This dance performance, directed by graduate student Njeri Rutherford, explores Black femininity, liberation, joy, and healing. It confronts Black identity through dance and celebrates dance forms of the African Diaspora.
The event is held in partial fulfillment of the University of Michigan Master of Fine Arts in Dance degree requirements. Supported in part by the William Braddan McClellan, Jr. Fund in Dance, EXCEL Enterprise Fund, and the U-M Dance Department.
In the United States, ballet, modern dance, and post-modern/contemporary styles of dance dominate the professional concert dance industry. Concert dance is a form that has permeated through American culture for over a century and is regarded as “high” art within American society or art whose intention is to be consumed by the wealthy and socially elite. While cultural dance forms such as West African dance, Jamaican dancehall, Afro Cuban folkloric, Haitian dance, and others are prevalent in cultures in many African and Caribbean countries, they are scarce in American concert dance where many descendants of those regions exist. “Gestures & Journeying” challenges these dance “norms” by centering the experiences of Black dancers and elevating the social perception of Black dance.