Performativity of Gender by Early Modern Dancers on and off Stage. The Case of Elmerice Parts and Gerd Neggo / Soo performatiivsus esimeste moderntantsijate loomingus ja elus. Elmerice Partsi ja Gerd Neggo juhtumiuuring

Elmerice Parts and Gerd Neggo were among the first female modern choreographers in Estonia. The present article takes a close look at how they did gender in their early modern dance productions and how they performed gender in their daily lives in the 1920s. Käesolevas artiklis otsin vastust küsimusele, kuidas kujutasid Eesti varased moderntantsijad ja koreograafid oma tantsulavastustes naisi. Lisaks sellele huvitab mind, missugused naised nad ise olid. Kas nende lavategelased ja nende endi elukäigud olid „traditsioonilised“ või iseloomustas neid moodsus? Moderntantsule pandi Lääne-Euroopas ja Põhja-Ameerikas alus 20. sajandi alguses. Selle eestvedajateks olid peamiselt naised, kellele uus tantsustiil andis ennenägematu võimaluse luua ise oma tantsud. Varased moderntantsijad ei kasutanud balletitehnikat ning hülgasid baleriinile kohustuslikud kostüümielemendid. Uurimuse fookus lasub kahel tantsijal ja koreograafil, Elmerice Partsil (1878–1974) ja Gerd Neggol (1891–1974). Vaatluse all on nende 1920. aastate soolotantsud ning Partsi ja Herman Oginsky (ka Kolt-Oginsky ja Heiko Kolt, 1902–1977) duod. Judith Butler on seisukohal, et sool puudub stabiilne identiteet, sest sugu „tehakse“. Väljaspool seda performatiivsust sugu ei eksisteeri. Terminite naine ja mees või naiselik ja mehelik sisu on ajas muutuv, sõltudes praktikatest, mille taasesitamist peetakse kas „naiselikuks“ või „mehelikuks“ ehk sellest, kuidas sugu „tehakse“. Naiseks ei sünnita, vaid naiseks saadakse, on Judith Butler veendunud sarnaselt Simone de Beauvoir’iga. Kuidas sugu „tehakse“, on ajas muutuv: 1920. aastatel olid ettekirjutused „naistele“ ja „meestele“ teistsugused kui praegu. Missugused naisekujud tõid Eesti esimesed naiskoreograafid lavale? Kas nende looming aitas kinnistada ideed naise „traditsioonilistest“ rollidest või panustas selle kummutamisse? Koreograafide arusaamad jõuavad tantsuks transformeerununa suhteliselt suure vaatajaskonnani, mistõttu on oluline, kuidas nad üht või teist sugupoolt laval kujutavad. Esitades laval alternatiivseid olemise viise, tutvustab koreograaf oma publikule teistsugust või uut soo „tegemise“ viisi. Sellega panustab ta ühiskondliku normi muutmisesse, mida me soolistatud subjektidena oleme paratamatult sunnitud tsiteerima. Uurimuse peamiseks allikaks on Eesti trükimeedias ilmunud artiklid: kriitikute arvustused ning teated tantsuetenduste ja koreograafide tegemiste kohta (nt esinemine välismaal). Artiklite leidmiseks kasutasin Rahvusraamatukogu digitaalarhiivi DIGAR, kokku õnnestus mul leida 88 artiklit ja teadaannet. Nimetatud allikad ei võimaldanud teada saada, kuidas tantsijannad end laval väljendasid, vaid kuidas (peamiselt meessoost) kriitikud nende loomingut arvustasid. Kuna koreograafide endi tantsualaseid märkmeid säilinud ei ole, pakuvad nimetatud allikad peaaegu ainsat võimalust Eesti varase moderntantsu kohta midagi järeldada. Partsi ja Neggo loodud naisekujude iseloomustamiseks