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Preface
- Wesleyan University Press
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PREFACE This project was initiated and developed, starting early 1998, by the American Dance Guild to honor the founders of six dance organizations: The American Dance Guild, Congress On Research in Dance, American Dance Therapy Association, American College Dance Festival Association , Dance Critics Association, and Society of Dance History Scholars. Formed between 1956 and 1978, these organizations shared commitment to developing the field of dance. They were grassroots organizations, “where people could come together and just be with each other” (Joseph Gifford, ADG interview). All six exist today and continue to support distinct areas within dance, including therapy, pedagogy, performance research , history, and criticism. Movable Pillars contains first-hand accounts of nineteen individuals who helped envision and build these organizations. As the interviews show, the founding of these groups marked a new period of collective action in dance and, as I will argue in this book, helped position dance as an autonomous and significant intellectual discipline. In so doing, they were an integral part of the concurrent transformation of dance studies, buttressing the burgeoning field in all its facets.1 It is equally important to note that these organizations were also a part of a dynamic exchange both in academia and on the performance stage, which intersected with the broader socio-political mileu. As a means of framing the interviews, Part I considers the political, economic, and epistemological context in counterpoint to developments occurring in the professional dance field between the pivotal years of 1956 to 1978. I ground my analysis in an historical review of three varying precedents—dance as art, dance as education, and dance as cultural study—which contradicted each other even as they jointly laid the groundwork for dance as a scholarly pursuit. The primary source documents for this research include the American Dance Guild’s Dance Scope journals, the Congress on Research in Dance’s Research Annuals and Focus in Dance series, and the early newsletters from each organization, which offered a forum for choreographers, educators, and politicians to discuss the burgeoning sphere of dance research. They include the writings of ix 1. I use the term “dance studies” to signify the proliferating scholarly work done in dance, including a range of historical, ethnographic, choreographic, performance, and somatic research pertaining to dance. famous performers as well as less familiar but equally important figures. In addition to offering first-hand insight into the transformation of dance studies, these documents show that the “artist/scholar” concept is not new. In fact, dancers have long been engaged in intellectual and theoretical discourse on stage and in writing. I hope that a focus on these materials will lead current dance artist/scholars toward the hidden treasure of discourse printed between 1956 and 1978. This research extends from a tradition of work that presents firstperson accounts of choreographers and performers, most notably Selma Jeanne Cohen’s 1966 The Modern Dance: Seven Statements of Belief, Sally Banes’s 1987 Terpsichore in Sneakers: Post-Modern Dance, Constance Kreemer’s 1987 Further Steps: Fifteen Choreographers on Modern Dance, and 2008 Further Steps: Fourteen Choreographers on What’s the R.A.G.E. in Dance, Joyce Morgenroth’s 2004 Speaking of Dance, and Brenda Dixon Gottschild’s 2003 The Black Dancing Body: A Geography from Coon to Cool. Movable Pillars, however, broadens the conversation to include people who were instrumental in organizing support structures that provide a forum for dance artists, educators, scholars, and activists. Their work has affected not only dance, but other fields as well, as I will show. Thus, my analysis connects the knowing, intelligent body to fields such as anthropology, feminist studies, critical research methods, and emancipatory education. As my emphasis is on primary accounts, I do not attempt to reconcile or hide contradictions that arise among various perspectives on dance, sociopolitical contexts, and federal policies toward education. My strategy is to present multiple views and experiences as straightforwardly as possible. The unabridged interviews allow the primary participants to theorize their own situations and conditions through revelation of multiple views and experiences . These dynamic tensions create an honest description that both resists narrative simplification and nuances further the complex transformation in dance studies that took place during this time. Dance scholars now entering the field are the first generation to have been nurtured by the intellectual and creative resources marshaled by these organizations, and this book is a tribute to those individuals who cleared the path. Project History Movable Pillars began as a project initiated by the American Dance Guild...