Movable Pillars: Organizing Dance, 1956–1978

The American Dance Guild, 1956

The American Dance Guild, 1956 The American Dance Guild (ADG) was the first of the six organizations described in this book to be formed. From its inception, the mission of the Guild was to service the dance community as well as the general public by raising teaching and performing standards, improving working conditions of dance, increasing the public’s appreciation of dance as an art form, providing a forum for the exchange of ideas, producing and disseminating publications devoted to dance, serving as an informed voice on behalf of dance to the public at large, and integrating dance into public education (Bernice Rosen, ADG interview). Originally named the Guild of Creative Teachers of Children’s Dance in March 1956, the organization changed its name that December to Dance Teachers Guild, to the National Dance Teachers Guild in 1963, National Dance Guild in 1966, and finally to its current name, the American Dance Guild, in 1969.1 These changes in name reflect the effort that was made over time to nationalize the organization in order to serve a broader community. Chapters were formed throughout New York City in Manhattan , Brooklyn, Queens, and Long Island, and then in New Jersey and Pennsylvania (Bernice Rosen, ADG interview).2 Although the vision of local chapters throughout the United States was never fully realized, the American Dance Guild now serves a nationally dispersed membership through its web site and newsletter. Currently, ADG has reciprocal collegial benefit arrangements with the American Dance Therapy Association, the American College Dance Festival Association, the Dance Critics Association, the Congress On Research in Dance, and the Society of Dance History Scholars, as well as the National Dance Association, the Dance Notation Bureau, the Florida Dance Association, and the Sacred Dance Guild. The American Dance Guild participates jointly in events with these and other organizations (www.americandanceguild.org, 2007). ADG’s primary function over the years has been to offer workshops, seminars, conferences, concerts, and other events such as book signings, receptions, and film-screenings, in order to generate communication within the field. Beginning in March 58 1. The dates of these changes in name were retrieved from the newsletters distributed regularly over the years, held in the Jerome Robbins Dance Division of the New York Public Library. 2. Activities of the individual chapters are included in the newsletters that were distributed regularly by the American Dance Guild. The American Dance Guild 59 Cover of Dance Scope 1, no. 1 (Winter 1965), edited by Marcia Siegel. Photograph of Meredith Monk by Gary Gladstone. Courtesy of the American Dance Guild. 1956, ADG distributed a newsletter to its members, with information on events, member activities, and other news. The newsletter tracks important legislation affecting the arts and dance and with the exception of brief periods of inactivity, it continues to be printed biannually. These newsletters are preserved, together with other early American Dance Guild documents and programs, in the New York Public Library’s Jerome Robbins Dance Collection. In addition, the ADG web site disseminates information concerning job openings, conferences, and events, offers a blog for discussion, and distributes the various publications and video produced through ADG. ADG rewards contribution to the field of dance through annual awards and has promoted the study of dance by offering both the Fannie Weiss Student Scholarship and the Erna Lindner-Gilbert Scholarship in partnership with the School at Jacob’s Pillow. The ADG supports the creativity of artists by presenting their work in concert. Between the years 1965 and 1981, ADG published the periodical Dance Scope. First edited by Marcia Siegel, Dance Scope immediately became an important platform for critical and theoretical discourse in the field. In the first issue, printed in winter 1965, Siegel proposed that the journal, “explore the scope of dance as a theatre art and as an aesthetic discipline” (Siegel 1965b:2). Siegel then asserted an important new perspective that eventually became foundational to the discipline of dance studies: Our ideal dance theater is designed to serve both contemporary and traditional forms; our plea for more intelligent criticism applies to all areas; the growing public acceptance of dance as a cultural necessity must take all types of dance into account sooner or later. Certainly there are differences, but these are differences in the creative approach. (Siegel 1965b:2) In this modest yet pivotal assertion, Siegel reformulates the binary between high art and cultural dance as problematic, and in so doing...