DANC 107
Dancing in the Streets Fall 2020
Division I
This is not the current course catalog

In the summer of 1964 musicians Marvin Gaye, Williams Stevenson and Ivy Jo Hunter composed one of the enduring anthems of the 1960’s powerful social and political movements, Dancing in the Streets. Motown’s Martha and the Vandellas introduced this song, which continues to be sung by contemporary artists as an expression of celebration and as a call to action. What brought people into the streets in many world communities during the summers of 1964 and 2020? We will examine, discuss and respond to the ways dance, music, visual art and stories offer documentation of lived experiences and develop ways to investigate and document our present experiences. Science and inventions impact how dance, music, visual art and information are made and shared causing culture and experiences to be witnessed and become meaningful beyond the boundaries of their origin. Creating for example, the globally evolving canon of Hip Hop. We will consider: – How artists document major themes in social justice such as anti lynching movement across time through work such as Strange Fruit (as poetry, dance, visual art, music, media) – How the arts documented the 1950’s-80’s in selected communities such as New York City, Los Angeles, Detroit, Kingston, Johannesburg, Atlanta, Rio, Chicago, Havana, Port au Prince, Lagos and Accra – Selected dance forms such as Charleston, Lindy Hop, Hip Hop, Electric Slide, Vogue, Stepping and Rumba as documents in motion – Contemporary choreographers Camille Brown, Rennie Harris , Vincent Mantsoe and Ephrat Asherie use social dance as an anchor for choreography – Music of the Black Lives Matter, Say Her Name and Civil Rights Movements Course meetings will include: – Study of designated social dance – Making solo and group dances – Learning selected songs – Discussion of selected readings, media and works of visual art in class meetings – Showing of individual and group generated performance and or media or text based material