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Ramsay Burt's research into histories of avant-garde and experimental dance performances during the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries has facilitated cultural enrichment through its impact on choreographers, dancers, dance audiences, administrators and policy makers. His publications have advanced understanding both of the general public and members of the dance industry into the ways in which dance is affected by and influenced socially and historically specific concerns or anxieties about changing notions of embodiment. He has received invitations to speak at major international dance festivals, given interviews for radio and television broadcasts, attended meetings with policy makers, and been invited to collaborate with artists involved in making new works based on historical avant-garde performances.
Since 2008, three coordinated projects have interlinked expertise and resources in Surrey's dance division (including Surrey's National Resource Centre for Dance, NRCD, est. 1982) with the institution's technological expertise.
The aim was to enhance access, visibility and experimentation with the dance heritage by digital means. The project has generated an online repository for dance resources, available for the education sector. It also led to economic benefit for the non-academic project partner, digital design company Bullet Creative, who were able to build both their technical skillset and their knowledge base, in order to then continue to expand their own dance-related business portfolio. The digital archiving expertise is also disseminated to future online archive projects.
Through community arts practice based on the principles of mindfulness, choreographer Rosemary Lee works with inclusive, therapeutic and inter-generational groups, as well as artists and dancers, using unique elements: close attention through touch and mindful listening. Her work has evolved over two decades of practice, research and collaborations, and shows impact and reach through bringing transformation to community participants, artists, health professionals and professional arts practice. She moves away from the role of choreographer as director with a set agenda, and empowers participants to embody issues that are important to them, setting a model for community life. The performance works Common Dance (2009) and Square Dances (2011) have led to a DVD and symposium that develop a practice-as-research methodology for dance practitioners and researchers, and to workshops for artists and practitioners around the world.
This case study details the impact of South Asian dance research on its practitioners and organisations. Immediate beneficiaries include artists engaging in, and organisations supporting, South Asian dance. Through them, we have given prominence to dance genres outside the established canon and fostered broader understanding of dance in a culturally diverse society. By articulating the relationship between artistic practice and the social, political, and financial mechanisms of late twentieth- and early twenty-first century Britain, our research has influenced creative practice, teaching and dance writing, as well as contributing to the practicalities of artists' business ventures and grant applications.
The impact is on dancers and audiences in North West England. Choreographic practice in live dance performance was found through a collaborative research programme to build particular relationships with audiences. Where audience feedback influences the choreographic process the subsequent effect on how audiences respond to performances is marked. Strong links between audiences and dancers can enhance creativity in performers, and enrich and expand the imaginations and sensibilities of audiences. On the basis of this kind of empathetic relationship, the Manchester Dance Consortium has worked to enhance locally the quality of dance as a cultural asset and to intensify the involvement and receptivity of dance audiences.
Shobana Jeyasingh is one of a handful of British choreographers - and indeed, choreographers worldwide - who successfully choreograph work using a multiplicity of cultural techniques and methods. Having trained in the Indian classical form Bharata Natyam, Jeyasingh produces work that utilizes a mix of classical, contemporary, popular and site-specific techniques. Impacts are generated through her writing, mentoring, public engagement and performance works, as she asks audiences and dancers to re-think notions of authenticity, unchanging tradition, and binary identities such as Asian and British. While her workshops in schools and performance works in various British and European sites change perceptions of gender, ethnic identity and Indian dance, in a tour supported by the British Council and commercial sponsors, she has taken her diasporic, hybrid sensibilities to India, to convey a postmodern, multicultural British identity.
Although Adam Benjamin's research has greatly influenced contemporary dance in the UK and elsewhere through his development and advocacy of inclusive practice, this case study focuses on his impact on contemporary dance and disability culture in Ethiopia. By introducing integrated practice to Adugna Community Dance Company in Addis Ababa (in which able-bodied and disabled dancers perform together), and continuing to foster its development through his choreographic and mentoring work with its current Artistic Directors, he has helped to transform the lives of individual disabled performers as well as strongly contributing to the socially-driven nature, values and aesthetics of contemporary Ethiopian dance.
Dance research has frequently suffered from the divide between historical investigation and performance making. This case study focuses on an innovative approach to a practice-based process of making dance histories, or choreological historiography. This approach brings together the narratives that are central to research in Music, Dance, Drama and Performing Arts (MDDPA) at the University of Bedfordshire. Since 2010, this approach has informed choreographic work or performance-lectures across Europe. Events such as the Royal Ballet School's Focus on Style highlight the benefits a practice-based historical investigation in dance brings to both dance scholars and dance practitioners.
This case study charts the specific impact of The Living Room (Yael Flexer, 2010-11) to determine the impact made on the UK contemporary dance profession (professional and emerging choreographers as well as organisations who support those choreographers). The Living Room constitutes a seminal moment in Flexer's choreographic development and career and was made just prior to the culmination of twenty years choreographic work. Her earlier performance research, for example Doing, Done, Undone (toured internationally 2007-2010) through to later pieces such as Weightless (2013) have made a significant impact on the UK contemporary dance profession. It is Flexer's long and sustained career in a sector known for its emphasis on young and emerging choreographers along with her depth of research into choreographic methodologies that has made a difference to this professional dance sector.
Flexer's choreographic style and methodology is the research that underpins this impact. The pathways to impact involve direct engagement by professional and emerging dancers and choreographers, apprentices in Flexer's choreographic process and via workshops delivered by Flexer for young people and emerging dancers, and her commissions for national dance organisations seeking change. Flexer has been developing creative methodologies that question the socio-cultural diversity and hybridity of the dancer (specifically in The Living Room, 2010-11). This provides a unique pathway to impact as the beneficiaries become invested and able to critically reflect on the choreographic process and its application to their own signature style and feminist artistic/choreographic voice.
This case study addresses new methods for identifying talent in young musicians and dancers, and also concerns issues regarding their wellbeing during training, both inside and outside the academy. This research has achieved impact in two areas, firstly by raising awareness among training institutions and performance companies of the importance of scientific assessment and screening, and secondly through impacts on policy-making, educational and otherwise, beyond the submitting HEI. This impact has been achieved through research dissemination that includes, but goes beyond peer-reviewed journal articles. This has involved broadcast media, digital media, symposia, workshops and numerous conference presentations, the popular press and resource papers for teachers.