Dance and Cultural Theory
The application of cultural, critical, and political theory to dance, treating it as a site of identity, power, and social meaning.
Definition
The study of dance as a cultural and political practice through which identity, power, and social meaning are produced and contested.
Scope
This topic covers critical dance studies, which read dance through frameworks of gender, race, sexuality, nation, and class. It examines how dancing bodies produce and contest social meanings, how power operates through movement and representation, and how dance participates in the politics of identity and difference.
Core questions
- How do dancing bodies produce and contest meanings of gender, race, and nation?
- How does power operate through movement and its representation?
- What can dance reveal about cultural difference and identity?
Key concepts
- embodiment
- gender and dance
- race and dance
- nationalism
- representation
- power
Key theories
- The dancing body as a site of cultural knowledge and power
- The argument that dance is a form of embodied knowledge through which cultural meanings, hierarchies, and identities are produced, transmitted, and contested.
History
From the 1990s, dance studies absorbed the methods of cultural studies and critical theory, producing influential anthologies and monographs that analyzed dance in terms of gender, race, sexuality, and nation, and established critical dance studies as a major strand of the discipline.
Debates
- Cultural critique versus the specificity of dance
- Scholars debate whether cultural-theoretical readings risk treating dance as merely illustrative of social forces, neglecting the specific aesthetic and kinesthetic dimensions of the form.
Key figures
- Jane Desmond
- Susan Leigh Foster
- Susan Manning
- Brenda Dixon Gottschild
Related topics
Seminal works
- desmond1997
- fosterbodies1996
Frequently asked questions
- What is critical dance studies?
- Critical dance studies is an approach that analyzes dance using cultural and critical theory, focusing on how dance produces and contests meanings around identity, power, and difference.