Dance History + Technology

This course explores the intersections of dance and technological innovation within 20th and 21st-century Western concert dance. It traces dance makers, choreographic movements, and artworks through their use and misuse of technologies such as motion capture, interactive media, recording and archiving, and the production of embodied data. These artistic and technological practices will be examined through interdisciplinary perspectives, including critical race theory, gender and sexuality studies, and media theory.

This course is necessarily selective in its focus on global modern and postmodern dance practices. It grapples with the fragmented nature of ephemeral data and historical records, considering how different bodies are impacted by these gaps. History is haunted by absences as much as inclusions – a theme central central to discussions + classroom inquiries.