analüüsisin fraase, millega kriitikud kirjeldasid ja iseloomustasid nende tantsuloomingut ja liigutusi. Koreograafide elukäikudele hinnangu andmiseks koostasin nende biograafiad ja võrdlesin neid 1920. aastatel valitsenud ideega „traditsioonilisest naisest“. Koreograafide biograafiad panin kokku trükimeediast pärit info põhjal, idee „traditsioonilisest naisest“ konstrueerisin teemakohaste uurimuste põhjal. Parts ja Neggo kuulusid kahtlemata moodsate ja iseseisvate naiste hulka. Nad harisid end välismaal ning töötasid seejärel elukutseliste tantsijate, koreograafide ja pedagoogidena. Mõlemad olid abielus, bioloogilisi lapsi ei olnud kummalgi. Nad tõestasid, et naisel on võimalik realiseerida end väljaspool kodu. 1920. aastatel ei peetud kodust väljaspool tegutsevat naist „traditsiooniliseks“, valitses arvamus, et naise koht on kodus, kus tema peamiseks vastutusalaks on lapsed ja majapidamine. „Traditsioonilist“ naist peeti õrnaks, nõrgaks, lapsikuks, leebeks, tundlikuks, passiivseks ja ebakindlaks (Poska-Grünthal 1936; Kivimaa 2005, 34; Hinrikus 2011, 40). Missuguse naise tõid Parts ja Neggo oma tantsulavastustes publiku ette? Partsi looming muutus tema karjääri jooksul märkimisväärselt. 1920. aastate alguses kirjeldasid kriitikud teda kui hõljuvat, graatsilist ja rõõmsat tantsijat, veidi hiljem iseloomustati tema tantsuloomingut kui jõulist, haaravat ja kütkestavat (siin ja allpool olen artiklitest pärit terminid kirjutanud kaldkirjas). Veelgi enam muutus Partsi esteetika 1926. aastal, kui tema tantsupartneriks sai Herman Oginsky. Kriitikud kasutasid nende etteasteid arvustades sageli termineid erootiline ja akrobaatiline. Neggost sai Rudolf von Labani õpilasena Eestis „uue tantsu“ (Saksamaal nimetati seda stiili terminiga Ausdruckstanz) esindaja. Erinevalt plastilistest tantsijatest, keda kriitikute sõnul iseloomustas impressionistlik magusus, kirjeldati Neggo tantsuliigutusi kui täpseid, julgeid, ekspressiivseid, energeetilisi, unikaalseid, jõulisi ja kergeid. Kuna koreograaf eitas literatuuri, assotsiatsioone ja sisu, mõjus tema looming mitmete arvustajate sõnul abstraktsena. Neile allikatele tuginedes võib väita, et 1920. aastate jooksul eemaldus koreograafide loodud naisekuju üha tugevamini „traditsioonilisest“. Kui Partsi 1920. aastate alguse graatsiline, hõljuv ja rõõmus lavakuju ei erinenud kuigivõrd „traditsioonilisest naisest“, siis jõulisuse lisandudes mõned aastad hiljem eemaldub ta sellest mõnevõrra. Väljakutse valitsevale soonormile esitas Neggo oma abstraktse tantsuloominguga, mida anonüümse kriitiku sõnul ei inspireerinud emotsioon, vaid mõistus. „Traditsiooniline naine“ oli teatavasti tundlik ja intellektuaalselt saamatu. Partsi ja Oginsky erootilised tantsud kujutasid endast midagi radikaalselt uut, presenteerides naist kirgliku, sensuaalse ja iharana. Tuues lavale „ebatraditsioonilisi“ naisekujusid, näitasid koreograafid, et sugu saab „teha“ mitmel moel. Nad demonstreerisid, et naine võib olla graatsiline, jõuline, mõistuslik, erootiline. Sellega esitasid Parts ja Neggo väljakutse valitsevale soonormile ja aitasid muuta arusaamist sellest, mida pidada „naiselikuks“ või „mehelikuks“.

