November 23, 2009

November 23, 2009

Dear Colleagues,

The Congress on Research in Dance Board met November 14th in New York.  Beyond welcoming the new Board Members, Helen Thomas, Sally Sommer, Judith Hamera, Henry Spiller, Maura Donohue, and Eric Handman. The board accepted the resignation of Carla Walters as Treasurer. The board noted her far-reaching contributions to CORD during its move from SUNY Brockport to Prime Management and the extensive reorganization she did of CORD’s finances. The board extends a very big THANK YOU to her for her contributions to CORD.

Besides conducting the daily business of CORD, the board when through a visioning exercise to consider CORD’s contribution to the dynamic community of dance scholars. The vision statement is below: 

CORD promotes a globally inclusive respectful dialogue around embodied and discursive approaches to dance research.  Building on the rich legacy of dance scholarship, CORD advances innovative and creative understandings of dance.  Through mentorship, advocacy, and outreach, CORD fosters an international community of current and future dance leaders. 

In the discussion of a vision for CORD certain themes were consistently raised. They include the ongoing desire to acknowledge the diversity of approaches to dance research--history, ethnography, pedagogy, somatics, dance science, cultural studies and more. Other themes include the importance of defining dance in the broadest possible terms, the importance CORD and other dance organizations play in creating the dance leaders that may also become the university leaders of the future, the significance of remembering that the dialogue in dance is international and this implies a diversity of viewpoints, and finally how can we use the internet to increase this international conversation. As some of the considerations of these themes will increasingly take place on the CORD website, I encourage you to visit the website http://www.cordance.org/  to see what new directions the conversation is taking.

As you may be aware from recent call for papers CORD is joining with ASTR for a joint conference titled: “Embodying Power Work Over Time.”

Nadine George-Graves and Anthea Kraut are the co-chairs for the conference. Beyond panels, the conference includes a format in the afternoon of working group and seminars. This organization of a conference are a new way for CORD members to share information. Ashanti Pretlow has sent you the conference call, but I have included it again in this e.mail. Many of you work in a department which combines theatre and dance or within the faculty or school that encompasses both theatre and dance.  This conference is an ideal opportunity to reach out to your theatre colleagues and submit a plenary paper or working group or seminar that considers how these two disciplines approach questions related to performance. 

Wishing you the best of Thanksgiving Holidays,

Barbara Sellers-Young,
President, Congress on Research in Dance