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Thursday, February 06, 2025
How We Move Offers a New Kind of Intensive Designed for Disabled and Multiply Marginalized Artists
Dance Magazine: In recent years, the dance world has grown and changed “in really cool ways,” says India Harville, the founder and executive director of disability justice performing arts organization Embraced Body. “We’re seeing more BIPOC dancers, and fat dancers, and queer dancers, and Disabled dancers.”
The creation of this program makes me so happy! I love to see that the dance and theatre industries are continuing their work to create spaces with marginalized and multiply marginalized artists in mind. While this is only one intensive, I hope to see it quickly build momentum and inspire other similar programs to be created. The thing I found the most interesting was that the intensive is “shaped by and with its six participants.” This concept, giving the participants the agency to choose what the program will look like for them, sound like a fantastic framework for any intensive. I could see logistical problems with a large number of participants, but even then I think there is a solution that could be a hybrid of participant-shaped and prescribed programming. Overall, I can not wait to see the growth of this organization and its impact on the dance and theatre industries.
“In unity there is strength” which is a paraphrase of a quote that was given to me as advice a long time ago. While I do not remember its origin it lives in the background of my brain making the occasional appearance in my thoughts. I think that this quote applies to this article, it is about creating a community, awareness and a voice for marginalized artists. This has been made possible because people have bound themselves together to create this to make opportunities for others and to attempt to level the playing field and disway stereotypes. I think that this program is a really wonderful thing and I hope that there are others like it and that it continues to get the funding it needs to open these usually restricted pathways. I am very excited to see what comes of it and how it can make a difference in someone's life, in someone's teaching and puts things into perspective for those who need to see the world through a different lens.
This is a wonderful sort of movement to see in the dance community. Dance in general has such awful stereotypes for pushing really unhealthy body expectations and even pushing dancers into disordered eating habits, seeing organizations like this that aim to push back about everything so toxic in the dance industry is really exciting to see. The fact that the organization will cover food, housing, and provide a stipend really proves that they are doing everything they can to support communities that normally don’t have a strong presence in the dance community. Similarly because the program size is so small it really will be tailored completely to the benefit and give agency to those six participants in a manner that they would never have in a space not specifically created for them. I really hope to see more programs like How We Move in the future to combat the toxic standards and expectations of the dance industry.
This company is so cool to offer independence and agency to these people. I imagine it must be incredibly frustrating to want to do things but you are not afforded the opportunity or resources to make it happen. I wonder what the thought process behind founding this dance company was. I also wonder where they get their money. I wish the government could sponsor things like this. That should be what the government is for, taking care of people who are unable to contribute to a capitalist society, and therefore get put on the sidelines of life a lot of the time. I also think its cool that instead of prioritizing dancers auditions tapes or resumes, they instead are more interested in who is passionate about dance and wants to build that community. Dance is a great way to build community! Their name, "How We Move," is also super clever, because there are so many different ways in which people can move. They are expanding the definition of what dance is.
I am so glad space is being made for disabled artists! They get overlooked a lot, but I think some more emerging conversations have been happening recently due to the influx in Wicked popularity and discussions about the actresses for Nessa Rose. It's so frustrating that theres this perception that disabled movement artists can't participate fully in performance because of physical limitations, because while the exact performance may be different, they still contribute valuably artistically and in incredibly important ways. I am so glad this agency is giving artists a space to express that!
5 comments:
The creation of this program makes me so happy! I love to see that the dance and theatre industries are continuing their work to create spaces with marginalized and multiply marginalized artists in mind. While this is only one intensive, I hope to see it quickly build momentum and inspire other similar programs to be created. The thing I found the most interesting was that the intensive is “shaped by and with its six participants.” This concept, giving the participants the agency to choose what the program will look like for them, sound like a fantastic framework for any intensive. I could see logistical problems with a large number of participants, but even then I think there is a solution that could be a hybrid of participant-shaped and prescribed programming. Overall, I can not wait to see the growth of this organization and its impact on the dance and theatre industries.
“In unity there is strength” which is a paraphrase of a quote that was given to me as advice a long time ago. While I do not remember its origin it lives in the background of my brain making the occasional appearance in my thoughts. I think that this quote applies to this article, it is about creating a community, awareness and a voice for marginalized artists. This has been made possible because people have bound themselves together to create this to make opportunities for others and to attempt to level the playing field and disway stereotypes. I think that this program is a really wonderful thing and I hope that there are others like it and that it continues to get the funding it needs to open these usually restricted pathways. I am very excited to see what comes of it and how it can make a difference in someone's life, in someone's teaching and puts things into perspective for those who need to see the world through a different lens.
This is a wonderful sort of movement to see in the dance community. Dance in general has such awful stereotypes for pushing really unhealthy body expectations and even pushing dancers into disordered eating habits, seeing organizations like this that aim to push back about everything so toxic in the dance industry is really exciting to see. The fact that the organization will cover food, housing, and provide a stipend really proves that they are doing everything they can to support communities that normally don’t have a strong presence in the dance community. Similarly because the program size is so small it really will be tailored completely to the benefit and give agency to those six participants in a manner that they would never have in a space not specifically created for them. I really hope to see more programs like How We Move in the future to combat the toxic standards and expectations of the dance industry.
This company is so cool to offer independence and agency to these people. I imagine it must be incredibly frustrating to want to do things but you are not afforded the opportunity or resources to make it happen. I wonder what the thought process behind founding this dance company was. I also wonder where they get their money. I wish the government could sponsor things like this. That should be what the government is for, taking care of people who are unable to contribute to a capitalist society, and therefore get put on the sidelines of life a lot of the time. I also think its cool that instead of prioritizing dancers auditions tapes or resumes, they instead are more interested in who is passionate about dance and wants to build that community. Dance is a great way to build community! Their name, "How We Move," is also super clever, because there are so many different ways in which people can move. They are expanding the definition of what dance is.
I am so glad space is being made for disabled artists! They get overlooked a lot, but I think some more emerging conversations have been happening recently due to the influx in Wicked popularity and discussions about the actresses for Nessa Rose. It's so frustrating that theres this perception that disabled movement artists can't participate fully in performance because of physical limitations, because while the exact performance may be different, they still contribute valuably artistically and in incredibly important ways. I am so glad this agency is giving artists a space to express that!
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