Nietzsche's Looming Presence in the 1930s Dance Polemics of John Martin and Lincoln Kirstein

Some of the most perplexingly antagonistic comments about the differences between modern dance and ballet can be found strewn throughout the works of two pioneering twentieth-century American dance writers: John Martin (1893–1985) – The New York Times's first permanent dance critic, champion of modern dancers and early supporter of Martha Graham ( Kisselgoff et al. 1988 : 44) – and Lincoln Kirstein (1907–1996), the prodigious author, impresario, and balletomane, who cofounded with George Balanchine the New York City Ballet. Looming behind a significant number of Martin's and Kirstein's appraisals and condemnations of modern dance and ballet are Friedrich Nietzsche's aesthetics, particularly his Apollonian-Dionysian conceptualisations. This essay investigates the reception of Nietzsche in the context of the 1930s writing of these two dance critics, particularly in respect to their treatment of gender. Foundational for this essay's development are the analyses of Nietzsche's reception by earlier twentieth-century dance figures in the works of Susan Jones (2013 , 2010 ), Susan Manning (2006) and Kimerer LaMothe (2006) .

“Feeling” in Modern Dance Print Media: Loïe Fuller, Isadora Duncan, Maud Allan

Between 1890 and 1920, modern dancers such as Isadora Duncan, Loïe Fuller, and Maud Allan presented a new performative aesthetic in dance. Breaking from the narrative storytelling that dominated nineteenth-century vaudeville and ballet, these dancers advanced non-narrative movement, thereby encouraging a new aesthetic engagement from the audience, namely, one that was rooted in notions of corporeal sensation rather than narrative telos or (melo)dramatic pathos. These new responses, this dissertation argues, are reflected in the new tactics for writing the dancing body, which at once render problematic the putative objectivity of journalistic criticism and reveal the limits of traditional dance criticism’s focus on intricate technique and plot line. This dissertation pursues its argument by studying over 300 print reviews of dances performed by Fuller, Duncan, and Allan between 1890 and 1920 culled from North-American archives and representing a spectrum of print media—from mainstream national media, such as The New York Times, to regional newspapers, to more specialized theatre magazines—to reveal compelling insight into hermeneutic entanglements of language and movement. Informed by the work of recent performance studies (e.g. Phelan; Schneider; Taylor), this dissertation approaches this body of dance reviews from an inverse perspective from that represented by traditional dance history scholarship. That is, instead of reading reviews as documentation in order to understand these dances, the study explores how reviewers perform criticism, thus framing our understanding of modern dance in specific ways. This dissertation engages with the correlation between media and performance as either documentary or performative, arguing that writing performance offers promises for both types of engagement with the live event. Collectively, these reviews reveal that dance criticism involved a metacritical reflection on the significance of the critical writing act itself, and advanced a style of synesthetic metaphor to describe novel kinesthetic experiences of spectatorship. Ultimately, the new tactics to modern dance criticism not only revealed a crisis in articulation but prompted a performative style of writing dance criticism that went in tandem with the development of the dance review genre itself, whose placement in popular print media was mounting to become a regular feature by the 1930s.

