Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-75dct Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-15T12:12:03.224Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Biography and Autobiography: Teaching Strategies for Dance History in a Mediatized World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2013

Ray Miller
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Teaching dance history to the undergraduate “Millennial Student” is challenging on many levels. Due to the proliferation of mediated technologies, critics Sven Birkerts and Martin Bérubé are concerned that they are loosing the ability to read deeply and to think critically not so much because of the strong visual appeal of these technologies and communication media but because they encourage a voyeuristic view of human interactions that leaves little room for the privacy of the individual. The personal becomes public. There is no room left for the reflective self, the soul. This paper will explore pedagogical strategies centered on biography and autobiography that are intended to shift the student from being passive recipients of dance history to becoming imaginatively engaged in the creation of dance history.

Type
Research Article
Information
Congress on Research in Dance Conference Proceedings , Volume 41 , supplement S1: Global Perspectives On Dance Pedagogy: Research And Practice , 2009 , pp. 241 - 247
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Adshead, Janet, and Layson, June, eds. 1983. Dance History: A Methodology for Study. London: Dance Books.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Auslander, Philip. 2005. Liveness: Performance in a Mediatized Culture. New York: Taylor, and Francis, . Barzun, , Jacques, , and Graff, Henry F.. 1992. The Modern Researcher. 5th ed. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.Google Scholar
Beiswanger, George. 1978. “Chance and Design in Choreography.” In The Dance Experience: Readings in Dance Appreciation, edited by Nadel, Myron Howard and Miller, Constance Nadel, 82–90. New York: Universe Books.Google Scholar
Bérubé, Michael. 2006. What's Liberal about the Liberal Arts? Classroom Politics and “Bias” in a Liberal Arts Education. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Birkerts, Sven. 1994. The Fate of Reading in an Electronic Age. Boston: Faber and Faber.Google Scholar
Dils, Ann. 2001. “Absent/Presence.“In Moving History/Dancing Cultures: A Dance History Reader, edited by Dils, Ann and Albright, Ann Cooper, 462–71. Middeltown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.Google Scholar
Dils, Ann, and Albright, Ann Cooper, eds. 2001. Moving History/Dancing Cultures: A Dance History Reader. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press.Google Scholar
Fraleigh, Sondra Horton, and Hanstein, Penelope, eds. 1999. Researching Dance: Evolving Modes of Inquiry. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
Gardner, Howard. 1983. Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. New York: Basic.Google Scholar
Goleman, David. 1995. Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam.Google Scholar
Kolb, David. 1983. Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development. New York: FT Press.Google Scholar
Sarlos, Robert K. 1989. “Performance Reconstruction: The Vital Link Between Past and Future.” In Interpreting the Theatrical Past: Essays in the Historiography of Performance, edited by Posdewait, Thomas and McConachie, Bruce A., 198–229. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press.Google Scholar
Veninga, James F., ed. 1983. The Biographer's Gift: Life Histories and Humanism. College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press.Google Scholar
Yon, Maria. 2008. “Designing a Learning Environment for a Millennial Generation.” Paper presented at the Lilly Conference on Teaching and Learning, Greensboro, NC.Google Scholar
Zarrilli, Philip B., McConachie, Bruce, Williams, Gary Jay, and Sorgenfrei, Carl Fisher. 2006. Theatre Histories: An Introduction. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar

Additional Works Consulted

Bell, Susan Groag, and Yalom, Marilyn, eds. 1990. Revealing Lives: Autobiography, Biography, and Gender. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Chazin-Bennahum, Judith, ed. 2005. Teaching Dance Studies. New York: Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
Conway, Jill Kerr. 1998. When Memory Speaks: Refections on Autobiography. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Edel, Leon. 1984. Writing Lives: Principia Biographica. New York: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Egan, Susanna. 1984. Patterns of Experience in Autobiography. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Ferguson, Marcia L. 2008. A Short Guide to Writing about Theatre. New York: Pearson Longman.Google Scholar
Hamilton, Nigel. 2008. How to Do Biography: A Primer. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Hudson, Suzanne. 2000. How to Write about Theatre and Drama. New York: Harcourt College Publishers.Google Scholar
Kappel, Lawrence, ed. 2001. Autobiography. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven.Google Scholar
Novarr, David. 1986. The Lines of Life: Theories of Biography, 1880–1970. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press.Google Scholar
Oates, Stephen B. 1990. Biography as History: The Twelfth Charles Edmondson Historical Lectures. Waco, TX: Markham Press Fund.Google Scholar
Thaiss, Christopher, and Davis, Rick. 1999. Writing about Theatre. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.Google Scholar
Tuchman, Barbara W. 1982. Practicing History: Selected Essays. New York: Ballantine.Google Scholar