Performing Arts as Language

by Shayok Misha Chowdhury

A complex and compelling bilingual play that examines the intersections of queerness and Indian-American identity. When Indian-American graduate student Choton travels from the U.S. to his family’s home city of Kolkata to film interviews with the local queer community, he relishes acting as the local expert, especially in his role as interpreter between Bangla and English for his filmmaker boyfriend. Soon, though, Choton starts to question not only what he thinks he knows about queerness in India, but what both queerness and his Indian heritage mean for him. When a rediscovered roll of film reveals surprisingly intimate photographs of Choton’s austere grandfather (taken by whom?), Choton’s understanding of his family, both living and dead, starts to unravel. What follows is a mesmerizing examination of intercultural identity, asking audiences to reconsider what we mean when we call a place home.

by Eva C. Vasquez

This is a theater history, performance studies, and U.S. Latino theater book that examines the artistic, social political contribution of Teatro Pregones to the larger American, Latin American, and Puerto Rican theater communities.

by Emmaly Wiederholt

One in four people in the US has a disability that impacts a major part of their life according to a 2018 report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. What if the dance world reflected that statistic? Breadth of Bodies seeks to investigate and dismantle the language and stereotypes often used to describe professional dancers with disabilities. Spearheaded by dancer/writer Emmaly Wiederholt and dance educator Silva Laukkanen with illustrations by visual artist Liz Brent-Maldonado, the team collected interviews with 35 professional dance artists with disabilities from 15 countries, asking about training, access, and press, as well as looking at the state of the field.

by Rachna Ramya

Kathak explores the philosophical and practical aspects of Kathak dance—its origin, development, and techniques. Investigating this compelling dance style from cultural and historical perspectives, the book delves into the essential principles of Kathak, its schools and major artists, the format of Kathak performance, repertoire, Kathak music, predominant trends in training, and the system of practice through the lens of theory and application. A rare resource, the text is a comprehensive read for dancers, teachers, and Kathak lovers.

by Julia L. Foulkes

In 1930, dancer and choreographer Martha Graham proclaimed the arrival of "dance as an art of and from America." Dancers such as Doris Humphrey, Ted Shawn, Katherine Dunham, and Helen Tamiris joined Graham in creating a new form of dance, and, like other modernists, they experimented with and argued over their aesthetic innovations, to which they assigned great meaning. Their innovations, however, went beyond aesthetics. While modern dancers devised new ways of moving bodies in accordance with many modernist principles, their artistry was indelibly shaped by their place in society. Modern dance was distinct from other artistic genres in terms of the people it attracted: white women (many of whom were Jewish), gay men, and African American men and women. Women held leading roles in the development of modern dance on stage and off; gay men recast the effeminacy often associated with dance into a hardened, heroic, American athleticism; and African Americans contributed elements of social, African, and Caribbean dance, even as their undervalued role defined the limits of modern dancers' communal visions. Through their art, modern dancers challenged conventional roles and images of gender, sexuality, race, class, and regionalism with a view of American democracy that was confrontational and participatory, authorial and populist. Modern Bodies exposes the social dynamics that shaped American modernism and moved modern dance to the edges of society, a place both provocative and perilous.

edited by Kariamu Welsh, Esailama G. A. Diouf, and Yvonne Daniel

African dance has a long history in the United States: Asadata Dafora, a Sierra Leonean, had a successful run on Broadway with Kykunkor in 1934, and he was one of many artists who, in the 1920s to 1940s, concertized and stylized what we have come to know as African dance. Many African dance specialists remained in the States and taught dance, which began a renaissance in African Dance across the Americas in the 1960s, particularly in the U.S. As a result, the last fifty years have seen an explosion of African performances, choreography and courses in academic institutions and cities across North America, South America, and Europe. Still, there is little information available on African dance per se and some artists and teachers, while well intentioned, disseminate within performative information, myths and falsehoods that continue to characterize African dance as undisciplined, ahistorical, and with scant technical skills. This collection brings indelible stories of African dance as it exists within major cities across the United States, demonstrating the power and considerable influence it has in awakening identity, self-worth, and diverse community respect.