Dance and Ethics

Naomi M. Jackson

Description

Dance and Ethics: Moving Towards a More Humane Culture is an introductory study of ethical issues as applied to the history and field of Western theatrical dance. It is the first sustained work of its kind, inspired by the belief that there are serious issues to be illuminated by examining dance in relation to ethics and to the changing values in the dance world itself, especially as faced by young dancers entering the profession.

Since the 1960s and gathering momentum with the #metoo movement, scholars and practitioners, especially from the fields of dance education, somatics and the realms of postmodern dance and ballet, have increasingly believed that attitudes and practices involving psychological, physical and sexual mistreatment of students and dancers must be challenged. Dance and Ethics examines key ethical issues related to the dance field, primarily within the United States, and how those directly impact different aspects of the lives of dance artists over the span of their careers. The issues discussed include the basic ethical choices facing a dance artist in terms of whether to care about ethics or separate art from morality; ethical issues involved in student–teacher and dancer–choreographer relationships; how ethical concerns relate to the creation and reception of choreographic work; ethical aspects of the critical assessment of dance and dancers; and ethical issues related to presenting systems and institutional infrastructures within the dance field.

While there is a clear bias towards greater humanism within the dance field, Naomi Jackson is sensitive to the variety of moral stances available in any given situation. Readers are invited to consider that ethical options exist other than those that are usually promoted, that while sometimes there are no clear right and wrong answers, there are better and worse positions to be explored and defended and that it is important for the dance field and broader culture to consciously address ethical issues in relation to dance in a sustained, thoughtful and creative manner.

The book focuses on theatrical dance forms of ballet, modern/postmodern dance and theatrical jazz, but also extends to commercial dance, dance for the camera/internet and social/vernacular/folk dance when relevant to the main argument. 

Dance and Ethics will appeal primarily to educators and students as well as young professional dancers.  It is designed for undergraduate and graduate students in dance studies, American studies, performance studies and cultural studies. It will be useful for undergraduate and graduate dance courses focused on pedagogy, choreography, criticism, community engagement, politics and aesthetics.

 

Acknowledgements



1. Why Study Ethical Issues in Dance?

2. Dance, Decency and a Life Well-Lived

3. Educating Dancers with Dignity, Respect and Care

4. Ethics and Dance Making

5. Ethics and Critiquing Dance

6. Ethical Issues in the Presenting World of Dance

7. ‘Care’-fully Negotiating Change: Moving Towards a More Humane Dance Culture

References

Index

Sujets

• Professional Responsibility
• Performing Arts
• Droit et juridique
• Reference
• General officer
• Ethics
• Dance
• LAW
• General

Informations

• Publié par: Intellect Books
• Date de parution: 16 août 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781789386158
• Langue: English

Extrait

Dance and Ethics
Dance and Ethics
Moving Towards a More Humane Dance Culture
Naomi M. Jackson
First published in the UK in 2022 by
Intellect, The Mill, Parnall Road, Fishponds, Bristol, BS16 3JG, UK
First published in the USA in 2022 by
Intellect, The University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th Street,
Chicago, IL 60637, USA
Copyright 2022 Intellect Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, orotherwise, without written permission.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Copy editor: MPS Limited
Cover designer: Tanya Montefusco
Cover image: from Human-Elm-Sky series, copyright 2022 by Jody Sperling
Choreographer/Dancer/Artist: Jody Sperling; costume constructed by Mary Jo Mecca; textile painting by Gina Nagy Burns; cinematography by Benjamin Wolf.
Production manager: Laura Christopher
Typesetter: MPS Limited
Print ISBN 978-1-78938-613-4
ePDF ISBN 978-1-78938-614-1
ePUB ISBN 978-1-78938-615-8
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www.intellectbooks.com
This is a peer-reviewed publication.
To Andr and Damon, for making me want to be the best human I can be.
Contents
Acknowledgments
1. Why Study Ethical Issues in Dance?
2. Dance, Decency and a Life Well-Lived
3. Educating Dancers with Dignity, Respect and Care
4. Ethics and Dance Making
5. Ethics and Critiquing Dance
6. Ethical Issues in the Presenting World of Dance
7. Care -fully Negotiating Change: Moving Towards a More Humane Dance Culture
References
Index
Acknowledgements
I would like to first and foremost thank Dena Davida for her unwavering support for this work and her encouragement for seeing it through to its completion, and to Jennifer Quincey who assisted in getting the book to publishable form.
I would also like to acknowledge Jennifer Fisher, Andy Horwitz, Anthony Shay, Ellen Bromberg and Douglas Rosenberg, who all provided valuable feedback at various stages of the long birthing process of the manuscript, and to other colleagues such as Julie Van Camp, Lynn Garafola and Deborah Jowitt, who provided valuable insights along the way. This also includes the many choreographers, critics, educators and presenters who graciously agreed to be interviewed for the book. A special recognition for Robin Lakes, whose critical examinations of traditional pedagogical practices have been so important to the dance field and to my own understanding - my deepest respect for her pioneering work in this area.
I would also like to thank the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, at Arizona State University, and Margaret Urban Walker, for introducing me to the field of ethics in all its wonder and complexity. And last, but not least, to numerous incredible students who assisted with different aspects of the research, including (but not limited to) Audi Miller, Faith Markovetz, Ashley Cole, Shannon Smith, Austen Tackett and Hannah Cooper.
Generous funding for this project was made possible from ASU s Institute for Humanities Research and the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts. Financial support is also provided in part by ASU Jewish Studies. Special thanks to Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Director and the dedicated staff of ASU Jewish Studies for their support of this project.
1 Why Study Ethical Issues in Dance?

