Dancing Black: Embodying the African Diaspora in the United States and the Caribbean

What does it mean to dance black? How can studying comparative dance practices across the United States and the Caribbean expose continuities and differences in African diaspora experience? How can we draw strategies from black performance to inform our current movements for social change? This class will explore how dance and writing about performance have shaped notions of what it means to identify or be marked as an African diaspora subject. From the ring shouts of captive Africans to the 20th-century concert dance stage, from New York queer ballroom culture to Tiktok fads, this class will expose students to both historical and ethnographic methods for using dance to study the formation of black community in the New World. Looking beyond the surface of skin, we'll explore how race is experienced in muscle and flesh, and how black performers have historically taken advantage of or disavowed racialized ideas of how they can/should move. We will read theories of diaspora, queer of color critique and black feminist theory, and performance theory. We will search for the common questions and conversations about embodiment, the spectator's gaze, and black belonging that run through all three disciplines. Students will be required to do some movement research (through accessible, at-home dance practice), write weekly journals, and complete short essay projects. Students develop will skills for writing, speaking, and making performance to explore the intersections between race, sexuality, and dance.