“Feeling” in Modern Dance Print Media: Loïe Fuller, Isadora Duncan, Maud Allan

Between 1890 and 1920, modern dancers such as Isadora Duncan, Loïe Fuller, and Maud Allan presented a new performative aesthetic in dance. Breaking from the narrative storytelling that dominated nineteenth-century vaudeville and ballet, these dancers advanced non-narrative movement, thereby encouraging a new aesthetic engagement from the audience, namely, one that was rooted in notions of corporeal sensation rather than narrative telos or (melo)dramatic pathos. These new responses, this dissertation argues, are reflected in the new tactics for writing the dancing body, which at once render problematic the putative objectivity of journalistic criticism and reveal the limits of traditional dance criticism’s focus on intricate technique and plot line. This dissertation pursues its argument by studying over 300 print reviews of dances performed by Fuller, Duncan, and Allan between 1890 and 1920 culled from North-American archives and representing a spectrum of print media—from mainstream national media, such as The New York Times, to regional newspapers, to more specialized theatre magazines—to reveal compelling insight into hermeneutic entanglements of language and movement. Informed by the work of recent performance studies (e.g. Phelan; Schneider; Taylor), this dissertation approaches this body of dance reviews from an inverse perspective from that represented by traditional dance history scholarship. That is, instead of reading reviews as documentation in order to understand these dances, the study explores how reviewers perform criticism, thus framing our understanding of modern dance in specific ways. This dissertation engages with the correlation between media and performance as either documentary or performative, arguing that writing performance offers promises for both types of engagement with the live event. Collectively, these reviews reveal that dance criticism involved a metacritical reflection on the significance of the critical writing act itself, and advanced a style of synesthetic metaphor to describe novel kinesthetic experiences of spectatorship. Ultimately, the new tactics to modern dance criticism not only revealed a crisis in articulation but prompted a performative style of writing dance criticism that went in tandem with the development of the dance review genre itself, whose placement in popular print media was mounting to become a regular feature by the 1930s.

Injury Characteristics in Pre-Professional Modern Dancers: Prospective Study of Differences Due to Sex, Training Year, and External Causal Mechanisms

As efforts to improve surveillance and decrease injury rates in pre-professional dancer’s progress, it is important to identify injury patterns and contexts. The aim of this study was to examine sex, training-based injury characteristics, and external causal mechanisms of injury among pre-professional modern dancers. Using a prospective cohort study design, 180 dancers (females = 140, males = 40, age 18.15 ± 0.68 years) were screened at freshman enrollment and followed for the 4 years of their college training. Injury, defined as medical attention injury (MAI) or time-loss injury (TLI), was classified by diagnosis, tissue category, body region, and incident event (action and dance environment). Negative binomial log-linear analyses evaluated injury rates by sex and training year. Multinomial regression compared injury characteristics and incident events, p < 0.05. Sex characteristics differed in height, mass, years of dance training, and previous injury (p ≤ 0.037). Total, traumatic, and overuse injuries per 1,000 hours decreased across training years for both injury definitions, p < 0.001, with no sex differences. In year 1, dancers were more likely to sustain muscle, tendon, and bone injuries (p ≤ 0.008) and to injure leg, ankle, foot, and hip, thigh, and knee regions (p ≤ 0.001). Jumping and running was the most commonly cited action mechanism in MAI and TLI in both sexes. Females were more likely to report alignment in MAI and TLI and jumping and running in TLI. Males were 1.4 times more likely to sustain muscle or tendon MAI (p = 0.006), while reporting partnering in MAI. Ballet class and rehearsals accounted for the majority of attributed dance environment mechanisms in MAI and TLI. Injury rates in pre-professional modern dancers decreased with training. Understanding sex, training, and external causal mechanisms will allow teachers to tailor programs to reduce injuries during training.

Dancing beyond the Cactus Curtain

As the dance artists that the Mexican government created through its schools and companies matured, they carried its dances across international borders. The tensions between nationalist esthetics and more formal approaches to creating art were increasingly visible in Mexican painting, yet its fractious dancers proved established a unified front when it came to performing outside of Mexico. The resulting encounters with the official performing arts policies of the Soviet Union and China shifted their perspectives on issues of esthetics and technique. Their government’s concurrent discovery that the folk dances its modern dancers performed overseas provided positive press changed its perspective as well. Amalia Hernández and her independent Ballet Folklórico would garner the direct support of Mexico’s president and her success in providing potent stagings of national identity for audiences inside and outside her homeland marked the moment when Mexico’s dancers became the equals of its celebrated painters.

The Golden Age of Mexican Modern Dance

To help him shape the dance component of the new Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (INBA), Carlos Chávez invited the leading exponents of Mexico’s opposing camps of modern dancers to assist him, along with an array of painters, composers, and writers. As part of INBA’s charge to create a universal culture attractive to international audiences, and at a time the U.S. was promoting modern dance as part of its WWII propaganda efforts in the Americas, Chávez’s team created a modern-dance focused Academy of Mexican Dance. Chávez would soon appoint polymath artist Miguel Covarrubias to lead INBA’s dance department, ushering in a “golden age” for Mexican modern dance. INBA underwrote lavish productions by internationally recognized choreographer José Limón, it also extended similar support to its novice choreographers who mounted productions with scores by its leading composers and scenic designs by its most famous artists.