When it appears so obvious that dance can either enhance or diminish our humanness, [why] do we seem to use it so frequently for the latter and so infrequently for the former?
(Stinson 1984 : 17)
At its most profound, ethics asks how we should live. Where is the line between right and wrong? What does it mean to be a good human being and create a good society? The question is one of ought versus is . Just because something has been a certain way for hundreds, even thousands, of years is not a justification for its continuance.
In the case of the dance field, this is especially relevant. While dance is an exciting and vast domain with many different facets that offers a means of entertainment, exercise, solace, personal expression, cultural connection, insight and spiritual fulfilment, among other benefits, the field writ large has not always grown from a deep consideration of the ethical dimensions of its prevailing practices and values. This book aims to address this disparity by applying central questions of the philosophical discipline of ethics to the arc of a dance artist s career, where a dance artist is broadly defined as anyone who pursues a future in dance as a performer, creator, educator, writer, presenter, administrator or some combination of such roles. Topics include the ethical implications of becoming a dance artist and ethical issues involved in the student/teacher and dancer/choreographer relationships. I also consider how ethical concerns relate to the creation and reception of actual dances, ethical aspects of the critical assessment of dance and dancers, and ethical issues related to presenting systems and changing paradigms and institutional infrastructures in the dance field.
This book focuses on concert dance forms that students in North America and Europe typically encounter, such as ballet, modern/postmodern dance and theatrical jazz. These are the dance styles that many students study at a young age and then engage in the pursuit of their professional as well as recreational lives in dance. At the same time, the book also references social/vernacular dance, hip hop/urban dance, dance on the internet (through blogs and other social networks), competition dance and commercial dance. The line between non-profit and for-profit dance is difficult to draw; for the purposes of this book, commercial dance refers to for-profit dance activities related to Broadway shows, Hollywood films, music videos, live music concerts and mainstream television commercials and programmes.
These diverse forms of dance will be useful for drawing interesting connections, challenging traditional high/low art distinctions and indicating creative new ways people are finding to support humane values. For instance, the 2012 YouTube sensation Where the Hell is Matt? - in which an ordinary young man does an awkward jig-like dance at different locations around the world - continues a series of videos that first went viral in 2005. It is one of the most life-affirming examples of dance to emerge in the last two decades. Matt Harding, the computer programmer turned dancer behind the video, has stated, Some people will probably accuse me of spreading humanist propaganda [ ] Everybody knows that we can all be small-minded and petty. But we also like to be reminded once and a while about what we can be at our best (Sandoval 2008 : n.pag.).
The goal is to explore issues that appear across the full spectrum of the dance experience: from shaping oneself as an artist to performing, teaching, making, critiquing and presenting work. In so doing, I will consider how power and meaning-making work in the dance world through structures such as institutions (studios, universities, companies) and wide-reaching presenting networks. Some of these topics have garnered more attention, such as the treatment of dancers and, to some extent, ethical issues related to dance criticism. Other topics have little written on them, like the presenting of particular choreographers over others or how major aesthetic and ideological shifts impact institutions. Still, other subjects are well covered in other art forms yet remain underrepresented in the dance literature. 1 These include the nature of the artistic temperament and the concept of genius , how the final dance work connects to artists lives and how morality relates to aesthetics in experiencing individual dance works.
Ethical basics: Providing perspectives and possibilities
As a dance historian educated in the fundamentals of ethical theory and writing a book for the dance field and general public, I am sensitive to the need to make ethical concepts accessible and easy to relate to readers own experiences. This introduction to ethics provides basic categories and processes that can be helpful in working through moral issues - rather than speaking in generalities or ignoring or dismissing such issues as irrelevant. In Western philosophy, the specific area of normative ethics is the study of what is good and bad, right and wrong. Or, put another way, normative ethics attempts to derive standards of right and wrong. Normative ethics divides different ethical theories into three main categories: these are known as virtue, deontological and consequentialist theories. 2 Each is revealing when looking at dance. The first, virtue ethics, focuses more on the character of a person; the second, deontological ethics, concentrates on rules, laws and rights; the third, consequentialist ethics, centres on results or consequences of behaviour. By considering the central features of these categories, one quickly comes to recognize both serious limitations in the dance world and ways to improve conditions.
This book illuminates the strong tendency in Western theatrical dance - as practiced initially in Europe and Russia and then the United States, especially since the dawn of the twentieth century - to present honourable-sounding statements as rationalizations (often poorly conceived) for how the field actually functions. Whether intentionally or not, moral-sounding (versus morally sound) perspectives have come to mask a broad spectrum of questionable behaviours. These include everything from an irate choreographer dragging a dancer by the hair across the floor in rehearsal to a performer verbally attacking an audience member, a critic enlisting favours from the choreographer