Scholars within dance studies, such as Randy Martin, André Lepecki, and Susan Manning, have proposed that dance serves as a unique practical and theoretical site through which to think the political–what philosopher Jacques Ranciére defines as the distribution of the sensible. In this course, we will read foundational texts addressing corporeality, biopolitics, aesthetics, dance and labor, and question the political impetus behind experimental dance that has emerged since the 1960s in order to consider the socio-political value of dancing as an aesthetic practice. Alongside this work, we will develop movement practices that facilitate explorations of the politics of our own embodiment as dancers: How do our respective identities, histories and desires shape our experiences of agency, freedom and relationality? How do we move collectively? How do we occupy and share space together? What practices, techniques, and strategies can we develop to reconfigure our understandings of what a body can do? Students will be expected to read and chart approximately two articles per week, complete two short papers and contribute a movement score for the class as a whole. Each class will consist of discussion, analyses of texts, short writing exercises and movement.

Registration: See Elena Demyanenko Wednesday, Nov 29: 12:00-2:00 PM in VAPA E310