Lower Extremity Biomechanical Differences Between Female Dancers and Soccer Players

Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury in female athletes is common. Team sport athletes experience more ACL injuries than ballet and modern dancers. Examining biomechanical differences between these two groups may help to explain the discrepancy in ACL injury rates. The purpose of this study was to examine lower extremity kinematic differences between collegiate dancers and National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I soccer athletes during a rebound jump-landing task. Peak hip, knee, and ankle kinematics were collected during a jump-landing task. Results showed more knee flexion and less ankle eversion in the dancers compared to the soccer athletes. Differences in training and strategies used during landing may explain the kinematic differences between groups.

Injury Occurrence in Modern and Hip-Hop Dancers: A Systematic Literature Review

IntroductionDance-related injuries have become a field of great interest to researchers, with the most commonly reported injuries being those sustained by ballet dancers. However, there is a lack of research into injuries sustained by those who perform modern and hip-hop dance.MethodsA systematic literature review using the MEDLINE research database was performed and a search carried out for full-text studies that investigate injuries in modern and hip-hop dance.ResultsWhile a total of 74 hits were obtained from various searches, only nine studies were included in the systematic literature review. Six of them examined modern dancers, two examined break dancers and one examined hip-hop dancers. The results show that hip-hop dancers (and especially break dancers) sustain more injuries in comparison to modern dancers. The most common injuries are in the lower extremities, with studies revealing that overuse injuries occur in up to 71% of cases.ConclusionsThe injury incidence rate in hip-hop dance seems to be higher compared to modern dance, chiefly because of the more demanding biomechanics involved and the dance techniques employed. Prevention management can have a positive effect on the number of injuries.

Hamstring extensibility differences among elite adolescent and young dancers of different dance styles and non-dancers

Background Hamstrings have been analyzed extensively due to their tendency to shorten and their effect in the lumbo-pelvic dynamics and the sagittal position of the spine in trunk flexion with extended knees positions. It has been demonstrated that practicing a certain sport results in long-term changes in hamstring extensibility. Despite this, adequate extensibility of the hamstring musculature is essential for the dancer’s performance. Several studies have found differences in the extensibility of the hamstrings depending on the dance style, but none have compared ballet, Spanish dance and modern dance. The purpose of the present research was to analyze the differences in hamstring extensibility among professional dance students based on dance style practiced and non-dancers. Methods The sample was comprised of 210 students from the Professional Dance Conservatory (70 for ballet, 70 for Spanish dance and 70 for modern dance) and 70 non-dancers. For the assessment of hamstring extensibility, the angle in the passive and active straight leg raise (PSLR and ASLR, respectively) test, and the scores of the pelvic tilt in sit-and-reach (SR) test and the toe-touch (TT) test were randomly conducted. Results The results showed significant differences for all the tests according to group (p < 0.001). In the PSLR and ASLR test, for both legs, and in the pelvic tilt in the SR test, the ballet dancers showed greater ranges of hamstring extensibility than the modern dancers and Spanish dancers (p ≤ 0.001). In the distance in the SR test and in the pelvic tilt in the TT test, the ballet dancers obtained higher values than the Spanish dancers (p = 0.004 and p = 0.003, respectively). The modern dancers showed higher ranges of hip flexion than the Spanish dancers in the ASLR test for both legs and in the pelvic tilt in the SR test (p from 0.007 to <0.001). Dancers showed significantly higher hamstring extensibility than non-dancers in all the tests (p < 0.001). Conclusions The systematic practice of dance, regardless of the style, seems to lead to high ranges of hamstring extensibility. Ballet dancers have the greatest hamstring extensibility.