teaching statement
I structure classes and workshops around the belief that dancing and witnessing dance are vital tools for critically and compassionately assessing one’s self in relation to the surrounding world. Being mindful about moving in space and time, engaging in embodied experiments with weight and gravity, tuning in to non-verbal communication and synesthetic, sensed, full-bodied experiences create change. This is change that is incredibly important in a digitized, pressure-filled, twenty-first century reality. It is change that is crucial in a world where students are often taught to valorize the empirical and the authoritative. It is essential change in a cultural landscape grappling with the very real effects of injustices based on how bodies of different races, ages, genders, and sexual orientations are perceived and treated.
It is from these beliefs in the power of change made possible through mindfully moving bodies that I construct my classes and shape my own dancing practices. I expect my students to experiment and explore within the movement assignments, to engage in critical dialogue about dance and moving bodies, and to reflect on their collective and individual experiences. Through these experiential and reflective tactics, they identify, develop, and challenge their own aesthetic idioms. Through rigorous training, attention to detail, and deliberate communication, I work with them to create body-positive dance learning spaces where students can engage in bold acts of self-discovery.
Stylistically, I have studied the techniques of Graham, Horton, and Limon, as well as the genres of jazz, ballet, hip-hop, aerial, Somatics, and Afro-Haitian dance. I am also a certified Pilates instructor. In my own work I practice primarily release technique, and during my last two years of dancing, researching and choreographing in New York City, my training was devoted to improvisational practices. I am currently investigating how to structure movement scores that flow easily between the improvisational to the pre-determined.
COURSES TAUGHt
Dance 5: Introduction to Dance (UC Riverside)
Danc 46: Modern Dance I (Santa Clara University)
Danc 47: Modern Dance II (Santa Clara University)
Theater R1B: Writing About Performance (UC Berkeley)
Workshops
BREAKING BREAD
This lecture/demonstration presents research on Bay Area performances and projects that leverage food sharing as a tactic of audience engagement. These tactics exemplify efforts being made by choreographers and presenters who are responding to the problems of dwindling dance audiences. In addition to hearing about what others have done, participants have the opportunity to activate one of their own food stories via danced movement.
PRACTICING PRESENCE WORKSHOP
Drawing on techniques gleaned from contemporary dance training and dance improvisation techniques, as well as mindfulness meditation, Pilates, and other somatic principles, this workshop invites participants to reorient their sensory understandings and to use that reorientation to discover new movement pathways. Can be tailored to all ages. This workshop was developed while a fellow with the Gluck Foundation for the Arts.
Dancing Daily Life
This workshop is designed for K-2 graders who are encouraged to see their daily movements as a form of dance, helping them recognize the dance in themselves and in all things. This workshop was developed while a fellow with the Gluck Foundation for the Arts.
Move More
A workshop for 2-5 school students that encourages healthy lifestyle choices. Each workshop involves creative movement activities and dance experiences designed to bolster confidence, exercise imagination, and build strength and coordination. In addition to movement activities, students also discuss healthy eating, sleep, communication, and stress management. This workshop was conceived by Wendy Rogers and developed collaboratively while a fellow with Gluck Program for the Arts.
Site-Specific Dance
An introduction to the concept and practice of site-specific dance for 6-12 graders. Students are led through improvisational structures and compositional strategies to facilitate the creation of original dance studies that respond and relate to a specific physical environment. This workshop was developed while a fellow with Gluck Program for the Arts.
Introduction to Modern Dance
This weeklong workshop introduces students (9-12 grades) to some of the historical figures, guiding ideology, and movement styles of early modern dance. Students are led through dance warm-ups, danced combinations, compositional tasks, and mini-lectures in order to broaden their understanding of what is encompassed within this 20th century dance style. This workshop was developed while a fellow with Gluck Foundation for the Arts.