probably would have been easier to, Torres admits. To stay in the corner after being misgendered at rehearsal again, to stop correcting friends for using the wrong pronouns, to censor themself as they worried about what other people would think.

Torres, a senior in the Glorya Kaufman School of Dance, came out as gender nonbinary during their sophomore year at USC. Doing so came with a feeling of freedom but also with its own set of challenges. Now, Torres is creating space for others in the dance industry who don’t identify within society’s strict gender binary.

Armed with a pile of frustrated voice memos and a conglomerate of thoughts hastily typed out during breaks in rehearsals, Torres began to compile their experience as a nonbinary dancer. In August, Torres published “An Evolving Conversation on Gender: Dance Edition,”  a guidebook to gender inclusivity for anyone in the dance community. And in July, Torres started Continuum Community, a company which aims to provide practical and easy to implement resources for gender inclusivity.

Torres’ journey with understanding gender identity began at age 13, when they spent two formative years as a cast member on the Lifetime shows “Abby’s Ultimate Dance Competition” and, shortly after, “Dance Moms.” Being in the public eye meant scrutiny from strangers about Torres’ gender identity and sexuality, as well as instructors who emphasized the need to be strong, muscular and traditionally masculine. This is just one of the ways that the gender binary is perpetuated in the dance industry, according to Torres. 

“I started seeing all of the expectations that teachers — well-known dance teachers, and well-known choreographers — had for me as a male dancer growing up and at the time identifying as a boy,” Torres said. “‘Oh, you’re too feminine, you need to dance like a man.’ Just having teachers tell you that on national television, all this stuff, it kind of really got to me.”

Growing up, Torres was eager to put themself in a box, to pick a label and stick with it. While Torres knew that they were attracted to men, being labeled gay “didn’t feel quite right.” Torres wondered, briefly, if they were transgender — but this, too, left them with the feeling that they weren’t embracing their full self. It wasn’t until they came to USC, and realized they were nonbinary, that this feeling subsided.

“Those conversations just weren’t prominent enough in my local communities and in my circles, so I didn’t really have the resources,” they said. “I just kind of shoved it down because I didn’t like the feeling of the unknown.”

For Torres, changing their pronouns was like putting the last piece of a puzzle into place. Torres’ childhood friend Taylor Upsahl said the shift was noticeable from the outside, too. Upsahl has known Torres since they were 10, having attended the same performing arts school in Phoenix, Ariz. Though, according to Upsahl, Torres has always been unapologetically themself, using Torres’ deserved pronouns allowed them to embrace newer facets of themself — things like their style and a newfound confidence in advocating for gender equity.

“I feel like for so long, [Torres] was like ‘I don’t want to be the person in the room that people are annoyed by,” Upsahl said. “But finally, they were like ‘Fuck that, that’s what I was put on this earth to do — to advocate for equality.’ It’s just been so insanely inspiring to see.”

Now, Torres is advocating for gender equity on an even larger scale. Their book, “An Evolving Conversation on Gender: Dance Edition” is the result of years spent in an industry that is centered around — and continues to silently enforce — the gender binary, all while publicly advertising inclusivity. Torres is aiming for a restructuring of the dance community on a day-to-day level, from costuming to rehearsals to the way classes are split up. 

Rehearsals, Torres said, often operate on the assumption that playing a character means having matching gender identities, sexualities or pronouns. Torres isn’t pushing for a change in the canon of traditional roles or choreography but for the use of modified language, so that instructors aren’t forcing the identities of fictional characters onto dancers. 

“Everyone always talks about how inclusive the arts communities are,” Torres said. “But I’m just not really feeling it. I’m not seeing it on an everyday scale.”

Torres’ own work toward rejecting the gender binary in dance started a year and a half ago, when they started advocating for further gender inclusivity within Kaufman. Torres acted as a sort of liaison between professors and students in discussions centered around the role gender plays in dance, especially the way rehearsals and classes are run. Kaufman professor Bruce McCormick, who met Torres during their sophomore year, was one of these professors. Calling Torres a “generous thought partner,” McCormick believes that Torres’ advocacy has been central to creating a more inclusive environment at Kaufman. 

“[Torres] embracing their gender identity has been beautiful to witness,” McCormick said. “They have allowed themself to be vulnerable, with faculty and fellow students, in order to push this conversation forward and educate everyone around them.”

It seemed to Torres that their push for inclusivity had enough forward momentum to make tangible change, including a goal of de-gendering ballet classes. But when the Kaufman schedule was published for the fall semester of 2019, ballet classes were still divided into men and women. Torres began writing “An Evolving Conversation on Gender” shortly after.

“That’s when I started really putting my foot down, really hitting the gas pedal and driving right through all of it,” Torres said. “We kind of got comfortable and then change stopped happening.”

Since then, forward progress has been made. Ballet classes are now split based on the footwork and steps dancers are working on, rather than into binary genders. In a statement to the Daily Trojan, Kaufman’s Assistant Dean of Faculty Jackie Kopcsak emphasized the school’s support for Torres’ advocacy. 

“As part of our strategic planning process, USC Kaufman established affirmations — valued commitments which guide our decisions. Belonging, the embrace of individuality, inclusion and equity, was one of them,” Kopcsak wrote. “Categorizing ballet class by dance skill rather than gender was a decision that spoke to this value, and we commend Zack for advocating for this important change.”

Ultimately, Torres is grateful that Kaufman has been responsive to their push for inclusivity, believing that the school and its faculty want to grow and develop. But Torres isn’t planning on slowing down anytime soon.

“I want to stay on the edge of my seat, I want to keep challenging myself,” Torres said. “I don’t ever want to sit and be comfortable.”