An Introduction To Community Dance Practice

This popular core textbook offers a clear introduction to community dance practice today, preparing students for the realities of employment in this dynamic and widely studied field. The text is edited by a highly-regarded professional with an international reputation for best practice in community dance, and includes chapters written by an expert panel of contributors, comprising dance artists, practitioners and academics. It combines lively discussion with practical advice on the duty of care, inclusive practice and project coordination. With its stimulating range of case studies, interviews and resources, the reader is encouraged to apply the facts and theories to their own practice. This text is aimed at undergraduate and postgraduate students on community dance degree programmes, as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students of dance, theatre and performance studies who are taking specific courses on community dance. It is also accessible to emerging and professional community dance practitioners.

This popular core textbook offers a clear introduction to community dance practice today, preparing students for the realities of employment in this dynamic and widely studied field. The text is edited by a highly-regarded professional with an international reputation for best practice in community dance, and includes chapters written by an expert panel of contributors, comprising dance artists, practitioners and academics. It combines lively discussion with practical advice on the duty of care, inclusive practice and project coordination. With its stimulating range of case studies, interviews and resources, the reader is encouraged to apply the facts and theories to their own practice. This text is aimed at undergraduate and postgraduate students on community dance degree programmes, as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students of dance, theatre and performance studies who are taking specific courses on community dance. It is also accessible to emerging and professional community dance practitioners.

This highly readable introduction to dance with older people combines key debates and issues in the field with practical guidance, as well as a resources section including numerous 'toolkit materials'. Diane Amans provides the ideal beginners' guide for students, practitioners and dance artists alike.

This edited collection examines the potential of dance training for developing socially engaged individuals capable of forging ethical human relations for an ever-changing world and in turn frames dance as a fundamental part of human experience. This volume draws together a range of critical voices to reflect the inclusive potential of dance. The contributions offer perspectives on contemporary dance training in Britain from dance educators, scholars, practitioners and artists. Through examining the politics, values and ethics of learning dance today, this book argues for the need of a re-assessment of the evolving practices in dance training and techniques. Key questions address how the concept of ‘technique’ and associated systems of training in dance could be redefined to enable the collaboration of skills and application of ideas necessary to twenty-first-century dance. The editors present these ideas in different modes of writing. This collection of essays, conversations and manifestos offers a way to explore, debate and grasp the shifting values of contemporary dance. Examining these values in the applied field of dance reveals a complex and contrasting range of ideas, encompassing broad themes including the relationships between individuality and collectivity, rigour and creativity, and virtuosity and inclusivity. This volume points to ethical techniques as providing a way of navigating these contrasting values in dance. It serves as an invaluable resource for academics as well as practitioners and students.

Every dissertation is individual and unique - particularly for dance students, who must combine a wide range of approaches into a tailor-made research methodology. What Moves You? fosters a creative approach to dissertations and final projects. By guiding the development of a personal study program, this volume encourages dance students to take ownership of their artistic and academic work, a skill essential both to successful undergraduate study, and to making the first steps towards a career in dance. Rather than propose a prescriptive, step-by-step mantra, Charlotte Nichol and Lise Uytterhoeven draw upon contributions from students, teachers, examiners and practitioners to broaden the notion of ‘research’ and demystify the purpose of the dissertation.

The arts have a crucial role in empowering young people with special needs through diverse dance initiatives. Inclusive pedagogy that integrates all students in rich, equitable and just dance programmes within education frameworks is occurring alongside enabling projects by community groups and in the professional dance world where many high-profile choreographers actively seek opportunities to work across diversity to inspire creativity. Access and inclusion is increasingly the essence of projects for disenfranchised and traumatised youth who find creative expression, freedom and hope through dance. This volume foregrounds dance for young people with special needs and presents best practice scenarios in schools, communities and the professional sphere. International perspectives come from Australia, Brazil, Cambodia, Canada, Denmark, Fiji, Finland, India, Indonesia, Jamaica, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Norway, Papua New Guinea, Portugal, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Taiwan, Timor Leste, the UK and the USA. Sections include: inclusive dance pedagogy equality, advocacy and policy changing practice for dance education community dance initiatives professional integrated collaborations

In the last 30 years, a distinctive intersection between disability studies – including disability rights advocacy, disability rights activism, and disability law – and disability arts, culture, and media studies has developed. The two fields have worked in tandem to offer critique of representations of disability in dominant cultural systems, institutions, discourses, and architecture, and develop provocative new representations of what it means to be disabled. Divided into 5 sections: Disability, Identity, and Representation Inclusion, Wellbeing, and Whole-of-life Experience Access, Artistry, and Audiences Practices, Politics and the Public Sphere Activism, Adaptation, and Alternative Futures this handbook brings disability arts, disability culture, and disability media studies – traditionally treated separately in publications in the field to date – together for the first time. It provides scholars, graduate students, upper level undergraduate students, and others interested in the disability rights agenda with a broad-based, practical and accessible introduction to key debates in the field of disability art, culture, and media studies. An internationally recognised selection of authors from around the world come together to articulate the theories, issues, interests, and practices that have come to define the field. Most critically, this book includes commentaries that forecast the pressing present and future concerns for the field as scholars, advocates, activists, and artists work to make a more inclusive society a reality.

This highly readable introduction to dance with older people combines key debates and issues in the field with practical guidance, as well as a resources section including numerous 'toolkit materials'. Diane Amans, leading practitioner in Community Dance, provides the ideal beginners' guide for students, practitioners and dance artists alike.