Global Arc

This introductory survey course gives equal weight to scholarly study and embodied practice, using both approaches to explore a range of hip-hop dance techniques, as well as the cultural and historical contexts from which these dances emerged. Special attention will be given to breaking - the most prominent hip-hop form - as a foundation for exploring other forms of movement. By critically exploring these physical and historical connections, individuals will adapt and apply their own philosophies to dance in order to develop a personalized style.

Using an interdisciplinary visual and performance studies approach to explore various sites of contemporary art practices, this course will provide an introduction to radical performance practices through which artists consider the gendered and racialized body that circulates in the public domain, both onstage and off. We will query the kinds of political questions that performers raise with their work. Our texts will include live and recorded performances, as well as historical and theoretical secondary sources. Every other week the class hosts a public performance/speaking series featuring radical artists and curators.

This course introduces students to human anatomy using movement, drawing, and dance practices. We will study the structure and function of the body from an interdisciplinary perspective, with a focus on relationships between cognition, the nervous system and movement. Class time will be shared between anatomy/kinesiology lectures and exploring the material through experiential and creative activities. We will discuss common problems encountered in fitness and every day life, while looking at the human structure in depth to evaluate possible solutions. Creative and research projects explore multiple ways the arts and sciences intersect.

This introductory course gives equal weight to scholarly study and embodied practice, using both approaches to explore the flow, power and cultural contexts of Breaking. This course will focus on developing a clear foundational Breaking technique in order to build a strong basis for exploring other Hip-Hop forms. By critically exploring this form physically and historically, individuals will adapt and apply their own philosophies to dance in order to eventually develop a personalized style.

In this studio course, dancers will study the past, present, and future of rhythm tap dance by learning the techniques and Black American histories, traditions, and legacies that have established and continue to sustain the form. While learning fundamental steps and foundational routines, we will interact with various media curated to introduce some of rhythm tap's important people, happenings, and places. Additionally, we will engage with related theory and closely examine the work of contemporary tap artists to identify how the form is being preserved and how Black traditions are being used to shape innovations and new approaches.

Students will create sculptures that relate directly to the body and compel performance, interaction, and movement. Students will also create dances that are informed by garments, portable objects, and props. Works will be designed for unconventional spaces, challenge viewer/performer/object relationships, augment and constrain the body, and trace the body's actions and form. The class will consider how context informs perceptions of the borders between performance, bodies, and objects. A lecture series of prominent choreographers and artists will accompany the course. This studio course is open enrollment.

This course explores the politics, aesthetics, and histories of Black American dance from the early 1970s to today. Paying special attention to the politics of circulation and new technologies, we will explore questions around innovation, virality, citation, ownership, and appropriation. Radio, television, YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok will be studied as connected yet discreet technologies of creative dispersal in direct relationship to their capacity for/constraints around creative, economic, and political output.

Enrolled students will engage with this course as workshop cast members of a new interdisciplinary piece by Princeton Arts Fellow Michael J. Love and explore methods of rhythm tap dance performance, live electronic music composition, and practice-based research on Black American music (genres such as jazz, funk, soul, hip hop, techno, and house). In-studio class meetings, structured as rehearsals, will be augmented with weekly listening, viewing, and reading assignments. There may also be opportunities for guest artists and respondents. The course will culminate in a work-in-progress showing during the final weeks of the semester.

Offers students the opportunity to gain a working knowledge of the ways in which dance, dance/theater, and body-based art are created and performed today. Primarily a studio course that stresses learning through doing. Students will have the opportunity to work with leading experimental creators. Topics, prerequisites, and formats will vary from year to year.

This course traces histories, traditions and innovations in Black American dance through archival and embodied practice. Moving from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade to the 1970s, we will explore how dance - when executed by those who identify as Black and when circulated outside/beyond/without Black people themselves - speaks to the body's relationship to the political, social, and cultural contexts of American life. Through a hybrid seminar/studio seminar format, students will be introduced to theories, debates, and critical frameworks in Black Dance. We'll wrestle with the complexities around researching, doing, and reading Black Dance.