Research

As a dance artist and scholar, I believe dance as a medium extends to an artist’s work as a scholar, an educator, an arts advocate, a performer, a choreographer, a designer, and a producer. These elements are all interwoven and make for a well-rounded dance artist. Dance is more than a craft, as it holds much historical value and cultural relevance all over the world.

I consider my creative work reflective of my liberal arts, interdisciplinary education from Muhlenberg College, and it is informed by my backgrounds in dance, music, theatre, and psychology, and I aim to create socially relevant, culturally responsive, interdisciplinary choreography that reflects different human experiences through a process of research, dialogue, and collaboration.

To me, art is as inseparable from culture as mind is inseparable from body. I think artists have a responsibility to be informed of how their work is situated within their sub-cultures and the larger cultures at hand. As Bertolt Brecht said, “Art is not a mirror held up to society, but a hammer with which to shape it.” These words resonate with me, especially in regard to my choreography, my pedagogy, and my research interests. These areas are how I feel I can contribute to the larger cultures and sub cultures in my community as an artist.

As a choreographer I create socially relevant, culturally responsive, interdisciplinary choreography that reflects different human experiences through a process of research, and dialogue. My process is often very collaborative and the dancers I work with are often the driving forces that shape the work I create, as I provide them with prompts to delve into their personal experiences for the topics I explore. This is my way of giving performers agency and a point of entry into the work, in addition to creating a passionate and meaningful working environment. I try not to serve as a dictator, but more a director of ideas. As I most often find myself working with college students, I will continue to do this in an effort to make my process an educational experience that will affect and impact future dance artists.

I see myself as part of a generation of choreographers that are striving to create work that addresses social issues relevant to specific places and time periods in history. In addition to social justice, I also have a great interest in interdisciplinary work and collaboration across different mediums. I find that I most often find interdisciplinary connections with film, music, theatre, nature, and various visual art mediums. I have incorporated mixed media work in my MFA thesis production, as well as much of the work I have made since.

As a collaborative choreographer, I have worked with musicians, cinematographers, directors, visual artists, and dramaturgs. Especially in the era of COVID, I made several screendance works, where I have largely been responsible for my own editing and production. At UNC Greensboro, I worked with a doctoral conducting student at the UNC Greensboro School of Music, creating movement for an orchestral score inspired by Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell Tale Heart”. I also served as choreographer for the UNC Greensboro School of Theatre’s production of Heathers: The Musical in February 2018 in collaboration with an MFA Directing student. I have also collaborated with my theatre colleagues at Valdosta State University to choreograph and assistant direct “How I Became A Pirate”, a Theatre for Young Audiences production that toured to local elementary schools in southern Georgia.

These experiences, as well as my experiences working as a choreographer for several years at Buck's Rock Performing and Creative Arts camp have given me invaluable collaborative skills necessary in production. I am interested in using these skills to develop an interdisciplinary course that allows performing arts students to collaborate with students in adjacent arts disciplines to create production plans, communicate efficiently, and practice professionalism as artists. Most recently, I co-directed a production of an original “dansical”, a hybrid narrative based musical-theatre dance work with dance, musical theatre, and acting majors, and supported by additional theatre and dance production and design faculty.While students cast in the production and involved in the design aspect had first hand experience in collaboration, it is very different to be a member of a production team, and this course would give students an opportunity to bring a project to fruition from the ground up. 

My choreographic research is grounded in social justice and intersectionality. I am creating a body of separate but related works that expand upon research I started for my MFA Thesis production, #StandingBy: a work created for the proscenium stage that addressed intersectionalities of power, privilege, protest, race, sexuality, gender, and other social identities in the lives and experiences of young adults in contemporary U.S. culture. The dance promoted nonviolent direct action by incorporating recognizable movements and gestures from protests in U.S. history, from the civil rights sit-ins in the 1960s, to the ACT-UP die-ins of the 1980s, to contemporary protests. I also addressed the question of how the bystander effect challenges protests and social movements, and how this is affected by television and social media cultures.

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In conjunction with my choreographic research, my article titled, “Choreographies of Privilege and Protest: An Evolving Method of Dance Making” was published in  The Dancer Citizen journal in November 2020. This article detailed the inspiration, research, process, and final product of #StandingBy (2019), and a related screendance Together, A P A R T, We Stand (2020), as well as future inceptions of the work and how it will continue to evolve as a choreographic method. Like #StandingBy, the dance film Together A P A R T also addresses intersectionalities of privilege, power, and protest in the identities and experiences of young people in the United States.

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It is my intention to continue development of my research method from “Choreographies of Privilege & Protest” into an interdisciplinary choreography course called “Choreographing Activism” that blends the process of scholarly research with physical practice and the creation of dances.

During my MFA candidacy, my research titled, “How is Choreomusicology Addressed in Higher Education Dance Programs: Qualitative Case Studies of University Dance Professors,” placed as a top three finalist in the Doug Risner Emerging Researcher competition. This research was a microcosm of one university, and is something I hope to expand in the future and conduct on a national and even international level.

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This project was a qualitative research study of four university professors, and the purpose was to gain insight and find out the relevance of music and music theory in their own choreography training as well as the courses they teach. It was also my goal to find a significant difference between choreography courses that teach aspects of music theory versus those that do not.

The findings of this research prove the necessity for music theory in dance curriculums as exemplified by the ways music principles and structures are interwoven with choreographic principles and structure. It is my intention to continue this research and expand the parameters of the research to include multiple dance programs across the US. 

Musical theatre dance encompasses a wide range of styles that continues to expand as the landscape of contemporary musical theatre becomes broader. As an educator, this often begs the question of "what dance courses should be required for the musical theatre curriculum?" and, "How do we prepare musical theatre dance choreographers and teachers to meet the needs of  future artists?" 

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This research is currently in its initial stages, and it is my intention to collect and assess data as well as conduct embodied research. More info forthcoming!