jotrolldance

[jotrolldance]

some April readings

So, I’m so behind on everything, this was originally intended to go out in JANUARY. I feel like time has only made my original commentary even more…intense. Sometimes I include things on my link lists because they make me uncomfortable or I’m not sure how I feel about them. The first article here – Voting is Not Harm Reduction – is one of these. Especially with hindsight, I’m having a lot of…

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Resistance and change often begin in art

[tl;dr The results of the US presidential election will have a deep, horrifying impact, but art is still powerful, present, and necessary] All right then. I guess it’s time to talk about the presidential election that just happened. In full honesty, I’ve been kind of avoiding it because it is such an unavoidable topic of conversation these days that I feel like it’s the only thing I’m talking…

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The Makings of a Dance Class: Expectations for Teachers

[tl;dr Across styles, culture, and age groups, the main expectations for dance teachers appears to be caring about students, according to five lists of desired traits. The biggest area of difference is in the expectations for dance teachers to have specific qualifications] So in starting to define what a dance class is, I’ve spent a lot of time looking at expectations for students in class, but…

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Dance Teacher Red Flags and Green Flags

[tl;dr Everyone has different red flags and green flags for their dance teachers, but my red flags includes not taking no for an answer and my green flags include giving me control, choice, and trust.] Dance is possible for everyone, but, sadly, not everyone believes that. Sometimes the most exclusionary people in the dance world are the teachers. So, to help you and anyone who wants to dance…

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some November readings

I’m not sure if there’s an underlying theme in my reading for the past while, but these are all reads that really hit me in one way or another. I do want to flag particularly the article about Rachael Gunn. It circulated quite a lot around the time it was relevant during the Olympics this summer, but I think it’s relevant well beyond the immediate context – it brings up important points around…

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A vague ramble on codeswitching

[tl;dr my skillset involves being about to bridge the gap between various cultural spaces, which means I “codeswitch”. When codeswitching is necessary, this can be frustrating, but it is also a particular kind of power.] A long time ago, I wrote a blog post about never feeling “enough” of any one thing – caught between the various different worlds that I bounce in and out of, never quite…

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some August readings

I’ve been thinking a lot about the slow, tedious parts of change recently and I think this set of readings reflects that. How can we enact change meaningfully and thoughtfully? What are the small things in our lives that can lead to change? What are the parts of creating change that we don’t enjoy but have to do anyway? How do we make this sustainable?  Make Neurodiversity…

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Audience expectations: a lesson from fifth grade

[tl;dr An experience I had with my fifth grade teacher taught me how audiences are looking for what they expect. This is something I think about strategically in my art today] I’ve been thinking recently a lot about how small interactions can have such a huge impact on children. What might feel like a throwaway comment on a bad day for an adult can be life shattering for a child, who has never…

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some July readings

The theme for this set of readings is things that have pushed me – challenging me to think about how to make my work more honest, do better for people who are harmed by different axes of oppression than me, and stretch my creativity to be more accessible. Disabled people’s exclusion from indoor spaces is a civil rights violation, not an annoyance “The woman in the story may get her wish and…

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Reading Judith Butler: Chapter 1, Section 4

tl;dr This section of Butler has interesting overlap with intersectionality, a term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw around the same time. It brings up questions of solidarity, collaboration, coalition, and the impossibility of finding a single, universal definition of gender  [All Butler citations from: Judith Butler. 2007.Gender Trouble (New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group)] And it’s…

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Six Years of Queer Dance Workshops

[Tl;dr I’ve been organizing queer dance workshops for six years and am pretty proud of it] It hit me recently that August will mark six whole years of organizing Queer Dance Workshops in Boston, which feels like a pretty big milestone. I spend a lot of time feeling like I “haven’t gotten there” yet with these workshops – they’re not big enough, they don’t have regular enough attendance, they’re…

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Technique, rigor, value

[tl;dr The idea that certain dance forms are more technically rigorous is a disservice to the amount of different types of thoughtfulness that goes into all dance forms] I have a degree in contemporary dance. The skills I actually use from that program did not come from contemporary dance at all – it was my dance teaching class, choreology (the study of movement), and one very sensible…

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Modifications in Dance Class, the basics

[tl;dr Modifying or changing movement is an important skill in dance class. We can practice that by going in the same direction as everyone else, thinking about the core and purpose of a movement, and doing what feels good in our body.] Modification is a very common concept in dance class. We all have different bodies, so we often have to modify or change the way we move in order to do a…

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some May readings

The theme of this set of links is definitely about art, creativity, and what that means for people “outside of the norms”. Lots of incredible readings here that have been inspiring to think differently!  Diverse Artists, Diverse Audiences “Thoughtful engagement with access takes time. The current setup for exhibitions frequently focuses on immediacy, presence and embodiment, primarily through…

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The Makings of a Dance Class: Class Culture and Behavior

[tl;dr There are some standards of behavior across some dance classes, but the culture and value of different styles of dance show up in the details] So, in my exploration of what a dance class is, I want to continue a bit looking at the different cultures of dance class. This time, I want to pull back into this idea of the expectations we have for dance class and look at expectations for…

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[tl;dr Sometimes it is hard to feel like dance is “enough” when the world is exploding, but it is still an incredibly powerful tool and I still believe in it] So, in my usual fashion, I was slowly working up to writing a blog post on the ongoing violence in Palestine, especially after a group call “LGBT for Israel” tried to get me to join them and their particular anti-Palestinian message (I…

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some emotions about our ongoing pandemic

[Tl;dr The lack of covid precautions, particularly in dance, has been painful and broken my trust in other people and my communities] I’ve been sitting on this for a while. And to be honest? I don’t want to write it. I don’t want to have to write it. There’s still a part of me that cannot believe so many other people have written about this and that it still seems to just not be a thing for so…