Dancing in the Archives

The Main Idea

My Dance History class will be performing site-specific dances in the Judaica Suite at the Smathers Library Special Collections (2nd Floor) on Wed April 3 1:30-2:30pm (open to the public). Their choreographies are based on archival research they conducted on three African American women who shaped the field of modern dance in the 1930s: Katherine Dunham, Pearl Primus, and Zora Neale Hurston.

What is the impact?

This project is a collaboration between SoTD and the Special Collections in which the archive is not only as a place containing raw material for creating dance (even that is a novel concept for many of our students), but also as a site for staging dance. We hope that the performance will bring new audiences to dance and expand students' ideas about archives as old, dusty, and irrelevant to contemporary artists. We are also spotlighting the tremendous archival resources we have right here on campus!

What is the bigger picture?

Making visible the contributions of women of color to the development of American modern dance

Trends in contemporary dance: looking to the past to define the present moment

Room #

Judaica Suite at the Smathers Library Special Collections

Address

1508 Union Road
Gainesville
FL 32611

Website

Smathers Library Website